Defiant Queen: A Dark Bratva Academy Romance, page 26
He chuckles.
“Go ahead, Konstantin. Shoot me, since you can’t shoot your father—”
The smacking of flesh on flesh thuds from the speaker, followed by the other man snarling in pain.
“Because your mother was a whore, Konstantin,” he sneers. “That’s why! Because Antin found out that sixteen years before, your mother had cheated on him. She bore a fucking son to another man! To Semyon fucking Belsky!”
I can hear my heart thudding, and feel my skin pulsing with the cold, vicious energy crackling through the room. Jakov looks like he’s about to crack his own teeth.
Antin looks completely white.
“She bore Semyon Belsky’s child, in secret,” the man on the recording yells. “While your father was mostly gone for business. I was there, that night, you know. At the house, in Rye. You weren’t supposed to be there, of course. But I was.”
His horrible chuckling sound rattles from the recorder speaker.
“To get a piece of that bitch mother of yours. Antin’s gift.”
A piece of me breaks inside—for the man I love. For the woman I never knew.
“You know, we should have invited Vadim,” the man jeers. “He always had such a little crush on her.”
He laughs again.
“No pussy for Vadim that night. But I was there,” he hisses. “And I saw you—”
“Time’s up,” Konstantin’s voice hisses. “Goodbye, Dima—”
“You were in striped pajamas. Like a little boy,” he laughs cruelly. “Blue and orange striped pajamas, looking like you were about to cry seeing your whore mother like—”
Jakov’s hand closes around the recorder, muffling it. He breathes slowly, his shoulders heaving as he silently stands.
His huge hand flexes, and the recorder crumbles with the snapping sound of plastic breaking.
The room is deathly silent as he turns to level an executioner’s gaze at Antin.
“My friend,” Antin chokes, sputtering. “She was my wife, Jakov! Your sister! I could never—”
The gun blast is deafening. I cry out, my hands flying too late to my ears. My eyes not looking away quick enough not to see Antin’s head snap violently back as the bullet rips through it and the headrest of his wheelchair.
I stare in shock and in horror as Jakov calmly turns, dragging that same dark gaze to Konstantin just as he gets to his feet. Jakov’s gun hand raises, leveling the barrel at Konstantin.
“Jakov!” I scream.
He doesn’t even turn.
“The Reznikov organization is mine,” he snarls quietly. “Nothing personal.”
“He’s your nephew!”
He merely shrugs, still staring straight at Konstantin, who’s looking right at me, his face grim.
“It is just business,” Jakov grunts. “Just like you were, little Mara.”
My eyes drop. My jaw clenches when I see it.
“Time to die, little prince—”
“Put the gun down, Jakov.”
My words don’t phase him.
The sound of my thumb drawing back the hammer of the gun dropped by the dead guard sure does, though.
Konstantin stares at me, shaking his head. Jakov turns, his gaze narrowing.
“What are you doing?”
My lips curl.
“What I have to,” I choke, fury swirling inside of me—all of the lies he told me, all of the fake memories he polluted my childhood with.
“And believe me,” I snap. “This is personal.”
Jakov’s lips curl slightly in the corners. He’s still aiming the gun at Konstantin. But his attention is on me.
“Little zaychik—”
“Do. Not. Fucking. Call me that!” I roar, making him stiffen.
His gaze lasers in on me, his brow furrowing.
“Mara, please,” he growls. “Swearing? Violence?” He shakes his head. “This isn’t you.”
“You don’t know me.”
“Of course I—”
“No, you don’t,” I hiss, my fingers curling tightly around the gun I’ve got pointed at him.
“That’s what happens when you lie to someone and pretended to be someone else. They don’t know the real you, but with your mask on, you’ll never know the real them, either.”
“I know you just fine, little Mara,” he says quietly.
“Maybe you did.”
I swallow.
“But you don’t know this me.”
His mouth thins.
