Page 33 of Scarlet Sins (Yegorov Bratva #2)

Chapter Twenty-Nine

ERIN

My stomach’s in shambles. I should be upset at the deaths of the men who died protecting us. But I’m not.

Rather, I am, but not destroyed by it like I should be. Instead, I’m thankful we’re all alive, even if we can’t get hold of Demyan. Or Ilya.

Alina hands me some tea and I cup my hands around the glass, poor little Sasha anxiously looking from me to Alina to Kara and the men I’ve never seen. Alina knows them. And Olga has managed to ease Sasha from me to try to distract him and let me be.

“I can’t get hold of him,” I whisper. “You?”

Alina shakes her head. “I’ll try again. I’m sorry, I’m not privy to everything, so I don’t know why he sent us ahead. He’s probably working. Ilya, too.”

“But his phone should be on.”

“Maybe he needs to have it off or he forgot to charge it or he left it behind.”

He wouldn’t.

Demyan’s not the type to be careless in that way. He’d have his phone .

Another jolt of nausea rocks me.

Alina says she doesn’t know why he sent us ahead. But I do.

“He’s fine. Maybe he’s doing wedding stuff. And he sent us for a treat.” Kara smiles as Alina wanders off, texting and calling on her phone.

“No. H-he sent us to keep us safe. He didn’t trust this Sergio person, Kara. And I caused it all by making him back out of the wedding with Stefina before he had a plan.”

She grabs my hand, eyes blazing, and she leans in. “You listen to me, Erin Banks. I’ve met Demyan and he did that for you, yes, but he also would have put his foot down and risked your anger if he thought this would happen.”

“What if?—”

“Don’t.” She closes her eyes. “Look, I’d tell you to think long and hard before marrying him, but you have and you’re not backing out.

Plus, Erin, you’re right. He’s the father of your kids.

And he’ll protect you. His life is dangerous, but I don’t think he entered into that arrangement for thrills, and I don’t think he backed out to spice things up.

He seems to want more, and he sees that in you. ”

“What do you mean?”

She sucks in a breath. “He’s bratva, right?

Organized crime? But he goes to the park, he protects, and I think he’s smart enough to want peace within the more…

questionable parts of his outfit.” Then she flashes a small smile.

“That’s what Alina told me when I pushed.

She says their father was hard and pushed Demyan.

But Demyan wants to take it into the modern world.

Run his businesses, the legal and illegal, and form partnerships that build peace rather than land and power grabs.

So… I don’t know. I’m talking out my ass. ”

“You’re not. I see that, too. But something’s happened. Look where we are. What if you hadn’t seen me? I’ll never forgive myself if I’ve put everyone in danger. ”

Alina can’t hide the worry when she comes and sits with us, a glass of vodka in her hand.

I don’t know what this place is, but I think it’s more than a safe house.

She knows the people. From the car to those here.

And while she said staff, there must be more to it.

The place feels lived-in, high-tech. A fortress outside the city, one hard to find.

They turned the headlights off when we went through hidden gates, for crying out loud.

“I’m trying Ilya again.”

She sends a text, and then she calls.

This time his voice comes through as she turns it on speaker. “Alina? What’s wrong? I just got to your texts. I was?—”

She cuts him off and starts speaking rapid Russian to him. They talk and my frustration builds. I cast a glance at my boy, who’s getting upset again. I’m thinking he’ll behave for Olga for another five or ten minutes before we reach meltdown.

But I need to find out about Demyan.

“Is Demyan okay?” My voice shakes.

Alina holds up a hand to me. “ Odnu minute, Ilya.”

“Alina?” I ask.

“I was just catching him up on what happened.”

“You’re all right? The baby? Sasha?” Ilya demands in English.

“Yes, but is Demyan —”

“Alina,” he says, sounding like there’s a ton of pressure on him and he’s in the middle of something. “Are you safe?”

“We’re at Vasily’s fortress. My cousin’s away but his men and staff are here. He’s sending another family member to help out,” she says. “It’s well stocked, there are cameras, and it’s an absolute fortress.”

“Last time I was there the security needed upgrading.”

“You always say that,” she chides. “But it is. I’ve been told the cameras are all high-tech and there are patrols. We did the switch off from taxi to Vasily’s SUV a number of miles back.”

He barks an order in Russian, then he’s back to us in English. “You weren’t followed?”

“We did the two-car pickup. One went another way and the car with the precious cargo circled before coming in. We weren’t followed,” says one of the men. “And the high-tech cameras ring the property. We use it regularly, and not just as a vacation place.”

“We should be safe, Ilya,” Alina finishes.

“Should or are?”

