Page 14 of Scarlet Vows (Yegorov Bratva #3)

Chapter Ten

ILYA

I rub my eyes, half listening to Pavel as he reports on today’s collections and shipments for the Yegorov Bratva.

My ear bud’s in, and the door’s locked to my grandfather’s study. I find the chair behind the desk more comfortable than the ornate sofa, and I half suspect that’s on purpose.

“Will you be in tomorrow?” Pavel asks, the man who’s proven himself to be loyal, talented, and indispensable over the past two-plus years.

I’ve half a mind to steal him to help here, too.

Too.

The word sits in my mind, loaded. Too . What does that mean?

I’m going to run this alongside Demyan and share resources?

It happens. Bratvas sometimes operate so closely that they could be considered the same.

Others get absorbed, and others still have major differences while forming strong alliances.

The problem here is with the already setup allies. Yegorov sometimes clashes with some players in certain arenas. And many of the Yegorov allies are even bigger antagonists to many of Belov’s allies .

It’s a logistical nightmare.

I know I can’t let Demyan down. If I’m completely honest, my loyalties are there, not here.

But this has potential.

I’m the new pakhan. I can reshape.

A job someone like Pavel would be perfect for.

But I’m not stealing him. Not borrowing him. I have Melor. And perhaps the two down the line can work to form an alliance of our soldiers that could help create a bratva of great power, the sort that hasn’t been seen in decades.

I am, of course, getting ahead of myself.

I sip my whiskey and glance at my work computer, the one I use at Yegorov’s compound. It’s encrypted, and it’s mine. No one here would dare touch it, and if anyone did, they’d get exactly nowhere.

“I’ll be in at midday. You’ve got a handle on everything?”

“Yes.” He hesitates. “Are you going to tell me what’s going on, Ilya? There are whispers that I’ve quashed.”

I sit up straight. “Among our men?”

“Some outlier allies. Our men know better than to gossip on the job or talk outside of it. I’m just curious.”

“We have the meeting with the Cortez cartel at four, and the forensic accountant is coming in at six.” I glance over the information on the screen, then I open another file and check that, too.

“Things are going smoothly, but if I’m needed before that, I’ll come in at ten.

Contact me in an emergency, and I’ll be there. ”

I’m more than aware that’s not what he asked.

“We’ll talk,” I say, “when things on my end become settled, but it’s mostly a logistical thing on my end. Everything else is normal in our world.”

“Ilya…” Pavel pauses. “I do hear things. A grumble when I went for a drink at a local club.” By local, he means bratva cl ientele. “The Belov Bratva is here and has a new pakhan. Is that you?”

“My grandfather passed.” I choose my words carefully. “I’m exploring the avenues within the bratva for us. And this conversation never happened.”

“I’ll see you at twelve. Do svidaniya .”

“ Do svidaniya. ”

No sound penetrates the study, but I don’t expect it to. I’ve left Melor to keep up the regular guard duty roster, but right now, I don’t need the soldiers in the house. They have a routine for the grounds, which is fine.

I pull up the files for the Belov operations, but after about an hour, I can’t stand it. Everything is fine. There are things I’d change, but… early days.

Getting up, I stretch and refill my drink. Then I unlock the door, step out into the hall, and pause at the stairs leading up to the floor where my new bride sleeps.

New fake bride.

Alina.

Shit, I expected… I don’t fucking know. For tonight to be one of laughter and jokes, of Isaak and Isla coming here after the so-called festivities to check the place out, to talk privately. To just sink into the weirdness of it all.

In my head, I thought?—

I’m a fucking idiot.

I didn’t think.

Because if I did…

What? I’d have fought her harder on this thing? She wasn’t backing down, and if I’d turned her down, she’d have gotten upset.

I turn and go back into the study, where I pace the room, drinking the fucking whiskey. There’s excellent vodka, but I’m not inclined to immerse myself further into my grandfather’s cloying world .

Annoyance whips through me.

The wedding clearly triggered Alina. Of course it did. It’s clear she’s still in love with Max, and combine that with losing him at her wedding, how could I think that memories wouldn’t swamp her?

