Page 22 of Tangled Souls (Bratva Souls Duet #2)

OAKLYNN

Kirill is pacing back and forth in the living room. He reminds me of a lion trapped in a zoo. You’re told that the enclosure is big enough, but when you look into the animal’s eyes you can see the truth. Only the entire Serengeti will be enough room.

“Kirill,” I keep my voice soft as I call to him.

He turns toward me and for a moment it’s like he’s looking right through me instead of at me. But then he focuses, and all his intensity is directed at me. It’s almost too much and my breath hitches.

His steps are long as he closes the distance between us. Even though I can almost taste the danger in the air, I don’t flinch, and I don’t move away. All I can do is wait and see what happens.

“I need you to be honest with me, Solnishko ,” he murmurs, “how are you feeling?”

“I’m good,” I promise him. “It’s you I’m worried about right now.”

He rears back like I’ve slapped him, and his eyes widen slightly. “Me? Why are you worried about me?”

“You look like you’re about to lose your shit,” I explain. “I understand staying back and babysitting me isn’t exactly ideal.”

His hand shoots out so fast that it startles me when it wraps around my neck.

“Staying with you is an honor. I’m not here to babysit you,” his words are insistently rasped.

“I’m sidelined because the guys knew that I wasn’t going to be able to keep a lid on my rage.

Losing control would only make things worse, even if it would feel good in the moment. Dead men can’t spill their secrets.”

“But you would rather be at the warehouse to find out exactly who or what the weak link was in tonight’s coverage,” I push.

Kirill looks away, unable to deny my words. It’s written all over his face anyway.

It’s almost funny how he’s wearing his heart on his sleeve right now. Kirill is such a stoic man. He prides himself on keeping his emotions locked up and being unreadable.

But at this moment, when he’s still caught up in being scared for me, he’s showing me everything.

“I love you, Kirill,” I murmur.

He snaps his gaze back to mine and his shoulders relax. It’s small, but it’s enough.

“I know you want to be at the warehouse. Admitting it isn’t a bad thing,” I tell him honestly.

“No,” he shakes his head, “I need to be right here with you.”

I cup his jaw with my hands and search his eyes. It’s so obvious what he needs, but he thinks taking it will let me down. He’s wrong.

“You want to go and get answers?” His nod is hesitant. “You don’t want to leave me,” I don’t state it like a question, but he nods anyway. “Then there’s only one solution.”

He looks confused. It’s kind of adorable.

I would never underestimate this man. He is power personified and dangerous as hell. He’s also smart and capable. Which makes it all the more amusing when he doesn’t understand something.

“Take me with you,” I state the obvious, my words measured.

“No fucking way,” he snarls.

With my head tilted to the side, I study him. I wish my ribs weren’t aching right now because I know what would calm him down. But now isn’t the time for that.

The only thing that is going to help him cope is if he’s in the midst of the action, and the only action right now is the questioning of the security detail that was on tonight. He has questions. They, hopefully, have answers.

“Kirill,” my voice is stern, “it’s the only way for you to be involved right now. You agreed that you don’t want to leave me, but you want to be there. You are a lot of things, but you are still incapable of being in two places at one time.”

“I could have Huck hook up some sort of video feed,” he suggests, clearly mulling over the situation.

With an unladylike snort, I wave my hand dismissively.

“Like that will be enough for you. Look at you,” I accuse gently, “you’re about thirty seconds away from losing your shit.

” I stand up gingerly and nod toward the door.

“It’s time to get moving if you don’t want to miss anything.

By the time we get there, they will have them warmed up and we won’t have to wait long for answers. ”

The moment Kirill’s shoulders slump, I know I have him right where I want him.

Do I like manipulating the man? Not really, but I also am woman enough to admit it gives me a little sick thrill.

He’s not the kind of man to be led around by his nose, but he’d follow me into hell just to make sure I’m not too cold.

When he doesn’t move fast enough, I level him with a look and warn, “Don’t continue to underestimate me and what I can handle. If I didn’t feel up to going, I wouldn’t have suggested it and would have simply gone up to bed while allowing you to stew in your indecision alone.”

“Fuck,” he groans as he looks up at the ceiling like he’s praying for patience, “you’re a fucking pain in my ass, Solnishko .”