“Put down the gun, Mara.”
“No.”
He sighs.
“Mara, I taught you, when you were thirteen, down at the shooting club. Remember?”
He smiles.
“I taught you how to hold a gun just like that one. I taught you.”
“Yes,” I hiss quietly. “You did.”
My eyes narrow.
“And then you taught me how to pull the trigger a year later, when you shot me in the head.”
His mouth thins.
“I did not relish doing that.”
Jakov begins to walk slowly towards me. I flinch, my pulse thudding in my ears. My fingers tighten around the gun, but they feel slick.
The gun feels heavier.
“What you think you are prepared to do right now, Mara,” he growls quietly, almost warmly. “It isn’t in you. You are not a killer zaychik.”
He steps closer. And then even closer. My hands shake, my eyes stinging with tears.
He’s using our familiarity. He’s using my emotions, and weaponizing the happy memories I have of him hardwired into my brain.
I know this, and yet, I still can’t stop him. I can’t do what I know I need to do. I can’t make myself react or shoot him.
Or maybe, he’s actually right.
I don’t have this in me. As much as I hate him, for all of it, I can’t bring myself to—
I don’t realize he’s right in front of me until his hand curls gently around the gun in my hand. I whimper, shaking as he slips it from my hands with a thin smile on his lips.
“You are not a killer, little zaychik—”
“Yeah, but I am.”
Jakov’s eyes bulge as he whirls to the side, where Konstantin is standing, grimacing, holding the rifle that was slung over the back of the dead guard on the floor.
A cold, brutal look on his face.
Jakov pales.
“Wait—”
“Cover your ears, love.”
I clench my eyes shut, turning away and slamming my hands over my ears as the blast thunders through the room. I hear the sound of the body of Jakov—who was once my Grigori—thudding to the ground.
And then suddenly, Konstantin has me, holding me tight in his strong arms as I sob against his chest and hold him fiercely.
When we step out of the office, my heart lurches in shock as Lukas rushes into me, grabbing me fiercely into a hug. My eyes dart to Konstantin, ready to defy him if he gives me that jealous look. I mean for fuck’s sake, it’s Lukas, who might as well be my brother.
But he doesn’t. He just looks on in that dark, stormy way he does, with the gun-metal gray of his eyes swirling like mercury.
When Lukas pulls away, he turns and extends a hand to Konstantin. But in a blink, they’re hugging tightly, too.
Vadim grunts as he walks over to lay a bloodied hand on Konstantin’s shoulder. He’s holding a bandage to his arm, but he shrugs it off when I stare in horror, telling me he’ll be fine.
Konstantin grips Vadim’s good shoulder firmly, something knowing passing between them as they nod at each other.
“There are more Antin loyalist up the road—”
“Not anymore,” Lukas growls quietly.
He gestures with his chin, and when we follow him outside, my jaw drops.
There easily forty armed men outside, but not a one of them looks like they’re here to hurt us.
“I called in the cavalry,” Lukas shrugs nonchalantly as he glances to a surprised looking Konstantin. “These are courtesy of the Kashenko and Volkov Bratvas.”
Konstantin’s mouth thins, and his hand squeezes mine. He turns to arch a sharp brow at Lukas, but my brother-in-law shakes his head.
“With no strings attached, Konstantin,” he says quietly.
Two older, handsome, powerful looking men in dark suits step out from behind the assembled Bratva soldiers to approach us. As they step into the light, I smile as I recognize Viktor Komarov and Yuri Volkov.
Viktor smiles warmly as he moves close to me.
“Are you okay?” he asks gently.
I nod as I sink into his almost fatherly embrace.
“I am,” I whisper against his chest before I pull back and step back next to Konstantin, my fingers lacing with his.
Konstantin clears his throat.
“I think I owe you both a thank you.”
Yuri shakes his head. “You don’t owe us anything.”
Viktor levels his gaze at the man standing by my side.
