Merciless Union by Faith Summers

44

Lucca

This is where it has to happen— right here in this room.

The room they all died in.

I want Damien to meet me here so the ghosts of my family can see me deal with the man who betrayed us.

When I ask him why he did what he did, I want them to hear, and when I kill him, I want them to see.

I have the place surrounded by my men and everyone on the lookout. Everyone currently on the grounds of the estate is a skilled fighter and armed with machine guns. Look at them the wrong way, and you’re dead. All the other staff who could get hurt are not here.

Aria left for Aiden’s a little while ago, so she won’t see the monster I need to become when I butcher Damien.

I never want her to see that part of me, and after today, I hope I don’t have to kill like this again.

Then again, this is the last man who hurt me.

He’s coming on the basis of the company. I called him earlier, inviting him here. We talked like everything was fine and normal. I told him I had the paperwork for the company, and I wanted to get everything sorted out before my wife’s birthday tomorrow.

He sounded like the same old Damien, no different.

He should be here any minute now.

I look around the room and focus on the places where the bodies of my family once lay.

My mother, my father, my sisters, and my brother.

In the corner is the little rabbit Jessa used to play with. I chose the book today—Gulliver’s travels.

It’s set up just like it was back then.

Footsteps echo on the floor, and I’m brought from the daze of the memory.

It’s time.

I gather the paperwork. I brought it to make everything look as legit as possible.

Alexei ushers Damien inside and leaves us.

Right now, he’s the best man I know here and the only one I knew I could trust to carry out everything this far, knowing what I intend to do.

“Damien, good to see you,” I say with a forced smile.

If he’s picked up that everything about me is forced today, he’s doing a good job of hiding it.

“Likewise, moy syn.”

That is the first time he’s called me that, and it made me feel physically sick.

“I’m sorry I should be calling you, Pakhan,” he adds quickly. “I’m very proud of you.”

My eyes have been open enough to see through the shit. How can he be fucking proud of me when I’m sure he would have killed to be in my position? I surpassed him in every way.

When I thought about it last night, I realized there’s no way he would have even been happy that I was made Obshchak and not him. He would have just played along because of our plans to destroy Raphael.

“Thank you. It’s strange, but like everything I do, I’ll do my best.”

“Of course.”

“Well, shall we get down to business then?”

“Yes, I just wish we weren’t in this room.”

I was about to come to that, but since he’s ahead of me, why wait?

I always thought he hated this room nearly as much as me? I never knew that he might hate it because of guilt.

There’s an obvious tension between us, and as I look at him, I don’t think there’s any way he can’t sense that things aren’t right between us.

There’s a vibe coming off him that makes me think he knows exactly why I called him here, and it’s not for the reason it would have been if our plan had been successful.

“I hate this room,” I state. “But I thought it was fitting for us to be here today to do this.”

Nobody knows me more than him, so the shift in his mood is a tell that he’s on the same page as me.

“Why?” he rasps.

“How about you tell me why, Damien?”

A flicker of fear races over his face. “You know the truth, don’t you?”

“I do. I know the parts that apply to me.”

“Why did you bother with the paperwork?” he glances at it.

“Because Cervantes is very much a part of the shit as everything else. It’s what you wanted most in the grand scheme of things. It might not have been what you always wanted, but it was the reason you got me involved. That night at the morgue, I was going to kill Raphael. That was the first thing I was going to do, but you stopped me. You wanted to destroy him, and you knew from way back when that the biggest thing we could ever take from him is the company.” I’ve had time to think.

I’ve had time to piece certain parts of the puzzle together to see where I fit and where I was used.

“Am I right?” I add.

“Yes.”

I give him a crude smile. “How’d you guess I knew the truth?”

“When you asked me about Pasha the other day and killing Theresa De Marchi, I hoped you wouldn’t dig deeper. I knew you would believe your wife over me and then figure out that I couldn’t have killed her because of the company when we already had our plan in motion.” He draws in a haggard breath. “When the secret came out, I knew you’d link me in some way because you’d know I lied about how I worked for Pasha. Then when we got word that Miska had been killed. I knew you did it. I knew somehow you would have seen him at Mendes’ place. There was no reason for you to look for him other than you must have remembered seeing him here after your family was killed. Am I right?”

