Page 21 of Trapped by the Bratva (The Valkov Bratva #5)

DMITRI

I disliked the idea of Hannah’s eagerness to start a family. I understood why she wanted to. With her shitty background and lack of any actual family unit who would support her and provide for her, it made sense.

Her parents passed away, and it sounded like before they had, they weren’t great role models.

Then this sister of hers, Melissa, was an abusive, greedy bitch who took advantage of Hannah for too long.

I bet the sweet raven-haired beauty was impatient to experience a real family, to belong with others.

But she can—and does—here.

I couldn’t commit any further than the loose relationship we had. We weren’t fuck buddies, but I wasn’t rushing to call her my girlfriend yet. Underneath the layers of our attraction was the foundation of why she was here in the first place—as my therapy helper.

That element hadn’t changed. The morning after we slept together, she woke up a bit embarrassed to still be in my bed, but I kissed her quiet. After a quickie, teaching her how to ride me, we showered, and she guided me through my exercises.

Hell, she could just move into my room with me. She spent so much time in here already.

But duty called. When Alek said he wanted another meeting, specifically about Avilov, nothing would have kept me away from grabbing my cane and walking to the dining room where we always talked.

Hannah was called away too. Amy was struggling with the twins and needed help.

Mila was dealing with fussy Alana. Margie was helping Becca with Emily.

Nadia was already doing her best with Amy, but she didn’t seem to have that maternal know-how yet.

And you’re impatient to bring another baby into this house, Darling?

I shook my head, musing about Hannah’s admission of wanting to start a family soon. This place would be overwhelmed with crying infants and?—

Well. That’s assuming she’d be here with her child.

I winced as I entered the room, realizing my mistake in thinking that far.

I saw Hannah as a permanent fixture here.

I wanted her in my life permanently, but I couldn’t put that into words yet.

Not until I took care of myself and my needs, primarily in seeing through this revenge I needed to get from Erik Avilov’s torture.

It was instinct to see her here, with child, rather than somewhere else.

Because the idea of another man knocking her up elsewhere…

I dropped into a chair and grimaced. Rubbing my chest didn’t ease the burning tension there, and I winced as I realized it was a form of anxiety. Anger? I couldn’t pinpoint what this strong emotion was, but I did not prefer that scenario.

Thinking of another man even touching Hannah pissed me off. I had no right to be possessive of her when I refused to commit with simple words. I was an asshole to want to hog her and keep her without letting her think that she had any hold over me.

But I didn’t give a shit. Picturing Hannah with someone else had me seeing red.

“You all right?” Alek asked as he sat and called order to this small meeting.

“Yeah. Fine,” I lied, waving at him to start.

I was far from fine. As I considered the reality that Hannah and I hadn’t used any protection, I let that ramification cloud my thoughts even more.

I wasn’t bothered about it. It hadn’t entered my mind to slip a condom on or pull out. I’d guessed accurately that she was a virgin and was clean. And if I knocked her up…

Then it is what it is.

I wasn’t in a rush to have any children. I had lots of nieces and a nephew to dote on. This house had lots of babies as it was, but I wouldn’t be upset about Hannah being the mother of my kids.

I’d fucking love it.

The timing was all wrong. I didn’t want to think about my future until I wrapped up the unfinished business of my past. If she was already pregnant, it would be good news.

But it would mean needing to hurry up and end Avilov sooner. I’d be on a race against time to hunt him down and kill him. I had to so I could be fully recovered mentally to move on with my future. And I wouldn’t feel right or whole until I’d gotten my revenge.

“Dmitri?” Nik raised his brows as he faced me. “Did you hear me?”

Shit. “No. Sorry. What did you say?” I wasn’t paying attention at all, stuck in my head with visions of a future with Hannah.

“Freeman is willing to work with us on finding Avilov.”

I scowled at him. Again with that agent. I was sick of hearing about this possibility. Since when did we work with the goddamn law? Never, that was when.

