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Doc talks for a while and explains that I won’t be able to move much for the next few days and that he is having a team move me to the suite once I can get around better. He wants to keep an eye on me for the next three weeks before I resume normal activity, and I watch my uncle absorb it all.
This isn’t going to his plan. I was supposed to go home with the Kings and kill Boris over break, which means he’s pissed. Maybe he shouldn’t have sent his men after me.Asshole.He schools his rage and puts on the act of a concerned uncle like a champ. When Doc is finished, he leaves and it's just me and my uncle, as far as he knows at least.
Carefully, I take Lev’s hand in mine, centering myself in the moment.
“Little Warrior, what the hell happened?”
I let the fake tears fall and I see him attempt to soften for me. It’s amazing how much I can see he fakes with me now that I know who he really is. The tick in his jaw when I get upset isn’t him wanting to defend me, it’s him being angry he has to restructure the plan. The way he closes his eyes in frustration as if he’s appalled any of this could happen to me here is grade-A acting, but it’s all an act.
“I swear I’m going to get him. If it’s the last thing I do. I swear it.”
The smile that stretches across his face as I say the words I know he’s been wanting to hear is vile. It’s full of the most arrogant evil I’ve ever witnessed, and it makes me hate him even more. Lev begins to rub circles on my leg with his free hand and I take a breath, not wanting to come across as furious as I really am.
“That’s my Warrior. You get some rest. Heal. I’ll call you before people return so we can strategize a new plan to take them down. We need them at their weakest so you can strike. Don’t forget to keep taking your medications so you can recover quickly. They won’t get away with doing this to you. You may not be my daughter, but I sure as hell will defend you like you are.”
I nod at him because if I were to speak, I would yell. I would tear into him for not knowing what family really is. I would tell him of all the ways I want to destroy him. But instead, I take a breath, a long one that I pretend is me being in pain so he stays none the wiser.
“Thank you,” I say through gritted teeth. Then, I end the call with words that I strongly believe. “No one attacks my family and gets away with it. Their murders will be avenged if it’s the last thing I do.”
It’s the only honest thing I’ve said during this call, and I feel relieved that I mean it. He will pay for what he did. I don’t know how just yet, but I’ll give my life for it if I have to. He will not win.
When the call goes dark, Lev takes the phone from my hand and pulls me into his chest. I’ve learned not to fight them when they want me close, so I move with him so that my stitches don’t pull.
We lay there together while I doze in and out. It’s amazing how peaceful I’m starting to feel, sleeping without the constant nightmares. The anxiety about sleep is still there, but Damien taught me a few things to help my mind relax. I take a deep breath for four seconds, hold for four seconds, and release for four.
“You okay with this? Talk to me, Lucky Charm.”
I turn in his hold as he props himself up on his side so we are facing each other.
“It’s all a lot, but if you haven’t noticed, I tend to figure it out. It is nice not having to figure it out on my own though.”
Having his support over the past few days has changed something in me. I don’t plan on relying on them for everything, but knowing I have someone who will back me up has boosted my confidence when I’ve been down.
“You’re never going to have to again if you stick with us,” he says, rubbing his nose against mine. I smile at how cute he is. This big, tatted, pierced man is giving me nose kisses in my hospital bed as he cuddles with me.Gods I love this man.
I nuzzle into his chest with a huge ass smile on my face. Things are going to get better. They have to.
Chapter 12
This is a mess. Everything I’ve done up to this point has been carefully constructed. Make her depend on me. Create trauma so she can’t see through the pain. Have her therapists push her to seek revenge.
It’s not because she’s the only one who can do this job, it’s because of what he did to me. My brother’s best friend. They left me when I started working with the Shades, saying they would rather align themselves with the Russian mafia than with a ruthless assassin organization that holds more power than they ever could. Damir claimed we had no morals, but he was the one who sold his kid before he even knew her.
Too bad that backfired on him. I knew Boris would never take Eydis away from him. The man loved my brother more than our own mother did. He just wanted to show him the power he held, wanted to own a piece of him so he could claim they were closer than brothers, as if to spit in my face. Boris and I never got along. But my brother and I had been thick as thieves, literally, until he came along promising my brother the world.
So pathetic—holding something over someone's head so that they stay close to you. He’s weaker than my own brother. When he turned his back on me, my fiancéleft with them, claiming she didn’t know me anymore, didn’t feel safe with me. She ran into Boris’ arms, and his bed, falling in love with him before she even sent back the ring I gave her. Now the bitch got exactly what she deserved.
I swore I would get revenge on both of them for turning their backs on me, my own blood. I found the perfect person to team up with to make it all happen. He thought the Russian mafia was so great, so I’m going to take that too. I had my brother killed along with his precious wife all at the hands of someone who truly believed in me and the power I would hold one day. Then, I took his kid and made her trust me. Had her looking only to me for a purpose. I taught her to only want revenge and never allowed her to see another purpose in the world.
You see, the problem with turning your back on someone who joins an organization without morals is that it makes you a target.
I created trauma at every turn for his little girl so that she never had time to think about anything other than pain. I crafted friendships so that they could be broken and made sure my men showed her where she belonged. Yet, she surprised me and rose above it all.
I truly thought she might be unbreakable until I sent her to that prison camp. It took over thirty days before I saw her giving up. Longer than any other man I've sent there. I think that’s the only reason I was ever able to pretend to love her. It was never her I adored, it was what she could do for me.
And now that’s all gone to shit.
Bryce went and got himself killed after going above my head on the matter. The girl I set up to feed me intel went dark after I had her plant a video that would prevent Evie from trusting those damn kings ever again. The men I sent to torture Eydis so that she thought the kings were after her all ended up dead, not to mention the fact that the torture was taken way too far. The only survivors were the clean-up crew I flew in so none of them could be traced back to me.
