Page 38 of The Bratva’s Captive Flame

"You touch my daughter⁠—"

"I've already had her." I smirk at him as he realizes what I'm saying. But I don't let him get a word in. I keep talking so he gets the point. "She's in my bed every night," I tell him. "I own her body, Octavio, and she moans my name. You keep refusing me, and I'll own her soul too."

For a second I think I've broken him. Then he comes off that table with more fight than a man his age should have, twisting in my grip. His hand finds a beaker on the bench behind him and hurls it across the room where it shatters against the far wall.

"¡Hijo de puta!" he shouts, now raging mad. "You are no different! You hear me? You are no different from Solano. You are worse, because Solano never touched her." Tears streak down his cheeks as he batters my chest, though he's so weak he couldn't hurt a fly. "You are the same animal. The same. You have only learned to smile."

I pin him back against the table and hold him there. He fights me, but there's no strength left in him, just the rage of an old man's body spending the last of itself. It's humorous for a moment, but something raw drags across my conscience as he screams her name and I shove him back.

What the fuck is happening to me? Isabela is leverage to force this tired old man to do exactly what I want him to do. Feeling guilt isn't something I do. I use force to get what I want and I don't back down for anyone. But this man… my God, the way that just stabbed my heart as if I actually fucking care.

"She's safe as long as you cook," I growl, angry with myself for breaking before he did. "You pick up the tools and do the fucking job, and I don't harm a hair on her head." What he doesn't know is that I've just had some stupid revelation myself. I won't harm her. Even if he refuses to cook, I can't. I don't know why, but I know I can't.

Octavio straightens and turns to the bench. He sets his shaking hands on the cold steel to steady himself, but he doesn't look at me. He picks up a flask then sets it down while he ducks his head. I can see he's going to start moving but it's torturing him. When he picks up another and starts laying out the things he needs, I know he's finally caving in.

I watch the first careful steps of it, the old motions coming back into those famous fingers, and I should feel nothing but satisfaction. The thing needed to happen is finally happening. The investment pays out. Sebastian gets his independent production, and the Roshin Bratva stops bleeding money to a Spanish thug.

It's about fucking time, and I'm glad I don’t have to keep saying her name like a curse in front of this man. Somehow, it's more confronting to my sense of morality than the idea that I have a mole here betraying me. She has no clue what torture I've gone through to make myself spit her name like venom, but it's over.

I don't have to hurt her, and I don't have to pretend to her father like I even could. I back away, turning to Mishka, who has watched the whole scene unfold, and feel like things are finally turning the right direction.

The phone in my pocket buzzes before I can chase the thought any further, and I step away from the bench to take it. It's Bart, talking in a clipped tone. He sounds flustered.

"Boss, they hit the Lichtenberg warehouse. Definitely Cartel. Maybe twenty minutes ago."

"How bad?" I'm already moving, gesturing to Mishka to follow. I need to find someone else to stand over this old man because I need my best soldiers on this with me.

"Bad—two of ours dead, Yuri and the new kid. They torched the product too, Boss. Whole stock, up in smoke. The crew that did it was gone before the fire crews even rolled." He's as angry as I am, and only seconds after I thought I'd be able to rest for a moment. "This wasn't a warning, Boss. They came for revenge because we took what they want."

I look back at Octavio, head bent over his work.

"Double the men on the lab," I tell Mishka. "Now. Nobody in or out of this basement who isn't on a list I write myself. The chemist doesn't stop and he doesn't leave that room. Then meet me in the armory."

I take the stairs up two at a time and head for the back of the house, where the armory runs the length of the wall with the racks down both sides. Mishka comes in behind me a minute later, and Sergei's already in there, checking the load on a rifle when I walk through the door. I'm still not pleased with the man, but I have no choice but to use him now.

"Lichtenberg's gone," Mishka says, pulling a vest off the wall and tossing it to me. "I've got men headed over to hold what's left, but Bart says there's nothing left to hold. They burned it down to the slab."

I pull the vest on and start working the straps. "We've been a step behind these bastards since Madrid… They're out for blood now and we aren't going to put up with this shit."

Sergei sets the rifle down and looks at me. "You want to hit them back."

"I want to lock down." I take the weapon Mishka hands me and check the action while I run the map of the city in my head. "Every safehouse gets extra men before midnight. Every route changes. I want this whole network shut so tight, the Cartel can't find a soft spot to lean on."

"That's a lot of men spread thin," Sergei says. He's acting smug, like he knows how to run this better than me, and I'm already feeling charged. I have to bite back my temper so we can stay unified.

"Then we spread them thin."

"There's a smarter way." He leans a shoulder on the rack as if he's got any say in this. "You leave one site light. Make it look easy, like a gift they can't pass up. Then you pack the building behind it with your best shooters and you wait. They come for the easy one, you close the door, and you take a dozen of them off the board in a single night. Beats running yourself ragged, bolting every window in Berlin."

It's a clean plan, and it would work too, on paper. It would also put most of my best men in one building like sitting ducks. All it would take is one bomb and boom, we're halved.

"No," I tell him. "We don't bunch up. Not while I've still got a leak in this house I haven't found."

I’m no fool. I see the disdain in his eyes as he hears my refusal. I'm starting to see why this life isn't for Sergei. He thinks he's better than his leadership, and men like that don’t play by the rules. It makes my shoulders tense as I wonder how well he'll follow my directives regarding Isabela and whether I need to put more guards on her specifically to keep him away from her. The fear in her eyes when she told me what he did…

"Your call, Boss." Sergei turns away, but not before I see the glower on his face.

I lock a magazine in place and reach for a second to put in my pocket. "I'm not gambling men I can't replace on a clever idea while I'm half blind to who's selling me out."