Page 64 of Protected By the Sinner

It all happened in a split second.

A parked car suddenly sped up toward him.

I saw the gun in the window and acted purely on instinct to protect an older man.

It was stupid to put myself in the line of fire, of course, but now I think it was already written somewhere that this was how it would go.

I got grazed on the shoulder because my unexpected move threw the shooter off.

The real target, Ruslan Vassiliev—who I later learned was thePakhan[8] of the Russian mafia—escaped unharmed, and from that day on, he became my mentor.

He didn’t purge the darkness from me. He just redirected it—toward the right people.

I was informally adopted as one of his grandsons, with all the privileges and protection they get, though I’ve never really connected with his blood family.

Together, we formed a hidden force, bound by an unbreakable tie. It is only at his request that I haven’t yet completed my revenge against Angelo.

The Russian mafia and the Sicilian mafia—really, the Italian mafia as a whole, but especially the Sicilian branch—are old rivals. Ruslan has an interest in taking them down. If we coordinate our actions, we can strike together.

“I know what happened between her and the Italians,” he says, as if reading my thoughts.

That doesn’t surprise me. There’s no secret he doesn’t know.

“I only found out today. How long have you known?”

“Not long. What are you going to do about her?”

“I’m not sure yet. I need time to think. Now there’s the baby to consider.”

He gets up, walks to the desk, picks up an envelope, and hands it to me. “Maybe this will help you decide. Everything in life has two sides, Beau. Seeing only black and white, ignoring the shades in between, can lead us to make irreversible mistakes.”

Chapter 28

I don’t know why he handed that to me. I don’t want to see Amber as someone with a past—I want to see her for what she really is: the woman who entered my world under orders from the enemy.

Still, I can’t stop myself from pulling the contents out of the folder.

“What is this, Ruslan?” I ask before even looking at what I’m holding.

“Her story. Or rather, her life, up until the moment she broke free.”

Contrary to what I expected, there are no photographs, just newspaper clippings. And at the back, a report.

I start reading the headlines, most of them dated eight years ago.

The first one makes my stomach turn to stone.

Suspected pedophilia in newly uncovered fundamentalist cult in rural Texas.

A newly discovered fundamentalist cult in rural Texas is being investigated by local authorities and the FBI on suspicion of abuse of underage girls.

The article doesn’t go into detail. It’s clearly designed to grab attention, not actually inform.

The others are more or less the same.

I toss everything onto the coffee table, including the report. “Tell me about this.”

“Don’t you want to read it?”