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At some point, he turned me toward him, away from the fucking cameras. I buried my face into the side of his neck, soaking his expensive suit with my hysteria. His arms didn’t loosen and he didn’t speak, not until the outside world forced him to step back.
Someone walked up to us and cleared their throat.
“Marek?” The voice wasn’t Misha’s.
I turned my bleary gaze toward the cop, one I recognized from any number of domestics over the years.
“What happened?” I asked, drying my face with the edge of my sleeve, even though the tears kept coming. “What happened to my brother?”
The cop, Ramos, shook his head sadly. “Drive by.”
“Not a robbery?” Misha asked behind me.
Ramos looked at him and shook his head again. “They didn’t stop. Witnesses described a Navigator with purple lights in the rims.”
“That’s Alonzo’s fucking car!” I practically lunged at the cop. Misha’s hands reattached themselves to my biceps and he reeled me backward, out of Ramos’s face. “Are you saying Alonzo murdered my brother?!”
Ramos didn’t have to say anything because the answer was right there on his goddamn face.
“Are you going to fuckingdosomething about it this time?!” I demanded.
“We’re going to try.”
I snorted. “Yeah. I won’t hold my fucking breath.” Somehow I managed to rip myself free from Misha’s grasp and darted away, shoving through the crowd roughly.
Misha caught up to me in no time. “Where are you going?”
“Where the fuck do you think I’m going? I’m going to get my fucking siblings, the only two I have left, and get them away from that fucking crack whore! And then I’m going to track down that motherfucker who shot my brother and—”
“You’ll be dead before you get anywhere near him.”
“Ask me if I fucking care!”
“Icare!” He grabbed my wrist and whipped me around, a surprisingly lethal look on his face. “You don’t have the training or the resources.Iwill deal with him.”
I yanked my wrist free with a glare. “Oh, really? You’ll just ‘deal’ with him? Like last time? What are you going to do now? Murder him? Because money doesn’t make this problem go away. He’ll keep coming back again and again. Just like Ken. They don’t give a fuck about anything except getting their way. Whatever fucking honor codeyoulive by,theydon’t!”
“He took Axel. It’s his turn to suffer and I promise you he will.”
“And then what? His people will come after you next!”
“I guarantee they won’t.”
I shook my head, backing away from him. “No. I won’t let you get hurt because of me. This is my mess.”
“It’smymess now. He didn’t just kill your brother tonight, Marek, he spit on my goodwill. He had his warning and he chose to disregard it, even after he’d been paid. This is bigger than you or Axel now. If people learn he disrespected my organization like this, it opens us to attack from every side. AndthatI will not allow.”
Deep down, I knew he was right. Power was everything with guys in Misha’s world. If some other gang or mafia found out the Russians were insulted like that and didn’t retaliate, their criminal currency would be bankrupt. But knowing that didn’t make it any easier to swallow.
“Will you take me to the house?” I asked quietly. Leaving the killing to Mishawasthe safest course of action for everyone. Plus, I didn’t want to stand around arguing with him anymore, not when my other siblings were potentially next on Alonzo’s hit list.
Misha nodded. “Of course.”
36
MISHA
Guilt satin the pit of my stomach like a giant stone as I drove Marek to retrieve his siblings. His only siblings, as he said, because I’d gotten the other one killed. As the leader of his own gang, I thought Alonzo understood the nuanced balance of power and how to maintain it with other leaders so everyone benefitted. I’d underestimated his pettiness and Marek paid for my mistake.