“Bluntly, we came for Mara.”
Konstantin shrugs with a small grin on his lips.
“That works for me.”
“But, Konstantin,” Yuri shrugs. “The days of turmoil between the head families is over. You must see that, don’t you? The ways your father and Semyon did business is no way into the future. So, yes, we came for Mara, because of course we did.”
His eyes narrow slightly, holding Konstantin’s grays without flinching.
“But, we came to help you, as well. The Reznikov empire is yours now. But…”
“Why do I get the feeling this is leading into you saying we should all sit in a circle and sing kumbaya?”
Yuri glares at him. Viktor snorts, rolling his eyes.
“I have no interest in hearing you sing shit, Konstantin,” Yuri growls with a small smile on his lips. “But I do have an interest in being at peace with you and your organization.”
Konstantin’s lips curl slightly.
“So,” Viktor sighs. “You ready to step up to the Bratva High Council, now?”
Konstantin’s lips curl slightly. His hand tightens in mine as he turns to let his stormy, captivating eyes burn into mine.
“I mean, I could use a minute.”
Viktor smiles.
“Well, we’ll be waiting for you.”
The men outside begin to pile into SUVs. Viktor and Yuri shake hands firmly with Konstantin, and then Vadim, who Lukas then leads over to the open trunk of another SUV, where he starts to examine the older man’s wound.
Konstantin and I turn to each other on the porch of that house, with the ocean crashing softly in the background, and the half-moon glinting off the waves. My heart surges as he pulls me close to him.
“We’re not them,” he chokes, his muscle clenching as he grip me tightly.
“Not who?” I whisper back.
“Romeo and Juliet.”
He pulls back, his eyes locked with mine as he cups my face possessively in his hands.
“Romeo couldn’t save her. And she couldn’t save him.”
His jaw clenches.
“I would turn the world to ash for you, Mara,” he hisses. “I would bring you back from death itself to keep you selfishly all to myself.”
My eyes blur with tears as my hands grip his wrists.
“You already did.”
My lips sear to his as the tears slide down my cheeks.
Love in the ruins. Forever in a kiss.
Forever ours.
Epilogue
One month later:
Gavan sighs as he laces his fingers together, his elbows on his knees. He lets his gaze drag across the verdant, blooming campus laid out below us from our perch on the roof of the dining hall.
“You’re coming here next year, you know.”
He smirks, eyeing me sideways.
“Eh, I’m still making my mind up.”
I glare at him.
“Don’t make me order you.”
He snorts.
“Order? You can’t order me anymore,” he grins. “Not when we’re going to be partners.”
I arch a brow.
“Well, it would be unseemly if I started to jointly run this organization with an uneducated—”
“Fuck you.”
I chuckle darkly, patting him on the back as I lean back against the brick chimney behind us.
‘Think they’ll still let guys like me in next near? After you and the rest of them ruined this place?” He smirks. “I think the cool factor of being Bratva at OHA might be a waning star.”
I shrug. “Well, guess you’ve got your work cut out for you, then. But, in any case, Oxford Hills wants you here.”
“They want your sizable charitable donations here,” he mutters.
I roll my eyes. “No, dipshit. They want this,” I grunt, tapping a finger against his head. “And so do I. I just want it honed to perfection before you step up to help me run things.”
That’s the plan, at least. After Gavan graduates OHA, I’m sending his ass to the best business school on earth. I’m going to need that calculating brain of his tuned to the finest detail if he’s going to jointly run the Reznikov empire with me.
Two of us; brothers, at the helm of the table, together. And I quite honestly wouldn’t have it any other way.
It’s not out of allegiance, or a sense of debt owed or anything. I mean I’ve always thought of Gavan as a little brother anyway, so finding out he actually is just felt like pieces to a long-forgotten puzzle coming together.
I mean, it’s a mind-fuck. But it feels right, knowing that he really is my blood.
