AllFreeNovel
Share Us
He undoes two buttons of his shirt, pulling it open to reveal a swath of tattoos clearly marking him as Bratva on his firm chest.
“Before you suggest I merely had these done for show, my grandfather started the Krylov Bratva family, modeled in the old ways, when he had nothing to his name. And that?” He stabs a finger at the box. “That birthright of mine is how I will build my modest kingdom into anempire, and how I will ascend to my rightful seat at the table of the Bratva High Council.”
I smile coldly. “You certainly have a vivid imagination.”
He chuckles. “We’ll see.”
Drazen stands and opens the metal case. He pulls out the Tupperware I’ve put the shattered pieces of the egg in and sets it aside before pulling out the weathered, grubby, wood and brass base it once sat upon.
I drag my gaze to Eilish, my eyes locking with hers. When Drazen deftly dumps the pieces of egg out onto the table, we both turn to look on in confusion.
Suddenly, Drazen raises his gun.
And starts tosmash.
“What thefuck!” I hiss, staring at him like he’s a crazy person as he uses the butt of his Beretta to start pounding the pieces of egg into nothing but dust.
…Except…not quite.
When he smashes one of the large chunks, a piece of black metal suddenly appears and clatters away across the table. Drazen smiles, his eyes glinting as he reaches over and holds it up to the light triumphantly.
I blink.
It’s akey.
Drazen turns to the old wooden base, and rips the black metal stand out of the wood, revealing a hole in the box beneath it.
Holy shit. Not a hole.
Akeyhole.
Eilish and I lock eyes before we both stare at Drazen, who is slowly inserting the key into the lock and twisting it with a small metallic clicking sound.
Suddenly, the top pops open.
“You see, Mr. Tsarenko,” Drazen says quietly, picking the box up and staring into it with a dreamy, meditative look on his face. “It’s not the egg that was my birthright. It wasthese.”
My eyes bulge in disbelief as he turns the base of the stand over, and proceeds to dump a fuckingriverof gleaming, glitteringjewelsout onto the table.
What. The.Fuck.
Drazen smiles widely, gesturing with the gun in his hand. “A pity that the egg needs to be destroyed to open the box. But that is what a shield does, no? Much like my great-great-grandfather. A shield protects the…” he reaches into the box and grunts as he wrestles something heavy free before pulling out his hand and revealing a gleaming, glittering, diamond-encrusted royal crown.
He glances at me and smirks. “A shield protects the crown, does it not?” Drazen glances at Eilish, then back to me. He nods. “I have what is mine. Thank you. Now you may take what is yours.”
He’s barely finished his sentence before I bolt around the table and grab Eilish. I tear off the ropes binding her arms, then her gag. With a choked sob, she wraps her arms around me so fucking tight I almost can’t breathe, clinging to me as she buries her face in my chest. I close my eyes, sucking in air shakily as I stroke her hair, before pulling back. Our eyes lock, and a half second later, my mouth is searing to hers.
But before any more of that, there’s something I have to do.
“Thisis how I’ll be ascending to the High Council, Mr. Tsarenko. Perhaps we’ll see each other—”
I whirl and launch myself at Drazen, catching him off guard as my fist slams into his face. He groans, staggering backward with me on top of him as I pummel his face again and again before grabbing him by the collar.
Drazen groans, gritting his teeth. “Yes, I deserve that, for taking your woman. But ask her,” he hisses. “I never once touched her.”
My lips curl as I glance to the side, to Eilish. She nods.
“He didn’t. Not a single one of this men did, either. There was that one woman who helped me around and fed me, that was it.”
