Page 34 of Prince of Control (Bratva Heirs #1)

Chapter Twenty-Four

Lara

I barely see the direction we’re driving because tears blur my eyes. I can’t stop the sense that I’m driving away from my very existence.

But Baron tricked me. He was in on some game with my dad, and I can’t forgive him for that.

Brash is talking, but I’m not listening. I just keep replaying that look on Baron’s face. The guilty knowledge. The regret.

I replay the conversation with my dad in my apartment. Brash’s words, “you had interest from another party.”

There are still parts of this story that don’t add up. Like–why my marriage was arranged to Baron in the first place. What was so important to tie our families together when his dad and mine have worked together for years?

And if it was so important, why didn’t he tell me about it from the time I was young? Why wait until I had interest from another party?

Well, I can demand answers to those questions when I get back to Paris. I was giving my dad the silent treatment, but now I wish I’d pushed him more for answers.

Then again, he wasn’t very forthright about any of it.

Was that because he was tricking me? Removing me from the supposed temptation of Brash Rostov? He never stopped me from dating men in the past.

He could’ve just told me if he didn’t approve of Brash.

None of this makes sense.

I jerk back to the present when Brash pulls down the road to the airstrip I flew into just over a week ago.

“What are we doing here?” I don’t know where I thought he was taking me, but this comes as a surprise.

“I need to get you away from the thugs who are trying to control you,” Brash says, parking and getting out.

I don’t get out. I may have wanted to get away from Baron, but Brash is being equally presumptuous with me and my life right now.

He opens my door and reaches out a hand. “Come. You want to get back to your life, no? I can protect you.”

It feels wrong.

I wipe my eyes. “I don’t have my things. I need to pack.”

Am I really leaving Whisper? I’m pissed at Baron, but…my time with him was the best–and worst–in my life. I was furious and scared when I came here, but there was Baron. I guess I fell in love. I made friends. I became a part of something–willingly. I don’t hate my classes, either.

Paris feels far away. Like the woman who lived that life is already gone. Changed into someone else. The internship and career possibilities for me there seem far less exciting than what goes on at Thornecroft.

I remember the thrill of breaking into Melinda’s attacker’s apartment yesterday. Watching my badass husband in motion.

But no. He’s not a bad ass. He’s a controlling bastard who basically kidnapped me and then seduced me. He manipulated me just like my dad. I can’t allow men to treat me like that.

“I will buy you new things, milaya .”

I hesitate. That sounds like a nice offer, especially because I don’t want to go back to Baranov House and pack my things. But something feels wrong.

Brash said he would return me to my life in Paris, but now he’s going to buy me all new things? Is that a friendly offer because he’s rich or is there something proprietary to it– like…I’m going to be with him?

Because I don’t want to be with him.

Now that I’ve felt what it’s like to have my heart set on fire, it’s clear I feel absolutely nothing for this man.

“I don’t even have my passport.”

“You won’t need it. Come, the jet is on the runway.”

The jet is on the runway. Like…he had it waiting there for us? He knew he was going to whisk me away? Why don’t I need my passport? Because he’s paid someone off? This is getting weird.

My brain is slow to compute everything, probably because my heart is still hemorrhaging over Baron’s betrayal.

But okay. Yes. Getting away from Whisper is the best thing. Once I’m back in Paris, I can take time to grieve the heartbreak and get some clarity. Maybe I’ll give Baron a chance to explain.

I definitely will call my dad and have it out with him.

I allow Brash to escort me to the jet, and we buckle our seatbelts.

As the plane races down the runway, Brash pulls out his phone and makes a call.

“It’s done.” He glances over at me. “I have the Turgenev girl. Prepare the divorce papers. I want them ready to sign as soon as we touch down.”

Everything in me stops. My heart forgets to beat. My breath goes completely still. Grief clears out of my system, replaced by adrenaline.

I unbuckle my seatbelt and surge to my feet, but it’s too late. The plane is taking off.

“Ah ah.” Brash snatches my wrist and yanks me down on his lap. He bites down on the side of my neck like he thinks he’s a vampire.

“ Ou !” I yelp. I don’t know if he broke the skin, but there will definitely be a bruise.

“You’re not going anywhere.” His grip on my wrist hurts. There’s a maniacal glee in his voice that chills me. “Your father shouldn’t have refused our initial offer.”

My brain stutters. What offer? What is he talking about? I struggle in his hold.

