Nikolai considers his offer for a couple of seconds before replying, “Maybe one day.”
When Justine smiles as if Nikolai scratched Brax’s name off his hit list, I recall the work Henley did on my shoulder. Demi’s face is on a part of my body I can’t see without a mirror, but I don’t need to look at it to recall every perfect detail. They’re stored in my mind, where they’ll remain until the day I die.
When Justine and Nikolai start making out like teens at the prom, I head for the first car in a fleet of many.
I’m not jealous of their affection.
I’m merely letting them relish the calm before the storm.
Nikolai braces his hip onto the kitchen counter before folding his tattooed arms in front of his chest. He isn’t trying to intimidate me. He doesn’t need to use tactics like aggressive stances to command a room. His reputation alone gains him the attention of every person in his realm, but mercifully, this time around, we’re without an audience.
“Why did you remain in jail after Col was killed?”
I could tell him the truth, but honesty seems to be a lacking trait of mine lately. “My debt was with Dimitri.”
“And that’s been paid in full now?”
I twist my lips before shaking my head. “Not exactly. It was more transferred to another assignment.”
It dawns on me that Nikolai is more clued on to Dimitri’s crews’ inner-workings than realized when he asks, “The Dvoráks?”
When I bob my head, Nikolai looks set to kill. I find out why when he spits out, “I took care of the Dvoráks more than once…personally.They’re also not Russian as you’re insinuating.” He drops his arms before he takes a step closer to me. He hasn’t reached for his knife yet, but the murderous gleam in his eyes assures me his hands are twitching to slash the gleaming metal across my jugular. “Justine is with child.Mychild.” There’s no denying the pride in his last two words. “So I don’t care who I have to take down to protect her. Myahrencomes before anyone.”
Although shocked at his admission Justine is pregnant, the similarities between their story and Demi’s and mine is too similar to ignore. Agent Moses stated seconds before his death that India killed my unborn child because her wish to rule the world with as many cartel monarchs as possible makes her extremely jealous of any future princes or princesses. That means it isn’t just Justine’s life precariously hanging on the wire, so is her unborn baby’s.
“You took care of the Dvoráks sipping tea in their Czechia palace, but you missed the most vital player of their crew.” I dig the surveillance image Agent Machini gave me three days ago and thrust it into Nikolai’s chest. He doesn’t like being manhandled, but since he’d take bullets to the chest for my sister, he sucks up my aggression like his hand isn’t itching to slip behind his back to retrieve his knife. “From what I’ve heard, you know what a monster looks like.” I point out India standing in the very far corner of the photo. “Here’s a scarce female version you rarely hear about.”
Nikolai laughs. “This is who Dimitri is cowering from? A housemaid who’s pissed her husband couldn’t keep his dick in his pants?”
His response makes it obvious he’s heard of India before, but he’s downplaying his knowledge. For what reason, I don’t know, but I don’t have the time nor the patience to find out.
“You won’t be laughing when she organizes for your baby to be cut out of Justine’s stomach with no anesthetic on a dirty mattress in a room an addict would screw his nose up at.” He pins me to the kitchen cabinet with one hand on my chest, and the other pierces the tip of his knife into my neck, but I continue talking as if we’re having a friendly chat. “And that’s if Justine’s pregnancy makes it that far. India has a way of making men do anything she wants. Abortion pills. Birthing a child from every nation. She can even convince them that watching a woman be mauled by a dog would be a fun time.” I take a moment to get my emotions in check before muttering, “She was right fucking there, Nikolai, smiling while my sister was screaming.”
“Right there…with you,” Nikolai breathes out heavily, his voice as still as death.
I’d take a step back in shock if I could. “No. I was there at Dimitri’s request—”
“To watch myahrenbe mauled by a dog like she was a fucking animal!”
His accusation makes me want to vomit. “I was there tostopher attack! My life for hers. Dimitri said Col wouldn’t accept anything less.” I’m not ashamed about the wetness that fills my eyes when I mutter, “But he didn’t want my life. He wanted hers.”
The way I articulate my last word must clue Nikolai onto the fact I’m not talking about Justine. He lessens the pressure on his blade for a couple of seconds before he wholly removes it from my throat.
Once he has his knife housed back into the back pocket of his jeans, he asks, “Who was she?”
It takes me working Demi’s name through my head three times before it squeaks through my dry lips, and even then, I stumble over her last name. “Demi P-Petretti.”
As he takes a step back, Nikolai nods like everything suddenly makes sense. “Where is Demi now?”
The quiver of my chin answers him on my behalf.
“Isshethe last name on your list?” He nudges his head to the photograph he released to pin me to the kitchen cabinets during the ‘she’ part of his comment.
An ill-timed chuckle rolls up my chest. I should have realized you can’t hide murderous intentions from a mafia prince. He would have sniffed them out the instant I was released from Harbortown.
After taking a quick breather to pull myself together, I jerk up my chin. “Dimitri took care of Col.” The arching of Nikolai’s dark brow doubles when I add, “I took care of the agent who put Demi and Justine on her radar.” I stray my eyes to the photograph on the ground during the ‘her’ part of my reply. “That leaves only one name on my hit list. India Dvorák’s.”
I float my eyes back up to Nikolai when he asks, “And then what? Once she’s taken care of, where do you go from there?” I barely breathe out half a sigh when he shakes his head. “You don’t walk to death. You make death come to you, and you fucking smile while doing it.”