“I’m not willing to let them in too close,” Alek said.

Thank you. Thank you for having common sense.

As Alek and Nik argued, Maxim jumped in to give his input.

His perspective was different. He was grateful for the CIA agent’s help to find Nadia as quickly as possible.

I was sure that my brothers were also glad that I was found due indirectly to the agent being there and willing to collaborate in finding Avilov, but that didn’t mean we had to go against all that we stood for—which was running our organization to achieve maximum profit and power.

Ivan sided with me, heavily anti-law enforcement. But I didn’t weigh in. It was a volley of opinions about technicalities, and I was more interested in the end result.

My mind drifted, again, and I fell back to thinking about Hannah. About how she might react if I told her to move into my room. How she could interpret my suggestion that she get a new phone so her sister couldn’t contact her at all.

She said she wanted a family, but she was so damn young. What if she’d be happier going back to school and getting her degree, now that money and work hours wouldn’t be an issue?

And then Mila’s comment about wanting to hire her. Would Hannah prefer to work with Emily and Alana, and the other young ones, as my need for help with rehab exercises faded?

I’m doing it again. I furrowed my brow, annoyed with myself and how easy it was to drift to the woman I couldn’t get out of my mind.

My brothers were noticing too, and I hated that they might be judging me for being so distant. I wasn’t participating in the conversation, but then again, they were well aware of what I felt and thought about going after Erik Avilov.

“I know you’d like to be there,” Alek said with a sober glance at me, “but I think it would be best if Ivan and Maxim handle the Kastava soldier.”

I rolled my eyes. “I can’t even be there?”

“No.” Nik shook his head. “You’d get too mad. You’d distract from the interrogation.”

He had a point, but this was the first actual connection we could form with Avilov.

One of our soldiers had captured a Kastava who had likely been involved with transporting me to the warehouse where Avilov beat and tortured me.

We found this Kastava just yesterday, and I would bet all I had that whatever he could tell us would get us that much closer to finding the new Avilov leader.

“I won’t change my mind about this.” Alek folded his hands together on the table. “The Feds aren’t coming along on this. We’ll interview this soldier, and we can relay the information to the Feds.”

“But it sounds like Freeman wants a first-hand account,” Maxim argued.

“No.” Alek shook his head. “I would consider recording it and sending it to him, but that agent isn’t welcome to sit in on it.”

I huffed a dark laugh. Yeah, because our methods of getting those fuckers to talk aren’t pretty.

Torturing this Kastava wouldn’t make a dent in my need to pay back Erik Avilov for what he did to me. He was my sole target, and all the others would remain useful as nothing but pawns.

“We can share select information with Freeman,” Alek said, “but we’re not letting any agents or cops be present during it.

We need to keep the Feds further from us than that.

” He stood. “Collaborating with them on this one-time basis is manageable, but we’re operating independently at the heart of it all. ”

“We don’t need to kill Avilov,” Nik added.

I nearly gave myself whiplash in turning to glower at him.

“The Feds can have him,” Maxim said.

“The fuck they can,” I growled.

Alek held his hand up to silence us all. “They can. We don’t need to enter in a long, drawn-out ordeal with the Avilovs. We only need to end the Kastavas.”

Of course, you’d say that. He had a personal interest in killing Sergei Kastava, his father-in-law. He wanted the man eliminated so he couldn’t insist on having Mila returned to him.

But I’m suddenly ridiculous to want to kill Erik Avilov myself? My personal matter doesn’t bear any warrant?

“Kill all the Kastavas you find,” I said. “I’d like to see them all rot in hell. But I will argue with every one of you who wants to bring the Feds in and hand over Avilov to them. We do need to be the ones to finish him.”

I need to be the one to kill him.

If I didn’t, I’d never get closure, and right now, it was looking like I’d found my reason to want it. With Hannah and any family I could give her.

She represented the rest of my life, but I had to wrap up the loose ends of the trauma and pain of my past first.