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“Why is she still tied up?” he asks, glaring at me and ready to untie his little girl.
“Because she hasn’t learned to behave yet.”
“Fuck off, you piece of shit.” She jerks in her chair, hissing at me, trying to kick me but the guys tied her ankles. There goes her true colors.
Her father nods his head, crosses his arms, and says, “Fair enough.” Damn that burns. I’ve been his loyal dog for years, protecting his family, especially Natalya while he double crossed me.
“What? You’re sticking up for him when you didn’t even want me to marry him?”
He shakes his head, pulls a chair close to Natalya, and takes a seat. “I never said that, my dear girl. I don’t want you to be married to anyone yet, but if there is anyone, it’s Ilya.”
She tilts her head and stares at him in complete confusion. “Then why did you say he was marrying someone in a Russian family within the next year?”
He clamps his mouth shut and breathes through his nose, rubbing his hands on his thighs before saying, “Are we not a Russian family?”
“Are you kidding me?” Now her temper has turned on him. I cross my arms and smirk.
He looks at both of us and says, “I expected your mothers to take months to plan a wedding.” Then he crunches hisknuckles and continues, “I had other reasons. Even after vetting your friends, I didn’t trust them.”
“But you knew how devastated I was, and you could have told me.” Fuck. Her voice cracking almost sends me to my knees. The thought of her heart breaking for no damn reason guts me. I’ve loved her for so long. She has no need to feel pain except for missing me.
“I could have said something, yet every time I asked you how you felt about Ilya, you lied to me.” She has the shame to duck her head and blush. I love the pretty pink that dusts her cheeks.
I tip her chin and say, “You look down to no one.”
“Are you going to untie me?” she questions, looking at me with sad eyes, but I’m still not sure if she’s going to leave me, and I can’t let that happen. I love this woman to the point of madness. There’s no way in hell I’ll let her go.
“Not until you tell me why you ran off, and where the fuck is your diamond ring?”
“It’s at the condo. I got a voicemail from Junior who told me you were at the club when you were shot. I felt hurt and lied to. I was kept caged while you did whatever you pleased.”
“Your brother said that?” I could snap his fucking neck. We didn’t get along for so long. I wonder if he just played nice this past year as an act.
“Yes.”
“No, he didn’t,” my godfather says, shaking his head.
“I have the voicemail,” Natalya insists, so I open my phone and log into her phone, checking her messages andfinding the one that supposedly came from her brother, but the number comes up spoofed and it’s not his. I play it on speaker, getting pissed off by the second. “What the fuck? You have access to my phone.”
“I told you; you were mine, and I’d do anything to protect you.”
Drago shakes his head. “Your brother is on a special…mission and isn’t available for the next two days. He has no idea that you’re here or even that we were looking for you.” I knew there was something up with the spoofed number.
“What?”
“It could be AI-generated,” I explain, reaching around and untying my future wife.
Her hand comes out and slaps me across the face. “What the fuck were you doing in a strip club in the first place?” I suppose I had that one coming.
“Anatoly needed help finding some of his girls that were kidnapped, and the kidnapper requested that a ransom be delivered by me. I was in his office—not watching the entertainment—when we had our meeting. We were headed out the back entrance when we were both shot, along with some of our men.” She gasps, her mouth falling open. My hands go to her legs, and I cut the ties on her ankles. I remember her hand running over the scar, and I didn’t let her ask the question.
“Did you get the girls back?” I rub her wrists, placing kisses on her sore and reddened flesh.
I shake my head. “No, the bastard had no intention of giving them back. He killed them well before requesting the money. It was a game for the sick Italian fuck.”
She gasps and then says, “There was an Italian who found me when I left the condo, and he said he was looking for me.”
“He probably was waiting for the perfect moment to strike,” Drago mutters.
