Page 44 of Brutal Bratva’s Owned Hostage

“You look tense,” she said, not quite a question.

“I feel tense. I don’t know why exactly. Dmitri’s being strange tonight, more than his usual strange.”

“Strange how?”

“Quiet. Focused on something he won’t tell me about.” I glanced back toward the alcove where he sat, still watching the floor with that same unreadable stillness. “It’s probably nothing. He gets like this sometimes when there’s business happening I’m not supposed to know the details of yet.”

“Sounds exhausting, honestly. Being married to a man who operates on a need-to-know basis even with his own wife.”

“You have no idea.” I managed a small laugh despite the knot sitting low in my stomach. “Some nights I think I’ve gotten used to it. Other nights, like tonight, it just feels like waiting for a storm I can’t see coming.”

“Well, whatever it is, you know where to find me if you need an escape route that doesn’t involve armed security.”

“Duly noted.”

She squeezed my arm once before moving off, and I carried my tray back out, trying to settle back into the familiar rhythm of the evening despite the low hum of unease.

The evening progressed normally for a while after that. Regulars settled into their usual tables. Dealers worked through hands with the ease of men who’d done this every night for years. I moved through my section, refilling drinks, exchanging easy small talk, trying not to glance too often toward the alcove where Dmitri sat, watching everything with that same unnervingly patient focus.

Then Varley arrived.

The shift in the room happened almost imperceptibly at first, subtle enough that I doubted anyone without weeks of practice reading the rhythms would have noticed it at all. Dmitri’s posture tightened slightly where he sat. Roman, who I hadn’t even realized was on the floor until that moment, repositioned himself more deliberately at the nearest exit. Security along the walls adjusted their formation in small, careful increments—nothing dramatic, nothing that would have alarmed an ordinary guest, but enough that I felt the change register deep in my chest.

Conversations continued around me, but something beneath the surface of the room had shifted entirely.

Varley crossed the floor with his usual composed stride, nodding to a few of the regulars he passed.

Then two of Dmitri’s security men fell into step beside him, close enough to be noticed, not close enough to look like an arrest.

But that was exactly what it was, considering the expression each of them wore.

Dmitri stood from his alcove, and the entire room seemed to register his movement at once, conversation dying at the nearest tables the way it always did whenever he chose to make his presence known.

“Varley Karelin,” he said, his voice carrying across the floor without needing to be raised, calm in a way that somehow made it more absolute than shouting could have. “Internal evidence confirms you’ve been compromising Golovin operations. Facilitating external interference connected to Adrian Vale.”

What?!

The room went completely still.

I stood frozen near one of the side tables, my tray forgotten in my hands, watching the scene unfold with stunned disbelief that made everything feel slightly unreal. It felt like I was watching it happen to someone else rather than standing a few feet away from it myself.

There was no panic in Varley. Only resignation, mixed with something that looked almost like relief. As if he’d been waiting for this moment for longer than anyone around him had realized. Or maybe it was defeat.

“Do you deny it?” Dmitri asked, quiet and direct.

Varley held his gaze for a quick second before answering, “No.”

He didn’t respond with regret. It was more with clarity, sounding like the plain, unflinching acceptance of a man who’d already made peace with whatever came next.

Security moved closer at some invisible signal I didn’t catch, and the atmosphere of the room became almost unbearable in its stillness. The ordinary murmur of conversation and clinking chips faded into something taut and airless in that moment.

I couldn’t fully process what was happening, standing there with my tray still gripped in both hands. Varley had been a fixture around Dmitri’s world for as long as I’d known any of it, a familiar presence at the poker lounge, at the wedding, at every family gathering I’d been slowly absorbed into over the last few weeks. And now he stood in the middle of the floor, formally exposed as a traitor in front of an entire room, and something in me refused to fully accept what that meant.

Dmitri didn’t hesitate.

He drew his gun in one smooth motion. He pointed it at Varley and, in a split second, Varley dropped to the floor.

Final.