He sighs, his eyes darkening. I know him well enough to know where his head has just gone.
“You’re keeping the name Tsarkeno,” I grunt.
He shrugs, glowering.
“It’s worth discussing,” he growls quietly. “It’s just…” he shakes his head. “I don’t know. I’m still trying to piece together what I am. Part Reznikov, of course,” he hisses fiercely. “But, part Semyon Belsky—”
“You are zero parts Semyon Belsky,” I growl. “Neither is Mara, nor Lizbet. That monster, like Antin, has been scorched from the face of the earth.”
Gavan’s brow darkens.
“I hate it, sometimes,” he says quietly. “When I think about it, knowing he’s my—”
“You only have one father, and his name is Vadim Tsarenko.”
Gavan says nothing, but I smile when I see the corners of his lips curl as he nods a small nod.
“Ergo, you’re keeping Tsarenko.”
“Or else?” He grins.
I roll my eyes.
“Or else I push you off this fucking roof myself.”
He chuckles. “Even with your donations, I doubt they let you graduate after pulling that. On graduation day, none-the-less.”
He arches a brow as he glances at his watch.
“Speaking of which, don’t you need to go get ready or something?”
“Probably a good idea.”
I stand, reaching down to yank him up as well.
“See you in there for the ceremony. Don’t be late.”
“Hey, I’m already dressed, asshole,” he grins. “But you’d better go put that dorky fucking gown on.”
I sigh, shaking my head.
“So this is what co-ruling an empire is going to be like, huh?”
“You could always just step down and hand me the keys.”
“To a guy who can’t even tie his tie right?”
Gavan frowns as he glances down. I flick my finger at his nose, making him yelp as he hisses and jumps back.
“Oh fuck you.”
I grin as I turn to head back down.
“Don’t be late!”
“I’m upstairs!”
I smile at the sound of her voice when I step into Lachlan House. It’s something I’m going to miss—us “playing house” in this old home here at OHA. It’s funny; I never imaged I’d feel any shred of nostalgia for this place at all when I came here, even after I made the decision to stay.
But now? I think I’ll actually miss parts of this place—specifically, the parts that are entwined with the memories I have of her and I here.
After this graduation ceremony today, there’ll be a bit of a shuffle. Lizbet wants to take Mara traveling to all the places they always talked about going but never did.
On one hand, the idea of the woman I love traipsing around the world potentially being put in any even remote chance of harm’s way makes my blood boil. It makes my jaw clench, and my fingers drum with concern.
I almost lost her. I did lose her, once.
But on the other hand?
I scowl.
Fuck it, there is no other hand. Both hands are brooding, slowly, and if we’re being honest, scared as hell about her being away from me.
But she’s not a delicate Faberge egg. She’s not a wounded bird, even if I’m more than slightly okay at the idea of keeping her locked up with me forever.
But I can’t do that. Perhaps with another woman—someone less defiant and bold. Someone weaker. Someone who doesn’t possess the power to light the world on fire.
But there is no other woman for me. There never was, and there never will be.
So if that means stepping back so that she can spread her wings a bit? So be it.
It doesn’t mean I won’t have at least fifty armed men following her every move while she travels over the next few weeks.
After that, though, it’s her and I.
The brand-new king, with his queen at his side.
“Hey, could you help me with this?”
I prowl up the stairs at the sound of her voice. When I step into our bedroom, I grin widely.
Mara has her back to me in the large walk-in closet. She’s got her arms twisted behind her, trying to pull up the zipper on the stunning teal-colored dress she’ll be wearing under her graduation robe for the ceremony that starts in an hour.
My eyes slide over her recently re-colored lavender hair, twisted up in an elaborate bun high on her head. My gaze drops down the bare nape of her neck, and my pulse begins to thud when my eyes slide over the bare skin of her exposed back, where she hasn’t zipped the dress up yet.
“I just can’t—”
“Let me,” I murmur, moving behind her.