“As my wife, you’ll soon learn I’m quick to punish and slow to forgive.” He throws me off his lap. I careen into the aisle, banging my hip on my chair before I catch it. “Now sit down and buckle up, or you’ll earn your first punishment right here on the plane.”

Baron

I drift in and out of consciousness. I hear my friends’ voices as they struggle to pick me up and carry me inside.

She’s gone.

I lost Lara.

I force my eyes open and find myself sprawled on the sofa. All of my friends gather around me. Some of their faces pinch with worry. Some scored with rage.

“Anya,” I croak, trying to find her in the group.

“Right here.” She lifts a hand, and I manage to focus on her.

“Where is she?” I croak.

Anya looks startled. For once, she didn’t anticipate my next demand. “Lara?”

“Yes, Lara!” I struggle to my feet and throw my arms out when my vision blackens.

Phoenix shoves his slender shoulder under my arm to prop me up. “You’re in no condition to rush after her.”

“Where is she?” The sound of my own voice nearly splits my head in half. I wipe some blood from my mouth. One of my molars feels loose.

Anya unlocks and looks at the cracked screen of my phone. It must’ve fallen out of my pocket when Brash’s army knocked me down. “Oh shit,” she mutters.

“What?” I thunder.

“She’s at the airstrip.”

Whisper doesn’t have a commercial airport, just the private airstrip used by the wealthy to ferry their private jets in and out of town.

“Take me there.” I limp toward the door.

“Baron, in case you didn’t notice, they had AK-47s,” Zoe says. “We don’t have those kinds of weapons. And even if we did, you can’t start a war like that without calling your dad in first.”

“She’s right,” Leo says quietly. “I’m all for going after that fucker, but we need to think this through.”

I sag against the wall, the movement of my breath paining my cracked ribs. My eyes close. Think, Ben. Think.

They’re right–we can’t start a war. Not without my dad’s backing.

Blyat’!

I should have thought of something to say to Lara to keep her from running.

Why didn’t I tell her sooner–at dinner? Or on the drive home?

The fact that I’d planned to tell her everything tonight only makes losing her a million times worse.

I could’ve prevented that terrible scene out there if I’d just had the nerve to come clean an hour earlier. Or days. Weeks. From the beginning.

Now she’s in the clutches of Abrasha Rostov, and I really don’t think he’ll let her slip through his fingers a second time.

“Can you find out where they’re going?” My lower lip swells more with each moment that passes.

“I can’t just hack the FAA at the drop of a hat,” Anya complains, her brow furrowed.

Zoe pulls out her phone. “Maybe I can get someone to tell me.” She looks up the airstrip and hits the call button on speaker phone.

“Yes, this is Zoya Novikova,” she says in a thick Russian accent that sounds exactly like Leo’s mom, Sasha, when she’s tipsy. “My friend Abrasha Rostov has plane there?”

The guy on the other end says, “Okay.”

“ Da. His girlfriend left ring at my house, and I’m checking to see if she’s still there? Do I have time to bring it?”

“Ah…I don’t know anything about that,” the guy says.

Zoe rolls her eyes. “Has Rostov jet taken off yet?”

“Rostov? Uh…yeah, it’s on the runway now.”

“Ahhh, I’m too late. I’ll have to mail it to him. Do you know, are they headed back to Paris? Or was it Moscow?”

“The Rostov jet? No, they’re headed to Istanbul.”

A chill settles over me.

He’s not bringing her back to Paris. He’s taking her to Turkey. The Rostovs probably have a palace there. He’s bringing her somewhere he can lock her up tight and keep me away.

“Oh, Istanbul, that’s right. Oh well. I will get address. Spasibo. ” Zoe ends the call.

“Good job, Zoe,” I say.

The front door swings open, and Lili rushes in. “Oh my God, Baron. What happened? Leo texted me to come over.”

I make a mental note to punch Leo later when it won’t hurt so badly to move. As I give her the shortest recap possible, Leo makes a video call on his phone, and Phoenix brings an icepack for my face.

Leo’s dad, Maxim, appears on Leo’s screen. Sasha, his mom, leans into the screen with a big smile.

“Leonid! How are you?”

“Uh, okay, Mom, but can I talk to Papa in private for a minute?”

“If you promise to call me tomorrow.”

“Promise.”

“Okay, love you.” Sasha blows kisses as Maxim walks away from her.

“Hey, Papa.” He angles his phone to show my beat-up face for a second then turns it back to him. “Can we conference with you and Uncle Ravil?”