And I had to do it at a chapel.

Even a judge or something so basic and utilitarian with us, in just street clothes, might have triggered her, too. But not at such a level.

What the fuck was I thinking? And how the fuck did I ever think this whole experience, from the wedding to being married to me for a year, could be good?

Yes, it was all her idea.

But I could have told her no.

I could have sweet-talked her out of it.

But I wanted this, deep down.

That thought vibrates inside me like I’ve struck some kind of chord.

Does that make me selfish, a worse person than I clearly am, to go and structure everything to fit a narrative of poor Ilya, stuck in a hard place, doing the right thing by helping her and letting her bulldoze me because she insisted she wanted this?

I’m not fucking weak.

I’m not an idiot.

I know the score, and I should have understood the toll it would have on Alina.

I finish the drink.

The hall beckons to me again, and I pour some more whiskey into my glass and go back out, like her bedroom’s a siren.

Maybe I should talk to her.

Maybe some soothing words, checking up on her, offering her more freedom will work. We can tell Demyan she wants to help me here, be the liaison between the two bratvas, and that all came about by her not wanting to stay in the mansion alone…

I head back into the study, quickly grab another glass and the bottle, then climb the stairs. I set everything down by her door then raise a hand to knock.

And stop.

I step back.

No thin band of light shows beneath the space at the bottom of the heavy door. But to walk away is cowardly… That is, to walk away without trying.

So I knock softly, loud enough so she can hear if she’s awake, but soft enough it won’t disturb her slumber.

“Alina?”

I wait.

Listening.

The quiet of the mansion’s a misnomer. Like all old places, even though I suspect it’s newer than it seems, it sighs and creaks.

But then I hear her.

She’s awake.

Crying softly. A sniffle breaks through like she can’t contain it, and it sends spiderweb cracks over my heart.

I almost knock again, but I don’t. She’d have heard me. So I wait, hoping she’ll answer, hoping she’ll let me in.

She doesn’t.

But if I walk off, then I’m a coward. If I demand she open the door, I’m a demon.

So instead, I offer an olive branch.

“Alina, I’m here. I’ll be on the floor below, either in the study or the bedroom opposite. If you need me, any time, please don’t hesitate to wake me.”

With that, I leave the whiskey and the glass outside of her door, just to the side, and then I take my glass and go down to my floor.

She doesn’t come.

Alina doesn’t speak to me when she gets up. Doesn’t stop by my study, doesn’t do any of the things that she normally does.

If I’m at the mansion in Demyan’s study working, she always comes in. She’ll bring coffee, a muffin, something that’s from the kitchen.

When Demyan’s there, she’ll come and annoy us both until he kicks her out. Of course, when Demyan is annoyed at her, he simply sends her off with Sasha or Poppy, as Sasha named his little sister, Nadya. Erin just rolls her eyes.

Point is, if I’m there, I see her.

This morning, she doesn’t even come out of her room. I know she’s up. I hear her voice when Svetlana knocks.

The housekeeper hurries down the stairs, and ten minutes later, she returns with a tray.

I keep working. Another half hour passes with Svetlana on the stairs again. She finally comes in to give me another cup of coffee I didn’t ask for.

I’m about to tell her I’m capable of getting my own and that she doesn’t need to wait on me hand and foot when she blurts out:

“Is Mrs. Belov okay? She won’t eat her breakfast or come out of her room.”

The “her” room isn’t lost on me. Separate rooms aren’t unheard of, but a new bride hiding away is. My bride.

“I’ll talk to her.” I smile, and Svetlana nods then turns and heads downstairs .

I check my watch then close the computer. It’s 9:00 a.m, and usually Alina’s up.

So I climb the stairs and knock on her door.

“I don’t?—”

“Alina,” I say softly, “if you won’t come out, if you won’t talk to me, I’ll call Demyan.”

I’m bluffing. There’s no way I’ll call her brother. But I don’t know how else to get through to her.

Footsteps stomp closer, and the lock turns. The door flies open.

My heart hurts.

