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Chapter Seven

DEMYAN

On any kind of numerical scale, I’m probably up near obnoxious and bordering on bullying, but fuck it. Why is she here?

There are ways to handle things, but I’m still reeling from seeing this woman again, and touching her is like no time has passed since the last time.

She raises her chin, beautiful face carved from angry, unforgiving stone, and she says, “Get the fuck out of my way, or I’ll cause a scene.”

It’s the calm flatness that strikes me. And I have to say it’s impressive. Not many would stand up to me or speak to me like that.

I stare at her a moment, taking her in. Just how serious is she about making a scene? And would that reinforce or negate her apparently knowing Max? But… Fuck, I don’t know.

What are the odds of her turning up here? Especially when I haven’t seen her in years, when my sister or Max never mentioned her. And Alina loves to point out all the pretty women in the hopes of getting me to settle down with someone nice.

Someone, she says, who isn’t part of some business deal.

“I mean it,” the blonde says. She opens her mouth like she’s going to scream and I shake my head.

“Cause a scene, and that’s the last scene you’ll want to create.”

“Why?” she asks, big hazel eyes glittering. “Is that a threat? You’re what? Going to kill me?”

Well, fuck it all. It crosses my mind to point out I never mentioned killing anyone, and why the hell would I over…

whatever this is. But it’s piqued my interest. Because me telling her I’ll drag her ass off if she even dares to think of ruining Alina and Max’s wedding maybe tanning it a glowing red has somehow equated to a death threat.

It’s excusing the damn pun, overkill. Which makes me suspicious. What’s she hiding?

“Why would you think I want to kill you?” I ask softly, shifting against her to slide a thigh between hers.

Anyone looking and they’ll think this is the normal wedding hookup.

“Because of the bad sex? You don’t want me telling the truth.”

The spitting fire in those hazel eyes makes me want to smile. Worse, it gets my dick’s attention. She wants to stick sharp little barbs in me and all she’s doing is stirring up desire.

Unwanted desire.

I won’t lie and say I haven’t rubbed one or two out to her over the last three years. Her lips on my cock. Her tight cunt. Her asshole. The taste of her and the way she responded. Yeah, not going to fucking lie.

But I’ve got an extensive spank bank. Just because she’s been the go-to star of it is nothing at all. I’ve fucked countless women. One-night stands are my thing. Sometimes it extends to two.

I’m bound at some point to run into one.

Thing is, I’m careful. I don’t tend to choose from my circle if I don’t want it coming back. If the woman doesn’t know who I am, then I want to keep it that way. It’s easier. Cleaner.

“I think we both know the truth,” I say, leaning into her, close to that delicate ear, and I get a nose full of her scent.

This time she doesn’t smell like me, the lemon of the bath oils, or my whiskey-tinged honeyed leather and lavender. No. She’s like roses warmed by vanilla, real vanilla, that heady complex scent.

Somehow, I resist rubbing up into her, just to see if she still moans in that same erotic way.

What I do is ease back. Meet her gaze.

“And what’s that?” she asks, spiky with it.

I take her wine and swallow a mouthful. “Hot. Erotic. Something good enough you somehow found yourself here to sink your teeth into me.”

“What is wrong with you? I didn’t?—”

“Or something more sinister?”

“Your ego needs adjusting. Christ, you’re annoying. I wish—” She stops herself. What was her name? Erin… Erin stops herself and blushes, her gaze skittering from me. “Please let me go.”

“No.” Whatever Erin was about to say, she changed her mind, like she’s hiding something. “It’s a hell of a coincidence you turning up at the same wedding I’m attending. Out of the blue. No one’s so much as mentioned you.”

I expect the fight, the anger, a barrage of explanations.

After all, I’m being an asshole of the highest order.

I left her in that hotel room without even a goodbye, and I’m being rude now.

But instead of a tongue-lashing, she swallows, the blush draining until she’s pale, like a damn fucking ghost, and sheer terror’s all over her face.

Erin opens her mouth, closes it, and perspiration pops up on her forehead, like… shit, I don’t know what. Like she’s up to no good. Fuck. She’s not just looking terrified. Erin looks terrified of me.

Wordlessly, I step out of her way and hand her the glass, her fingers cold and clammy, snatch it, and she pushes past me.

“What the fuck was that?” I’m going to have to ask about her, look into her. In fact… I reach for my phone, intent on getting Ilya on the job, when a rumble of voices builds into a cacophony of commotion.

I look up as a loud pop cracks the air, and people scream. I don’t think, I move. It takes two steps to grab Erin as another gunshot fills the air.

A succession of quick pops follows the shot, and the air fills with more screams.

“We need to get moving,” I say.

But Erin isn’t having any of that. The terror on her face has ratcheted up.

Another shot.

She shrieks and yanks her hand free, disappearing into the chaos of the crowd. There’s more shouting and with the screams and yells, I can’t make it out, but I fear it may be an enemy.

What if Erin was the distraction?

I grit my teeth and force myself to remain on the right side of calm. My sister’s out in that melee, but Max is with her, and he’s got a good head on his shoulders. She’s the only reason I’d panic and the very reason I can’t.

I search for them, making my way from the corner where I was with Erin, and take in the scene before me.

Where did I see them last? Up the back to the right, talking to some older people, Max’s boss and I don’t know who else. No one of importance to me. No rival bratva.

Shit. Is this bratva related? It could be, but to cross me on the evening of Alina’s wedding is a death wish for whoever’s behind it. So, that means someone big trying to rise up and take my empire or someone I’ve never heard of. Someone from Russia herself, perhaps?

Or a robbery gone wrong? There’s a lot of money in here tonight. Jewels, for starters, and important people who could go for a pretty ransom.