Maxim swears, and his camera jostles as he walks out the door of his penthouse and over to my parents’. “Was it Rostov?”

“Yeah.” Leo props his phone up in the window sill, and the bratva heirs gather around. Phoenix and Anders hang back, out of the picture.

“Okay, give me a minute, so you only have to update us once.” A moment later, he video calls us from my father’s desk. Maxim, Dima, and my dad look back at us.

By now, I’ve had time to think it through. To run scenarios in my head. I have a half-baked idea for rescuing Lara.

“Are you all right, Ben?” my dad asks.

Am I? Not even fucking close. And it’s not just because I had the shit beat out of me. It’s because Lara’s gone. I had one job–to protect her–and I failed at it.

Worse than that–I hurt her. All I wanted to do was win her love and trust.

I thought I was there, but my misstep demolished everything I’d worked so hard to build.

“Lara’s gone,” I say. Admitting my failure has a bitter taste.

“Brash had a spy at Thornecroft who was involved in an assault on Gabe Tracy’s daughter.

It was meant to bring me and Baranov House down.

They drugged her and brought her to a hospital where the spy must have had contact with her.

I’m guessing while she was drugged, she told him something I shared with her in confidence about my arranged marriage, which was that it was made urgent because Lara had interest from another party . ”

My friends all stare at me in surprise. They weren’t privy to the conversation I had on the lawn–they just witnessed it from the windows.

“Brash used those exact words–the ones I used with Melinda–when he showed up tonight. Oh, and in case you didn’t know–Adrian didn’t trust Lara with the truth, so she showed up here believing our marriage was actually arranged from birth, and I was the asshole.

A heads’ up on that would’ve been nice. So anyway, Lara was understandably upset about being manipulated, and she left with him. ”

“Also, they showed up with AK-47’s, so Baron couldn’t go after her,” Anya interjects.

I continue, “He’s got her on a flight to Turkey right now. I’m going to fly in solo, go in, and take her back. Could you arrange a plane for me?”

My father stares back at me impassively. We share the trait of keeping our expressions inscrutable while processing complicated situations. “Do you think she’ll go with you?”

The pain of hurting her floods to the surface, raw and fresh. Will I find the words to make her forgive me?

No, wait. That’s irrelevant. Her choice to love me or not is less important than her safety.

Like her father, I would choose her safety from Rostov over her forgiveness any day.

“I’ll be persuasive,” I say.

Zoe and Lily give me dubious looks. They must hear the resolution in my tone. The certainty that I’ll take Lara back whether she wants rescuing or not.

“The Rostovs have a property in Istanbul. There'll be ten times as many guards there as came to pick her up. How will you get around them?” Maxim asks.

“I’ll go in quietly. Like a secret ops mission. That way we can avoid a war.”

My father’s face still shows nothing. He considers me for what feels like an eternity. “Okay,” he says at last. “She’s your wife. You should be the one to go in.”

Relief rushes through me. I was afraid he would try to protect me and hold back his assistance to dissuade me from going. “You will wait until Adrian and his team are in place as backup or for extraction in case things go wrong.”

I nod. That makes sense. They can get there from Moscow faster than I can. “Don’t let them go in without me.”

My dad hesitates then nods. “I will give that order. But I can’t guarantee Adrian will follow it. A father will do anything for his child, including disobeying his pakhan .”

Right. This is why families are normally forbidden in the bratva. But my mother’s pregnancy with me changed everything for the Chicago Bratva and later for the Moscow arm that Adrian runs now, too.

“But your plan may avoid a war. If it doesn’t…” –my dad spreads his hands– “we go to war. The Rostov brat can't abduct my daughter-in-law and lay hands on my son without me fighting back.”

I swallow, grateful for his full backing.

“Dima will work on getting through their security and providing you with whatever you need.”

“I can help,” Anya says.

Her dad nods at her. “We’ll work as a team.”

“I’m going with Baron,” Leo says.

“No,” I cut in. “I need you to stay here and protect the house. Especially after what happened with the Titans.”

My dad raises an eyebrow, but when we don’t explain, he lets it go.

Leo frowns but doesn’t argue more.

“I’ll see how fast I can get a plane to you,” my dad says. “Maxim will prepare a list of things for Adrian to bring for you–weapons and kevlar–that kind of thing. We’ll be in touch. Meanwhile, rest and eat. You’ll need your strength.”

I nod my agreement, but I don’t need food or rest. Rage gives me all the strength I need.

My wife is in the clutches of a psychopath. I could burn down the entire world right now to get her back.