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Did he suspect Nikolai’s changing alliance? If he did, our plans were fucked.
Nikolai sat and flicked his dark hair back, somehow looking like a young rebel Romanov as he clicked his fingers for the server to pour him wine.
“It sounded like a family dinner. Father, brother, sister-in-law, and the little beansprout, so I wondered why I wasn’t included. That wasn’t nice, Kirill.” He pointed at me, a shit-eating expression on his face, and turned his eyes to Mallory. “Good evening, Princess.”
Her smile dropped, and she shot him a nasty look.
Before they could argue, I got back to business. “Very well. We’re talking about De Sanctis. What do you propose we do about it?”
“I have offered to take one for the team and marry Sofia,” Nikolai stated.
Viktor dropped his knife loud enough to cut through the surrounding conversation.“If you think we’re going to make nice with those cunts, you have another think coming. Forget Renato. He’s too well protected. Let this end where it started—with Sofia.”
Nerves sprang to life in my gut.Motherfucker.
The only sign that Nikolai was tense was the slightest tick of his granite jaw.“Meaning?” he bit out.
“Meaning, you try to kill my kid, and I’ll kill yours. We take out Sofia. Retribution is served, and we can move on.”
“You think Antonio won’t retaliate for killing his daughter?”
“We have just cause, and he knows it.” Viktor speared a bleeding piece of rare steak and shoveled it into his mouth, ignoring the line of red juice working its way down his meaty chin.
“Forgive me if I’m wrong, but won’t killing the sister annoy her brother, too, and create a back and forth?” Mallory sipped her water and calmly looked at Viktor.
Nikolai snapped his fingers and nodded. “Precisely. We don’t want to prolong this whole mess Kirill got us into. We want to end it. I say we kill Antonio. The old fucker has it coming, and Renato will probably thank us for it.”
Viktor scowled at his youngest son. “We’re not killing the capo of the De Sanctis family. Young people think they can solve everything if only their generation was in charge. Renato is a pup, like you.”
“You asked for my opinion. Here’s another—they want Kirill, give him to them. Maybe they’ll give him back after they’ve satisfied their revenge. He’s already got a kid on the way, so there’s at least one body part they can lop off and he won’t miss,” Nikolai said and smirked at me.
Making Viktor think we were at odds as usual was part of our plan.
Mallory seemed to have forgotten that from the scowl she gave him. “You’re disgusting,” she muttered.
Nikolai laughed. “Thanks. I try.”
“Enough. Talking about the baby, is everything healthy? Do you know the sex yet? Is it a boy?” Viktor asked, signaling for another refill of his wine.
“We don’t know,” I answered curtly, certain this was going to annoy Mallory—as if having dinner with the man who’d ordered her father killed, and the man who’d carried out that order, wasn’t already pissing her off.
“Find out as soon as you can. If it’s a boy, we need to take extra care of your lovely wife.”
“And if it’s a girl?” Molly interjected, smiling with razor-like sharpness.
“Then we’d better get ready for trouble. All the women in my life have only ever given me trouble,” Viktor said. “I’m sure you’ll be no different.”
“A girl can dream,” Molly muttered under her breath.
I pushed my chair out from the table, and my bodyguards stepped forward immediately.“I think we’re done here. Mallory looks tired. Princess, are you finished?”
Viktor stared at us, his shrewd eyes taking in every tick and micro expression. I hated to put Mallory under his microscope, but there was no avoiding it. If we wanted to take Viktor down, he had to have his guard lowered. Pretending I had no idea that he’d attempted to have Mallory killed was an important, if unpleasant, step.
“Yes. I’m not hungry anymore,” she said, standing and stepping back from the table. Viktor eyed her body.“Don’t see much sign of a baby yet.”
Nikolai chuckled. “My father, the doctor.”
“Be careful, Nikolai. Disappointments should watch their mouths,” he snapped.