“I feel like clapping. You are spot on. What I don’t know, though, is if you knew Timothy died because of the secret. That’s the part that doesn’t make any sense.”

“I didn’t know.” He tenses his shoulders. “They kept me out because he was my son, and that’s why Raphael made it look like enemies got to him. But he slipped up when he left his fucking ring at the crime scene. It wasn’t until you told me he was on the hit list that I knew the truth, but then we were both in so deep that I couldn’t turn back. I just prayed you’d never find Gina because it would ruin everything.”

“How the fuck can you say that?”

“Because it meant this situation here between us.”

“I see, and how the fuck are you going to explain your hand in my family’s death?” I ball my hands.

“I can’t. Do you want to hear how I betrayed my best friend? I don’t think you do because nothing I say will matter.”

It’s now rage that fills me. “You think it won’t matter, and you shouldn’t explain yourself?. You are truly fucking despicable, and I want to know why you did it. I want to know how you could think it was okay to just kill them for a fucking secret. The children, Damien. You thought that was okay? My brother…” My fucking voice trails off as emotion chases away my words.

He shakes his head. “No. I hate myself every day for what I did. Your father never knew of my secret work for Pasha, and I hoped I would never have to do anything against somebody I cared about. When that secret dropped, and Lucian got involved, I wished like fuck he didn’t. Pasha knew I was the only one who could get on to the property without alerting anyone, and that’s why he used me.”

“What you mean is you opened the door and allowed those men to come in.” Of course, he did. The guards wouldn’t have even questioned a man like Damien on the grounds. Everything Damien did that night would have been a surprise attack and my father never even knew they were coming because Gina couldn’t alert him. Had he known, he wouldn’t have allowed me out, and security would have been tighter.

But Damien, his best friend, knew.

“Pasha threatened my family’s life, Lucca. He threatened death if I didn’t do it. He would have stripped me of my position as a Vor, but that wouldn’t have mattered as much as losing my son and, at the time, my parents. All I could do to make up for what I did was take you in when I found you and raise you, and he only allowed it because his father knew you survived.”

“You raised me in a lie.” He could have found a way. I’m not going to take pity on him because he got caught in shit. Nothing excuses him because he could have gone to Grigori. He had the power to do so. “If you’d gone to Grigori, at least you would have tried.”

“I couldn’t take the risk.”

“So instead, you helped Raphael keep Pasha’s dirty, destructive secret.”

“I hate Raphael.”

“That’s bull shit to me now. None of it means anything.” I’m done with this. He’s told me all I need to know about the past. There’s nothing more he can add besides shit I don’t want to hear. What I’m interested in now is if he’s figured me out, and if he’s still clearly working for Pasha, what’s he doing now?

He wouldn’t have come here unprepared, and I don’t think he would have allowed himself to fall under my control without an exit route.

“What’s going on, Damien?” I ask.

“Pasha wants Cervantes. He’s offered to make me a business partner and the position of Sovietnik in the Yurkov once he returns to power.”

There we go. “So much for feeling guilty, Damien Mikhailov. What about Raphael?”

“Pasha will deal with him.”

“Oh really? Well, both those things require me dead.”

“This is something you can’t fight, and I can’t save you this time. Cervantes is the only thing I have left in this world to live for. Pasha is too strong for you; he has help from Tobias and those from the Yurkov who followed him. You’ve already lost, moy syn.”

“Don’t you fucking call me that ever again. You talk to me like you don’t know who I am. How the fuck do you people think you’re going to kill me? I could cut your head off before you take your next breath.”

“I know, and that’s why we got to your weaknesses.”

I’m about to mouth off about shit and tell him I have no weaknesses, but the fucking words don’t come.

I do have weaknesses.

“What did you do?” I demand.

“Pasha has Aria.”

“How?” My heart stops in my chest.

I don’t understand. She went to Aiden’s. No one can just get on to Aiden’s property. Aiden would have called me.

“You planned to send your pregnant wife to Aiden’s for safety, but she didn’t reach him. The two guards you arranged to accompany Levka weren’t just Grigori’s personal guards; they were spies for Pasha.”

God, no. No, no, fucking no. I was so fucking careful. I sent her with the best people. Shit. This isn’t happening to me again.

My wife and my baby are in danger.

I reach for my gun. “ Give her back to me now, or you’re dead.”