“You say the nicest things,” I sass him.

I slap his ass as I walk past him toward the front door. When he jolts, I giggle softly, making sure not to aggravate my ribs too much. They do hurt, but I’m not going to show weakness to anyone. Not tonight when there is still more work to do.

The ride to the warehouse is quiet. I realize just how much my men are letting me in, how much trust they are putting in me. They’ll never know how much I appreciate it.

While they might forget from time to time, they don’t look at me like some weak woman. They treat me like an equal. I’m just an equal they feel the need to protect. I can respect that.

An ominous feeling settles in my gut the moment we arrive, and Kirill leads me into the cavernous interior. We don’t stop until we head through a door, down a set of stairs, and into a large room. Hidden away from prying eyes, it is exactly what I expected.

It’s clear everything in the room is designed to be thoroughly cleaned. The lingering scent of bleach makes my stomach flip. Keeping my face set in a neutral mask isn’t easy, but I manage.

The men who were working security for the event, the same ones who were supposed to maintain the perimeter, are strapped to chairs set-up in a semicircle around a drain which could only have one purpose. When I step into the room with Kirill at my back, every set of eyes lock onto me.

Huck and Baker look surprised to see me. Maxim along with Wolfe and his guys all have smirks on their faces like they were expecting us. They probably were.

Baker’s the first one to move toward me. The moment he’s close enough, his hands shoot out and wrap around my waist. His touch is gentle and full of caring as he tugs me closer to him and wraps me up in his strong arms.

“What are you doing here?” The question is murmured against my hair as he buries his nose there and takes a deep breath.

“Kirill needs answers,” I whisper back. “He was pacing like a fucking lion. It had me on edge so I convinced him to bring me down here so we could both get the answers we need.”

Baker sighs, but I’m not sure if it’s because he’s annoyed or understands. I’ll take either at this point. It’s not like it changes anything.

“We were just getting started,” he tells me.

I nod against his chest and then take a step back. When he looks down at me, I arch an eyebrow in question. The breath he blows out tells me he knows exactly what I’m asking and is not happy about it.

“Fine,” he grits out through his teeth.

With a kiss to the underside of his jaw, I step around him. As I look over the men in front of me, I slowly assess them. My men are capable, but I’ve spent a long fucking time studying men with overinflated egos and have learned a few things because of my unique education.

“Sorry to interrupt the party,” I don’t take my eyes off the men in front of me as I speak and it’s unclear whether I’m speaking to them, my men, or Wolfe and his guys.

Not like it really matters. “I’m sure the gentlemen behind me have threatened you all in no uncertain terms. The way I see it, this could go a few different ways.

One, a lot of energy can be used to extract the information, the anticipation and fear building as you watch each other being tortured.

Two, everyone dies because you think you’re so big and bad, and you don’t give up the information needed.

Now, my personal favorite is option three.

This is where integrity and courage come into play,” I look each man in their eyes, “because the man responsible for the hole in the security speaks up now and dies with some fucking honor.”

I watch each man closely. Almost everyone’s eyes are moving, trying to take in each other on either side of them and around the room. Everyone’s eyes except for one.

I almost do jazz hands and shout ‘ta-da’ as I take slow steps toward the man in question. If the sweat on his brow is any indication, and it is, he’s nervous. Good; he should be.

“Why are you the only one not looking around like you’re trying to piece together the puzzle without the box in front of you?” I infuse as much innocence as possible into the question. I even bat my eyelashes at him for a little extra zing.

Maxim barks out a laugh, the first time he’s sounded like himself since he found me in the bathroom earlier. I’ve been worried about my cocky man who doesn’t seem like he takes much seriously, even though it’s all a front. The man loves deeply. He loves me.

The sweat on his brow starts multiplying. It isn’t just nerves either. The eyes of every man in the room, including the ones still being held captive for questioning, burn into him.

His eyes start darting now. He looks everywhere but at me or the men surrounding me. One place he never looks is toward my four men who have taken up residence at my back. I can feel the heat from their bodies and it’s delicious.

If only my ribs weren’t fucking throbbing right along with my jaw.