Alina’s eyes are red and puffy, and there are still damp tear tracks on her cheeks.

“You’re not to call him. You promised,” she snaps.

Frustration coils tight.

“Talk to me, then, please. Or someone else. I’ll call Isla if you’d prefer it be her.

” I sigh. “Obviously, the wedding triggered something, and I feel like a fool for not seeing that coming. I should have. And I should have put my foot down about this marriage thing. I didn’t, and we’re here now.

But while I get it, malyshka , bottling things up is not the way to deal with it all.

” I swallow and then make myself say it.

“You’re missing Max, the love of your life, and that’s understandable?—”

“That’s not it,” she whispers. She half looks at me then drops her gaze down, her misery poisoning the air around us. “It wasn’t the wedding that triggered me. Well…it was, I guess, but I’m coping with that. The thing I can’t handle is the way I felt when you kissed me.”

Her words render me silent.

The kiss—such as it was, nothing more than a fleeting brush of our lips—was amazing in all the ways conceivable. But the last thing I ever expected was for her to have felt the same reaction. The same powerful connection I did .

I take her hand and wait until she looks at me. “Alina, we can end this arrangement right now if it’s what you want.”

Alina shakes her head. “Don’t offer me a false way out. We both know we don’t have that option. I need you to keep people like Santo, and Santo himself, away from me. And you need me to get your inheritance. We both need this marriage.”

A muscle tics in my jaw, and I nod. “Alina, our friendship means everything to me. I’d never jeopardize that, ever. You can trust me to keep this platonic.”

She looks at me, then slowly nods, seemingly more reassured.

“Now, I have a full day, but I’ll be back. Eat your breakfast, talk to Svetlana, or stay in your room. I’ll see you tonight.”

And before I do anything stupid like break my just-made promise, I head back down to go to Demyan’s early.

It’s around eight when I get back. Melor is in the study next to mine.

A door I never noticed before connects the two rooms. The big computer in his study is on as he moves between the rooms, working.

I watch for a few minutes, a little more relaxed with the idea of him being me in this particular bratva relationship.

He did tell me he’d be helping me ease into the job, which I appreciate, so I hunker down to learn the system here better.

When he leaves, it’s nine, and the house is quiet. Svetlana lives on the property in a guesthouse, as does Melor. But they’ve both left to do what they do after hours respectively.

I’m about to head up to see how Alina’s doing when she appears at the study door .

“I like Svetlana,” she says.

I smile “Good. Me too.” I gesture to the door. “I’m going to make some dinner. I can bring you something up, or you can join me.”

Her face perks up. “Pasta?” she asks, a hint of hopefulness in her voice. “The Ilya Special?”

“Do I know how to cook anything else?” I say.

“You can cook. Better than me anyway.”

I laugh, and we head down. Alina chops while I cook, sauteing bacon, onion, and garlic. The chopped canned tomatoes are at the ready, the mushrooms, other veggies, and pork all set in dishes that Alina set up as a mise en place for me.

After she chops the herbs, she grates the cheese. Then she decides to get creative by choosing dried artisan pasta.

“Are you trying to open a restaurant here?” I ask as I stir the sauce.

“Only if I’m head chef.”

“You want to be head chef?”

She shrugs. “It sounds glamorous.”

“It sounds like thankless, hard work.” I bump shoulders with her as I salt the simmering water and drop in the pasta.

“I’ll have lots of Michelin stars.”

“Oh, you will, will you?”

The pasta takes minutes to cook, and then I toss it with some of the sauce. Alina sprinkles some of her signature fresh grated parmesan and cracked black pepper mix she makes on top.

I open the red wine and pour us both a glass. “Glad you got up and joined the land of the living, malyshka .”

She wrinkles her nose. “It’s just been an overwhelming few days, I guess. The lead-up to yesterday’s wedding, the wedding, all of it. It crashed down on me.” She looks at me. “But the thought of losing you as a friend’s too much, so here I am. ”

“Alina.” I set down my fork and squeeze her hand. “That’ll never happen. We’ll get through this and come out with an even stronger friendship.”

I’m going to make sure of it. No matter what.