AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Raffaele barked out a laugh and shook his head. “No,cugino,that’s the best part. She just graduated.” His grin became wolfish. “She’shere.”
I burst out laughing. “Why do the Fedulov Bratva make it so goddamn easy?”
Rubbing his hands together, my cousin chuckled and nodded. “So, want me to get rid of her?”
I paused and looked out the window as I was about to say yes. That would be the wise and ruthless move, to stop the bleeding and strike hard. But this was an opportunity I couldn't pass up.
I’d already hit Viktor Fedulov’s pockets.
Money was one thing, but a man’s heart?
“I’ll take care of it,” I heard myself say and a smirk spread across my face as I looked back at Raffaele. “The Fedulov Bratva think they’ve gotten ahead of us. Time to fix that misconception once and for all.”
I’d take the little Fedulova in a firm hand.
And after I finished giving Elena the punishment she so badly needed, for her family’s sins, as well as her own, I’d make her take back everything she stole and then some.
Elena Fedulova would be the key to destroy the Fedulov Bratva once and for all.
CHAPTERFIVE
Elena
“Thank you again for such a nice dinner, Daddy,” I said. We’d just left one of my father’s favorite restaurants and were currently cutting through downtown Chicago in a black SUV. Tinted windows kept out the sharp slant of sunset and the humid warmth still sticking to the evening hours. “I’m so glad we got to spend time together.”
“I am too, Elena,” my father said. He reached over and squeezed my hand once, then went back to frowning at some paperwork that one of his men had slipped him at the end of dinner.
A dull ache went through me as silence fell in the car and I tried not to make a peep. My father hated the tap of my manicured nails on my phone screen and noisy breathing and fidgeting. Really, anything that might distract his focus.
I can’t complain,I scolded myself. We’d had almost the whole day together. A mid-morning ride at Moth Stables, then a stop by the spa, a brief stint in my father’s favorite antique shop to replace some of the items he’d smashed, and then dinner. Although, save for the horseback ride, all of that had punctuated with sidebars and paperwork from his men.
Four days ago, I’d saved the Fedulov empire and had never felt more on top of the world.
But now, I felt neatly shunted to the side, the dutiful and quiet daughter, no better than a ghost. I’d hoped that had been the start of something, but…
The car pulled to a stop. I blinked out the window, confused as to why we weren’t at my father’s giant townhouse. “Wait, we’re at my apartment?”
Surprise and dismay rippled through me. Usually, if my father needed me to go home, we took separate and roundabout routes. This was profoundly reckless. Who was the driver?
“Hm?” My father roused himself and frowned, then rapped on the divider. It rolled down and I jolted again as Erik’s smug face was revealed. “Dernov, I told you—”
“Sorry, sir,” Erik cut in and then began to speak in rapid dialect of Russian that I didn’t know. I shot a glance at my father, who sighed.
“Elena, I have business this evening.”
“I …”I thought we were going to stay in and watch a movie.I swallowed and nodded. “Okay. Do you want to drop me off at the nearest L stop, then? Or somewhere where I can call a rideshare?”
“Nonsense, we’re already here,” Erik said and smirked at me. “The only thing you have to worry about is that no one in this artsy hood has probably ever seen a Cadillac before.”
Anger sparked in my throat. “What thehell—?”
“Elena,” my father interrupted, patting my knee and sounding weary. “It’s fine. Just this once.”
I stared at him for a moment, wanting to press Viktor on this because he'd been the one who'd set up all these meticulous protocols in the first place. But the lines around his mouth were deep, and he appeared suddenly old in the dim light of the car.
“Okay,” I said.
“Want me to walk you up,lisitsa?” Erik offered with genuine warmth.
