AllFreeNovel
Share Us
We jog up the short staircase that opens to the roof of The STRAT. It’s a secluded corner tucked away around the back of the hotel. Val takes a few steps forward, stretches her arms in the air, and takes in a large gulp of air.
God, her ass looks so good in those short shorts. The cheeks peek out from under the fringe of denim, and I just want to drop to my knees and bite them.
Like she can sense my eyes on her, she turns to face me, a smile lifting her lips. “This was a pretty good idea.”
I shrug. “I have them sometimes.”
“We’ll see if this is a one-and-done kind of thing.” Then she winks at me.
Shit, she does have a sense of humor after all.
“How’d you get yourself wrapped up in this whole quest for Branko Ivanova?” I lower myself onto a whitewashed ledge surrounding what looks like a generator. “Why’d Alek pick you?”
Val stares past me at the lit-up desert below, a faraway look in her eyes. “After Charly and I were taken… after I was rescued… I told my dad I never wanted to be in that position again. So I trained with him first and then with Katarina. Boris had connections to Alek and his family, so he hooked me up.”
“Yep, she’s brutal. Her reputation precedes her.”
Val’s face relaxes into a smile. “The most brutal. Anyway, a few years passed, and all the while, Dad had been trying to track down the people who killed Charly and targeted us. Turns out it was a member of this secret society, Brotherhood 7. And Branko had turned the members against my dad. They weren’t always enemies, but Branko wasn’t happy with the direction the Brotherhood was taking, so he decided to destroy my father and brother Dima who was next in line.”
“Betrayal.” I nod. “Had my fair share of that. So these guys… they’re the ones who killed your father and brother?”
“Yes. And my mother, years later. They also almost killed Luka, who’s now the boss.” Val twists her ponytail around her finger. “It’s like he won’t stop until he gets us all. Or until I gethim.”
“You said you came close. How?”
“Dad knew one of the guys in the Brotherhood was working against him. He always suspected something was happening behind the scenes but couldn’t prove it before he was killed. A lot of what we know is stuff we’ve put together from what we’ve heard or found.” Val lets out a deep sigh and sits down next to me. “He needed someone on the inside. I volunteered because nobody else in my family knew about Charly or why we were hunting Branko. Dad suspected it was him behind our kidnapping. He arranged for me to marry the son of this guy Stepanov just so I could spy and find out the truth.”
“Shit, so you’ve already been married?”
“No, it never got that far.” Her face clouds over, her forehead pinched with pain. “That was the night Dad and Dima were gunned down. At my freaking almost wedding to that sadistic asshole Dmitri Stepanov. That’s when Alek pulled me. He got me out of the venue when my family was under attack. That was five years ago. I haven’t been home since. I’ve been tracking enemies of my family and of Red Ladro.”
Red Ladro is the one link we have in common, how we all are tethered to one another. It’s the crime syndicate our families are part of. There are seven families in total, and Alek is the senior member who governs all of the activities. We all invest in businesses and work to protect our collective interests.
Val’s lips twist. “And as a member of Red Ladro, you get why Alek is so pissed at you, right?”
I let out an exasperated sigh. “Yeah, yeah. I did something that’s gonna blow back on the group. I get it. I fucked up.”
“Being out here is your penance.”
“Is it yours?” I ask, my brows knitted together.
“After everything my family has dealt with, now this will blow onto them, too. I was supposed to stop it years ago and I didn’t. Denis Stepanov is still out there, still biding his time before the next attack is launched against us.” She looks up at me. “My penance is self-imposed. I gave up my freedom to hunt this guy because of what I let him do to my family.”
I lean toward her and graze the side of her cheek with my fingertips. “Never be sorry for what you did. You saved that girl the other night. She was steps away from losing her life forever.”
“Alek was right. I let my guilt guide my decision. It was stupid.”
“Nobody’s perfect.”
“In this life, you need to be.” A flicker of sadness glimmers in her eyes as the dusky sky deepens. “And I still haven’t been able to make up for it.”
“You tried. Hell, you were gonna get married to make things right.”
“Yeah. Have you ever been arranged to marry someone?”
I let out a snort. “I’m not exactly the marrying type. Sometimes I think my brother Patty would rather keep me locked away than put me in charge of something as important as a family union.”
“Technically, isn’t that what you’re doing now?”
