Page 17 of Obsession of the Bratva

The obsession.

The love.

The hatred.

All of it.

Waiting for me back at the house was Vera behind locked doors. I had dumped her there and hadn’t looked back in three days. She had destroyed me, and now she was sleeping under my roof again. I stared out the window into the Miami night, and for the first time since taking her from that church, I realized something terrifying.

I had planned every step until I got her.

Every detail.

Every contingency.

Every outcome.

But now that Vera was actually mine to keep, I had absolutely no idea what came next.

Chapter 4 - Vera

It had been four days.

Four days since Nico had walked into a church and destroyed my wedding. Four days since he had carried me out of a life I had never wanted but had convinced myself I needed to settle for because of Papa’s threats. Four days since I had arrived at his house. And four days since he had practically left me here and vanished.

I had seen him exactly twice.

The first time had been the morning after the entire drama had gone down. The second had been yesterday evening. Neither encounter had lasted more than thirty seconds. He had looked at me, and I had looked at him, and then he had walked away.

No conversation. No questions. No threats. Nothing.

Just silence. Cold, deliberate silence.

I stood near the floor-to-ceiling windows of the guest bedroom and stared out at the beautiful gardens before me. Right outside was Miami, where thousands of people had absolutely no idea that Vera Stavros had vanished from her own wedding four days ago. The media had probably had a field day, and I’m certain Adrian was furious. Ava would be worried sick since I never did anything without telling her or at least consulting with her.

My father was probably losing his mind. That last thought made my stomach tighten. Because my father wasn’t the kind of man who simply accepted losing. Manny Stavros believed everything belonged to him.

Money. People. Loyalty. Control. Especially control.

And I had humiliated him. Publicly.

The fact that it wasn’t intentional wouldn’t matter. The fact that I hadn’t actually chosen any of this wouldn’t matter either. All he would see was failure. And failure always came with consequences. My fingers tightened around the glass of water in my hand.

Nico didn’t know.

That was the problem.

He didn’t know anything. He thought I had betrayed him, and I had cheated on him. He thought I had chosen Adrian over him. He thought I had thrown the best months of my life with him because I suddenly got bored. And because he believed all of that, he had no idea what kind of danger he had just placed himself in.

I closed my eyes briefly. The memory came back instantly.

My father’s study, his cold voice echoing through the walls of the whitewashed space. I had been terrified, definitely not having expected him home from his work trip. He had to cut it short because he had found out about Nico and me, and Nico, unlike me, knew who Nico was. Nico had never told me about his bratva links, but my father knew exactly what the Romanov name meant.

“You will leave him.”

“I won’t.”

“You will.”