She looks at the men and one nods. “Are.”

“Stay where you are. And tell the men no one, not even one of theirs, gets on the property. If anyone does and comes to the door, don’t answer. I know the house; no one can get in unless the door’s opened. So you’re essentially in a house-sized panic room, understand?”

“Yes,” she says, and Kara and I grip hands harder.

“Demyan’s phone’s out of juice, so I’ll track him down and we’ll work out a plan to get you all to safety.”

He hangs up. I feel a little better, but how the hell is Demyan with a dead phone?

“Alina, when you spoke to each other in Russian, did… did he say where Demyan is?”

“No.”

And in that moment, I see how she fits into their world. Because I don’t know if she’s telling me the truth or not, and it scares me even more.

“Mama!”

Sasha’s broken free, or Olga was smart enough to release him, and he rushes to me, grabbing at me. I slip an arm around him and pick him up, hugging him close. His little heart’s beating fast and I’m sure he’s feeding off the energy in the room .

“Hey, baby,” I whisper, peppering kisses over his little face as Kara bounces one of his feet that’s now shoeless. I spot the shoe near Olga who stands and heads to the kitchen, muttering about snacks and drinks.

The house isn’t big, at least not for this amount of people, but I don’t think many will be getting much sleep and already one man is carrying bedding out into the living room which is in the middle of the house.

“These sofas open out into beds, and we can make forts. Would you like that, Sasha? A sleep fort? We can have a slumber party.” She smiles at him as he buries his head into my chest.

I look at her, then at Kara as he pulls his foot from even her. “He’s overwhelmed.”

“Poor baby,” she murmurs. “Even though we weren’t followed, it’s smarter to sleep here. Ilya’s right, the place is like a panic room, but I know Demyan. He’ll want overboard on safety when it comes to you.”

“Us,” I say, making sure she understands she’s included.

“Olga’s getting snacks and one of the men put some clothes and amenities in the bathroom. They’ll probably swim, but we can get changed into them. Something more comfortable.”

I try to keep the panic down.

Clothes to be comfortable in. A panic room style house. Camping in the middle of it, pretending it’s a slumber party, to be even safer. Not being able to contact Demyan.

All those things clang in my ears.

And my heart is aching. My soul hurting.

I want Demyan. I want to smell his scent, bury my nose against his warm throat, feel the beat of his pulse, the rush of blood. I want his strength and the gentle under the hard. I just want him.

Safe .

Here.

Now.

Sasha starts to shake. “Mama? Where’s Daddy?”

“Shh.”

His head pops up and he grabs my face. “Scared. I don’t like!”

“It’s okay, Sasha. Kara is here. Aunt Alina. Olga.”

“Milk, Sasha?” Olga asks and offers it, but he bats her hand away.

I mouth sorry to her and stroke his hair as he grabs my face again.

“Mama?”

“Daddy’s coming here soon,” I say, not sure if it’s an assurance or a lie. I glance about and spy a pack of cards on the coffee table, and I gasp. “Sasha! Look!”

He does.

“Do you want to play a game?”

“Yeah, Sasha,” Kara says, “wanna play Sasha Go?”

His little face lights up.

And he nods, letting me go and wiggling down.

Sasha Go is a made-up game that I think he only knows the rules to. Or maybe there aren’t any. It consists of him mostly winning—although sometimes he takes pity on us—and lots of giggles and card throwing.

Kara explains this to Alina and Olga and we all sit, with Sasha making Kara hand out the cards for the game.

“Oh, this is like snap,” Alina says, laughing. “With added flying cards.”

We all play, and I try to keep Sasha distracted and happy. But I’m also trying to distract myself, because in the back of my mind, the panic grows.

I don’t know where Demyan is, and Ilya deftly ignored me. I know steamrolling when I see it. And that’s what he did. Steamrolled over facts and details .

So I’m sitting here with Demyan having a supposedly dead phone while he works. Except I don’t buy it.

I keep coming back to that. Maybe his phone is out of juice. But he’s not doing something safe. If he was, he’d have powered up, borrowed a phone.

Something’s happened and each time I close my eyes, I see the bullets rip into the men outside the club. I see the bullet hit Ilya.

But it isn’t the men. It isn’t Ilya.

It’s Demyan in my head.

And he’s not getting up.

He’s alone.

Bleeding out.

And it’s all my fault.

What if he’s lying somewhere hurt or dying or worse because I made him call off the wedding instead of letting him sort it out?

That keeps rotating in my head, too.

I made him call it off and now…

What if he’s hurt or dead because of me?

And I know if something’s happened, I’m never going to forgive myself.

Ever.