I don’t even know which I prefer, I think, making my way to where I last saw my sister. One is deadly, but I usually know how they operate, so it could be a renegade, and the latter is just an unknown. Both are dangerous, both something I need to stop.

And where is Alina?

People are running, most to the exit, and another scream fills the air to the left of me and it sets my heart hammering and I turn.

“Demyan! Demyan!”

Alina.

Terror rips into me as I push people out of the way to get to where I heard her, but there’s too many, and the scream goes up again. “Demyan!” This time behind me.

I spin and scan the crowd frantically, trying to spot her or Max. Something to let me know where to run. But there’re too many people.

As I listen and make my way toward the area the two screams rose from, knowing she might not be there anymore, I scan continuously and place that call to my second-in-charge, Ilya. “Backup, now,” I snap in Russian.

This is a fucking wedding, not a meeting for factions. It’s meant to be a day of love and peace, and I don’t have my fucking gun. Alina insisted no weapons. On me .

Even if this isn’t bratva, I should have ignored Alina and armed myself and the guards to the teeth. But the guards I have weren’t allowed—her orders again—and while I broke that, they’re on the down-low, so why…

Unless they were the recipients of the gunshots. Fuck. Fuck. And fuck.

I call Ilya again. “Armed to the fucking teeth.”

“Got it,” he says as I hang up.

Men will be coming to meet me, and they’ll have weapons. All I’ve got is a knife, so I pull that, ready to pop open the switchblade.

I don’t know what’s going on, but it’s not good.

Oh fuck, there are a few people on the ground not moving. Two are my men. I grab the gun from Gregov’s dead hand and check it before sliding it into my waistband in easy reach. I keep hold of the knife. It’ll be deadlier in close combat. If it comes to that. And if I need the gun…

I almost trip over a body. A woman in a purple dress. And then, just beyond her, I spot a familiar form.

Max.

Alina’s fiancé.

The love of her life.

He’s on the floor, not moving, and I reach him in record time, my heart trying to break free. “Shit. Fuck.”

Blood seeps and pools around him from several bullet wounds to the chest. I drop, heart racing to feel for a pulse. But he’s cooling already, and his eyes are open, unseeing.

Max is already gone.

“Sorry, Max,” I mutter, getting up and frantically searching for my sister. Where the hell is she?

Not on the floor. Thank fuck. No girl in white is down and bleeding, but where is she?

“Alina?” I call her name, but no answer comes and I fight the mounting terror .

I need to find her. She’s my one priority. And she better be okay. Apart from being my only family I have left, I love her with all I am. She’s one of the very few on this planet I actually care about.

Losing Alina isn’t an option.

The room is now mostly empty. People are hiding and cowering, those who didn’t make it out, and I waste a few seconds racing to the bar and peering behind it. Just the fucking staff and a friend of Alina’s, who’s crying.

I don’t even bother speaking to her. If my sister is anywhere of her own will, it’d be with Max, so I’m betting she’s not in here. Someone’s taken her.

With that thought, I run to the exit, hitting outside just in time to see three fucking men, trying to shove Alina and Erin into the back of a car.

Motherfuckers.

Both women struggle but my sister, who has a big red handprint on her face and blood at the corner of her mouth—I’m ready to rip off heads and piss down the throats of those who did that to her—sees me as I sprint and starts to fight more.

“Cunt!” The man holding her punches her in the face and I go for the gun, right as the man holding Erin looks up at me.

“Let her the fuck go,” I roar.

Erin suddenly ruins my shot by slamming her head into the man’s and kicking him in the balls. He doubles over and lets her go, and she scrambles away.

I’m still too far away and my sister struggles too much to get a clean shot. And it doesn’t help that Erin, though she scrambled free, dives back in to help Alina. Too many fucking people in my way.

Shit.

“Hold on, Alina,” I say .

One of the men goes to run after Erin but the one she kicked gasps out, “ Ostav'te suku nakh! Berem sestru i valim !” Leave her. We don’t need the bitch. Just take the sister.

This all happens in seconds. It feels like a slo-mo forever.

I bear down on them, managing to squeeze off a shot, winging the one Erin kicked.

But I’m too late for Alina. They shove her in the trunk and jump in the car, fleeing, right as I get there.

Erin stumbles, hitting the pavement, hands coming down to catch herself, and I pivot, grabbing her and pulling her up, running my hands over her to check for injuries.

She’s not bleeding. Nothing’s broken.

And anger and pain consume me. I put on my coldest stone face. “You, come with me. Now.”

Erin shakes her head. “I-I didn’t do it. I tried to help… I… I just… I need to go home.”

“No.”

“What do you mean?—”

“What do you think? No.” I drag her off, tucking the gun away. There weren’t any plates on the car, so of course I couldn’t get the registration tracked.

But they were fucking Russian and that makes it easier. And deadlier.

“I tried to help her. I?—”

“Helped her into that trunk.” I move her to safety, so I can take a moment. Think.

I don’t mean what I’m saying. She was grabbed like Alina and she tried to help, but until I know what’s going on…

Sister, they said fucking sister.

I close my eyes as a wave of nausea hits me. They were after me.

Max is dead because of me. My sister is gone because of me .

Erin’s speaking. And her voice brings me back. “…let me go! You’re hurting me!”

I loosen my hold just as Ilya pulls up.

“You’re not going anywhere, Erin.”

Leave the bitch. Just take the sister.

“We need to get the fuck out of here,” I say to him, not letting go of her. “And get people on this. Find out who did it. They got Alina.”

“Fuck,” Ilya says, gaze shifting to Erin.

I don’t explain.

“Let me go.” Her eyes are on Ilya’s big gun.

But I push her into the back seat of the sleek, armored black car. “Until I can figure out who those men were and why they took Alina… until I know what the fuck they wanted, I’m not letting you out of my sight.”