“No, you don’t understand. I don’t die in this scenario. You sign over all the paperwork to me along with Aria’s legal guardianship, and we allow her to live. Your life for hers.”

“I don’t fucking believe this. I want to talk to her and make sure she’s alive.” I’m fucking stuck, caught in this tangled web of deceit and shit where I don’t know if I can fight back.

My hands tighten on my gun when he reaches for his phone and dials a number.

“Here,” he says, handing it to me.

I take it and press it to my ear while I keep my gun trained on him.

“Lucca,” Aria cries out, and I feel like dying for hearing her voice.

“Aria, I’m so sorry. I’ll save you.”

“No, don’t do it.”

“You know I will.”

She breaks down because she knows I’ll do everything inside me to protect her.

There’s laughter in the background on her end of the line. I recognize the sound. It’s that motherfucker Raphael.

“Lucca,” his voice comes on the line.

“You dog! Fucking dog. I’ll kill you.”

“I would love to see you try. You’re scum. Have always been scum and will always be. I should kill you for impregnating my daughter.”

“She’s not your daughter.”

“She had my name, and people think she is. It’s enough to loathe any part of you inside her, disgusting scum. I have one last ace up my sleeve, though, for both you and Damien.” My gaze flicks over to Damien, who is watching with anticipation. “Do me a big favor and put me on speakerphone.”

“Why the fuck should I do you any favors?”

“Oh, believe me, this is a favor you’re going to love. I have something to say that Damien needs to hear.”

I don’t know what’s going on here, but I’ll follow to play along.

When I set the phone on the little table, Damien stares at me.

“Talk, Raphael,” I growl.

“Wonderful,” he laughs. “The two of you set out to destroy me; well, today, I’m going to destroy both of you.”

Damien stiffens. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about the fact that you are so fucking greedy it’s easy to trick and trap you. You’re no better than a donkey with a carrot dangling in front of it. There is no deal with Pasha, Damien. We both used you to send a message to Lucca and get rid of your ass. Think about it, why the hell would Pasha want to co-own a company like Cervantes with you when he could with me? I’m the governor of California, and my seat on the Camorra is just warming. What the fuck do you have?”

“You bastard, let me speak to Pasha,” Damien rushes over to the phone but, in his panic, doesn’t take it off speakerphone.

“Lucca, this man betrayed you and your family. How disgusting is he?” Raphael taunts. “And look at him still in his greed, willing to be business partners with the man who ordered the death of the same son he basically murdered your family to protect. I don’t know what disgusts me more. That, or what you did to betray Lucian Dyshekov and his family. Why don’t you tell the boy how you stood outside the window and watched the family getting ready to settle down for the evening and their book. Why don’t you tell the boy that was when you called me to let me know it was time to strike? Why don’t you tell the boy how you let the men in through the back entrance and turned off the camera’s so the guards wouldn’t see? Why don’t you tell the boy it was you who shot Marylin’s husband on your way out because you were a coward who didn’t want to watch the men rape his mother and sister? Why don’t you just tell the boy you’re ready for death? Merciless, it’s time to kill him, don’t you think?”

Damien opens his mouth to talk, but I shoot him. The bullets leave my gun, and they don’t stop until there’s nothing left.

All I saw as the bullets flew was Damien falling to the ground, then his head becoming a bloodied mess as each shot pulverizes him.

Now he lays right under the beam my father hung from.

I clasp my hand over my mouth to hold in the rage I still want to unleash. I do it because I still have to keep my shit together.

The laughter that booms from the phone Damien dropped reminds me exactly that.

“Finished? Or does he still draw breath?” Raphael asks.

I pick up the phone and take it off the speakerphone. “Tell me how I get my wife back, alive.”

“You sign all the paperwork and bring it to me at the address I’m going to send you in a minute. You come alone without your guns, and she will walk out of here in one piece. That’s just securing her freedom. But like Damien said, Pasha is too strong for you. He wants the Yurkov back, and he wants you dead. A life for two lives—Aria’s and your baby. That is the deal, Merciless, should you wish to accept.”

“I accept,” I say even though I don’t believe for one second that he’s going to allow Aria to walk away unscathed.

Why would he when he planned to kill her anyway?

But I’m going because I can’t take any risks whatsoever with my wife and my child.