Page 21 of We The Depraved

I look up and catch each one of my brother’s eyes.

“How so?” Artur asks.

“She’s a former dancer,” Erik volunteers.

Damien and Artur let out snorts.

My breath still feels like it’s caught in my throat.

“Our mother was a prima ballerina.” Damien states.

“Until the Bratva dug its claws in,” Erik retorts.

The other two nod and I don’t participate. Talking about my mother makes me feel anxious and unsteady. Our father was cruel to her, and would beat her. In fact, he broke her ankle and called her broken swan.

All of us have an unhealthy fascination with ballet but especially Erik. He has dated a few ballerina, but the relationships never last. It’s possible, he breaks them and then discards them.

“Well what’s the plan?” Damien demands to know.

The tan sugar cookie dough is cool under my fingertips. The childish side of me wishes to eat a piece and savor it. The adult in me requests that I wait to enjoy my creation. With ease I place a layer in the bottom of the red and white baking dish.

“Plan?” I ask.

“What is the plan for Sage Porter?”

“She will become my wife,” I announce.

The room grows quiet and I turn to them.

“You can’t be serious?” Artur shakes his head.

“You don’t even know this woman!” Damien’s eye brows have raised into his perfect hair line. He looks the most like our father when he offers us a disapproving glance.

“Yes, but I knew her father,” I state. “He owed me. I am collecting.”

Damien shakes his head, and Artur begins to laugh.

“What?” I snap.

“This is too much for me,” he laughs some more. “Think of the pussy you’d be giving up. And I know you, brother. You will be fully committed to the marriage even if it’s a lie.”

“You know that Safaryan Holdings wants the land permits and state contracts,” I tell them.

“And?” Erik asks, slightly intrigued. He runs the construction division of Safaryan at this point in time.

“The only fucking way I’m going to be able to get us where we need to be is by figuring out what dirt the Judge had on the governor.”

Damien’s brow is still quirked, his green eyes shining. “You think by marrying her you’ll gain access to his private files from his time as a lawyer.”

I nod. “I’ve been told he recorded phone calls…all of them. If I need to blackmail Governor Davis then that’s what I’ll do.”

“You could just titty fuck her again,” Artur states.

My skin begins to feel like ants are crawling all over me. Governor Davis and I have a history but that was when she was the attorney general for the state of Texas. As a governor she has been a real stickler. Blackmail is the only answer to securing the contracts and bringing Safaryan Holdings into the next generation.

I want them.

I deserve them.