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“I was trying to help!” I screamed back at him, holding my hand to my chest. My legs shook beneath me but I stood firm.
Denis strode forward but Yuri shoved him back leaving a dent in the drywall. “Help Matteo and keep an eye out for Gerardo,” Yuri ordered before turning around. I took a tentative step, trying to tiptoe around the shards on my bare feet. “You,” he pointed, “don’t move.”
I stopped and swallowed down the fear coursing through my veins. Luka coughed again as Denis pressed another towel against his wound and my eyes began to water. It was too much— the blood, the pain, the screaming. The porcelain crunched under Yuri’s boots until he made it to me and picked me up, holding me close to his chest as he made his way away from the commotion. I buried my face in his neck, trying to breathe away my racing heart.
He kicked his door open and carried me all the way to the bathroom, setting me down gingerly in front of the sink. Turning on the faucet, he gripped my hand. I sucked in a breath and winced at the pain and Yuri took a step back, his jaw clenched and his eyes darkened past what I had ever seen before. My legs shook as I watched him unravel.
“Rinse your hand,” he gritted out.
I stuck my hand under the stream of cold water, forcing myself to keep it there to clean out the cut. “Is he going to be okay?” I whimpered.
He shook his head, searching for words.
“I can help, whatever you need me to do I can…” My voice shook.
He stepped forward, his hand gripping my chin painfully. A tear rolled down my cheek and he bent low until he was everywhere, his scent wrapped around me like a soft blanket. I sucked in a breath just as his lips met mine, hard and angry.
He crushed himself into me, picking me up and slamming me into the cool counter. I wrapped my legs around his waist to hold on while his lips devoured mine. He swallowed my breath and every whimper that escaped my pained body until the room was filled with sensual noises.
The tension rolled off of him in waves and I swayed, woozy from the cut on my hand and his onslaught. He pulled away and let me down, refusing to take his hands off me until I was steady. Gritting his teeth, he snapped, “just stay here.”
He stormed off, the door slamming behind him. I jumped and everything caught up to me. The blood, the pain, the shouting, his kiss. I turned and didn’t recognize myself in his mirror before sinking onto the floor. I couldn’t stop the tears anymore. I stayed there, curled in on myself until my hand numbed and the ache in my chest was the only thing left.
Chapter 10
Yuri
Ileft her there in that bathroom, cheeks still wet with tears, because I couldn’t look at the blood on her hands and keep my composure. And if I got my hands on her again, I wouldn’t have been able to stop.
As the boss, I needed to be next to Luka and the others, checking in with the doctor and lending a hand wherever necessary. But all I really wanted to do was march back into that bathroom and fuck her senseless.
Lose myself in her.
Instead, my legs carried me back to the table where my brother lay, his bare chest open and oozing beneath bloody hands. Stained red rags filled the room with a thick musty scent, some spread across the ground and seeped into the hardwood, some still pressed against Luka’s peaked skin. Denis paced next to the wall I’d slammed him into and I refused to meet his gaze. Where he should have had his fucking tail tucked between his legs, begging on his knees for forgiveness, I knew I would only find smug indignation. Not only had he hurt Darya, he was closest to Luka when he’d been shot and I loathed the fact it was my brother with the bullet holes and not my idiot cousin. I strained to keep my voice even but I couldn’t wait any longer.
“Who was it? Did you get a look?”
“It wasn’t the fucking cops, who do you think it was?” Denis spat. He reached a bloody hand to rub at his neck, his eyes bouncing around the room.
“Did you see a brand?” I asked. Even as liquid hatred seeped through my veins and my fingers itched for retaliation, we needed to be sure. We needed proof– or at least suspicion without a shadow of a doubt. If those men were sent by the Desalmados, it was an act of war.
“I didn’t,” Matteo clipped. His hands were steel against Luka’s chest and not a drop of emotion crossed his face. “I checked each body, no brand, no tattoos, nothing.”
“No tattoos?” My brows knitted.
“No affiliations.” He answered my unspoken question. Men with no affiliations were like prey in our territory. You belonged to us or you were seen as an enemy. Our tattoos announced who we were– just like the bloody rose that wrapped around anyone working for the Zaragozas. A symbol of loyalty and a rejection of everything else. If not a single corpse left behind had affiliations, that in itself was an announcement.
The Desalmados were rewriting the rules and covering their tracks. To us, it was a declaration of power; to the feds, it was a smokescreen.
The doorbell rang and pulled me out of my thoughts. Whatever their true intentions were, they took a backseat to my little brother bleeding out on the dining room table. “Get the door,” I ordered Denis.
He returned seconds later with Gerardo in tow. His eyes widened when he took in the scene, but he waited no time going to Luka.
“Gunshot,” said Matteo, stepping aside to give the doc access. He surveyed before barking out orders.
“Yuri, get the liquor and a belt.” He pulled out a scalpel and tweezers, dumping them in the top-shelf tequila I handed him. “Give him a sip.” He nodded toward Luka.
My nose twitched when he poured the rest of the bottle over Luka’s chest, the blood washing away under the stream of crystal clear liquid. Luka groaned, his head turning from side to side and I brushed the fallen hair out of his face, wishing I could switch places.
