Owned by the Mob Boss: A Dark Mafia Romance (Ivanovich Bratva) Nicole Fox (year 7 reading list .txt) 📖

In a weird way, it’s a helpful reminder of what I have to do. “If that bastard had killed Ashley, is there anything in the world that would stop you going after him?”

“It is not the same. I am a soldier—”

“Erik!” I snap. I grip onto his neck and pull him toward me, reading the pain in his eyes. But it’s not pain for himself. It’s pain for me. “You said it yourself: I’m a Bratva queen. Well, a queen doesn’t hide in the shadows when there’s work to be done. Or am I wrong? I need to do this. You can’t make me hide.”

He lets out a groan, shoulders slumping for a moment.

“You will stay behind me,” he says. “And just know, Camille, that if something happens to you … I will never forgive myself.”

He touches my face. I don’t care that his hands are slick with blood. We are in a world of blood now. Again, that out-of-body feeling comes over me. I wonder what the old Camille would say.

But that doesn’t matter. She’s gone.

Only this new Camille is left.

“I love you,” he whispers, thumb tracing my cheek. He hefts his gun. “Behind me. Am I clear?”

I look down at Rob one last time, fighting the nursing instinct to fall to my knees and try to resuscitate him. Mom’s heart is going to shatter when she hears the news.

“I’m ready,” I growl, tightening my grip on the pistol.

27

Erik

“There’re more of them in the mansion, boss,” Oleg says, eyeing Camille speculatively.

I give him a look which means he shouldn’t ask any questions. Oleg has always been quick on the uptake. He nods shortly and waves a hand at the library.

“Two in there,” he mutters. “But I heard some ruckus coming from down the hallway. The bastards must’ve been planning this for a damn long time, paying off the guards, scaling the walls for all we know. We need to search the place.”

“Call Anatoly,” I tell him. “We need backup.”

“Is Fyodor in there?” Camille asks, gesturing at the library with the pistol.

The sight of her with a gun in her hand, her bandage spotted with red, tells me that I have crossed the threshold into a strange dreamlike reality. She should be riding swiftly into the city by now, toward some safe house. Yet looking into her eyes downstairs, I saw the pain at Rob’s death. I felt it, as though he was my brother too. The connection between us is too strong to sever so easily.

Still, it does not mean I am happy about this.

“Well?” Camille urges, when Oleg looks at me for permission to answer.

I give him a short nod.

“No,” he says. “I thought he was but when I poked my head around the door, it was two bastards I didn’t recognize. Sorry to say, boss, but they’ve tipped over one of your bookcases to use for a barricade. Never been much into reading, but still seems damn rude.”

“So he’s in the house somewhere,” Camille whispers darkly. “This way, you said?”

“Watch the door,” I tell Oleg. “And if there’s—”

Suddenly the door crashes open, almost flying off the hinges. I throw myself in front of Camille, firing off a shot that cleaves through the forehead of the first man. More shots bite at the air all around us. One bullet finds purchase in Oleg. He grumbles, falls flat on his face, tossing his hand out wildly at the last second to fire one final bullet.

It strikes the second in the knee, sending him in a mess of limbs to the floor.

Time seems to slow as I take in Oleg, blood spewing in a liquid gush from his neck, his last words throttled in frantic breaths.

He was my most trusted man.

He was my friend.

He was a good, solid, loyal soldier.

And now he’s dead.

I sprint across the hallway and kick the man in the face as he tries to clamber back to his feet. With a bony crunch, my bare foot catches him in the eye. Pain flares up my leg as two of my toes snap. I ignore it, falling upon him with waling hands, fists battering him into the floor.

By the time I am done, his face is no longer a face.

I run back over to Camille. She’s staring at me wide-eyed, shock moving through her like an electric current.

“We …” She visibly hardens herself. Her eyes get narrow and purposeful. Pride touches me. “We need to find him. We need to make him pay.”

I take Oleg’s cell phone from his pocket—not looking into the face of my dead friend—and call Anatoly. He takes the instructions quickly, not asking me to repeat anything, and then assures me that he will be here soon.

“Wait for me, nephew,” he says. “We cannot risk your death.”

Now I do look at Oleg, a big open-mouthed smile on his face. It is really a warped expression of death, but it is easy to imagine him at the Ruble, a girl in his lap and a whiskey in his hand. If it were not for that traitorous dog Fyodor, he would still be alive.

And then I look at Camille: the rage running through her, the bandage getting redder every second.

“I cannot promise that,” I snarl into the phone, hanging up.

“Which way?” Camille asks, eager like a soldier ready to prove her worth.

“Camille—”

“I’m not leaving!” she snaps. “So stop asking. Which way?”

I grab her uninjured arm and move her behind me.

I head down the hallway with the gun raised, my belly constantly tightening as though my ab muscles could tear apart any second. My bandage is soaked through and I feel myself getting lightheaded, but I ignore it all.

I can collapse once Fyodor is dead, once Camille is safe.

“We need to search each room one by one,” Camille whispers once we have cleared the entire top floor.

The rat could be anywhere.

He easily could’ve gone downstairs when we were dealing with the guards. The heightened battle state grips me, everything becoming hyperreal. The shadows of