Speaking of my jaw. I very slowly and deliberately pull my hair over my shoulder to ensure that my bruised jaw is very much on display. The anger coming from my men, which was already almost overflowing the boiling pot of their emotions, is now creating a sauna-esque atmosphere in the room.

“Who got to you?”

It’s a simple question that I throw out into the room, but it has the tension mounting. Honestly, it’s almost difficult to breathe, but I push through. Because my men need answers and they aren’t the only ones. I also need to know how the fuck this happened.

If I hadn’t been preparing my whole life to enact some sort of exit strategy from my life, when I came up with one, I would not have been able to defend myself from Mikhail.

The thought of him being able to do actual harm to me and for my men to find me—or not to find me if I had been taken—has my vision going a little red with fury.

“I’ve been seeing a woman for about a month now,” the man’s words come out quickly like his mouth is tripping over itself to get the information out.

“A few nights ago, after we had, um,” he looks at me with a sheepish expression on his face and I just roll my eyes and huff because I can guess what they were doing, “anyway, she told me about a friend who had been snubbed by not getting an invitation to the gala. I didn’t know who it was.

” He sighs, resignation in his tone, “I didn’t ask. ”

It’s like the fucking Niagara Falls of truth in here right now.

“Well, that was stupid,” I snark. The pain is making me a little more feral than I would like.

Large hands on my hips pull me back against a strong chest. When I look over my shoulder, I’m not surprised to see Kirill with his hands on me. I’d know his touch anywhere.

He takes most of my weight and I almost moan with how good it feels to not have to stand upright at the moment.

“You didn’t fucking ask?” Kirill’s words are cold, and I have a feeling he’s holding me against him for me as much as for him.

Dead man can’t word vomit all their secrets and all that.

“We don’t pay you enough?” Maxim asks the question, some of the devil may care man I know peeking through his tone.

The man in the hot seat swallows hard. “It’s not like that. I’m paid well,” he insists.

“Were,” I correct flippantly. When he looks at me, for the first time, I can see the question in his eyes. “You were paid well. Corpses don’t get a paycheck,” I singsong and he pales. I nod slowly and sass, “Yeah, now you’re starting to get it.”

“Who is this woman you’re seeing?” Huck comes up with the right question.

I was going to ask it, but I figured this doofus was all about giving the details about what went down, and we’d circle back to it eventually. Apparently, Huck is not able to be patient tonight. It’s understandable, all things considered.

The man bows his head, his answer whispered, “Betty.”

The laughter which comes out of me is so sharp and sudden that I let out a groan of pain and wrap my arms around my waist. Kirill’s hands tighten around my hips, but I’m not sure if it’s to help hold me up or to stop himself from ripping the man’s arms off and beating him to death with them before he goes to hunt down Betty.

“Well,” I muse once I finally get my shit under control, “that answers the other question of how Adam knew where I was going to be the night of the meeting.” I shake my head. “What a shame.”

One of the other men in the chairs speaks up, “I would like the chance to pay penance for not realizing I had a rat on my team by balancing the scales.” When I look at him, his eyes are focused on the traitor in the room.

“It would be an honor to kill him in Mrs. Volkov’s name.

His stupidity and his inability to keep his dick in his pants put her in danger and caused her injury. He deserves nothing less.”

My heart warms and I clasp my hands together over my heart. “Aww, that is the sweetest,” I gush.

I swear the man’s lip twitch slightly, but he doesn’t smile. Nor does he look away from the soon to be dead man.

Kirill leans forward, his teeth nipping at my earlobe before he warns, “Careful Solnishko .”

With a sigh, I mumble, “Spoilsport.”

His chest doesn’t rumble with laughter, but I can feel the vibrations against my back. It’s good enough for me.

My men exchange looks with Wolfe, Dominic, and Hendrix before herding me out of the room. Things will be taken care of in the room of death. The men who were innocent shall be given a chance to prove themselves, including the leader, and the dirty pussy fucking turncoat will die.

All in a day’s work, if you ask me.

As we walk out of the warehouse, I can’t help but ask the next question, “Now, what do we do about Betty?”

The gleam in the eyes of my men, filled with malice and probably too much excitement, is all the answer I need. I have a feeling I’m going to enjoy this next part.