Ruthless Stranger by Maggie Cole

33

Maksim

In the middleof the night, my phone rings. I pick it up quickly so I don't wake Aspen then get out of bed and go into the bathroom. "Obrecht."

"They're here."

Oxygen slowly fills my lungs, and my bear comes out of hibernation. I crack my neck. "All of them?"

"Yes."

"Was it discreet?"

Obrecht's voice lowers. "Are you trying to insult me?"

"Point taken. Don't leave. I'll be there shortly." I hang up and call Boris.

"Maksim," he answers.

"Did I wake you?"

He snorts. "Nope."

"We need to meet Obrecht at the garage."

Boris takes a deep, controlled inhale. "You going to let me have some fun?"

"Sure. I'll give you one."

"Good. I won't hold it against you for pulling me out of my warm bed."

Nora groans.

Boris says something muffled to her.

"If Nora's awake, can she come over and stay with Aspen? She's asleep, and I don't want her here by herself."

"Sure. You call the others yet?"

"No."

"Call Dmitri. I'll phone Sergey."

"Thanks." As soon as I hang up, I ring Dmitri.

"Hello?" Anna answers.

"Sorry to wake you."

Concern laces her voice. "Maksim, you okay?"

"Yes. Is Dmitri awake?"

"No, but I'm assuming you need me to wake him?"

"Please."

"Hold on."

I wait for several minutes. I go to the doorway and glance back at my bed. My krasotka is still sleeping.

Dmitri clears his voice. "Maksim."

I go back into the bathroom. "We need to meet Obrecht at the garage."

"How many?"

"Five."

"The others know?"

"Boris was calling Sergey. Nora is coming to stay with Aspen."

"Hold on," Dmitri replies. Then his muffled voice says, "Anna, I have to go out. Nora is going to stay with Aspen. I think you should go there. I don't know how long we'll be."

They murmur, and Dmitri comes back on the line. "I'm going to drop Anna off."

"All right."

I get changed and write Aspen a letter while I'm waiting for the others to arrive.

My Krasotka,

I'll be home as soon as I can, but it might not be for several days. Please do not worry. Nora and Anna are staying, but invite your friends over to help pass the time if you want.

Love,

Maksim

I setthe letter on my pillow and kiss her forehead. She stirs but doesn't open her eyes. I creep out of the room and shut the door.

Boris and Nora arrive first. He takes her bag to one of the guest rooms and comes back out right as Dmitri and Anna arrive.

Anna hugs me. "Aspen still asleep?"

"Yes. Her pain meds make her tired. Her pills are on the counter, and I've been keeping a chart when I gave her them in case this came up."

Anna's lips twitch. "Aww. Aren't you sweet? I always knew you were a softy though."

"Funny."

She yawns. "Okay. I'm going to bed. Be careful. All of you."

Dmitri picks up her suitcase and follows her down the hall.

Sergey steps into the penthouse. He's dressed in all black like the rest of us. "Why do I feel this will be almost as good as slicing Zamir?"

"Wes is mine."

Sergey's eyes darken. "They're still Petrovs."

"I hate we have to pin this on Rossi's men. I'd love nothing more than to see Zamir's face when he finds out his beloved son is dead, and it was at the hands of the Ivanovs."

I point in Boris's face. "Zamir cannot know this was us. Not yet. We must pin this on the Rossis."

Boris licks his lips, and his face hardens. "Yet is the key word I'm going to hang on to. When the time is right, and I finally end Zamir's life, he will know the wrath we have brought down on his family."

"Just like how he destroyed ours," Sergey mutters.

"We are not destroyed. Don't ever give Zamir that," Dmitri says, entering the room.

"Let's go," I order.

We leave. Adrian drives us to the garage. We all go inside and meet Obrecht.

He sits at the desk, his feet on the table, tapping the pads of his long fingers together. His dress shirt has several buttons unfastened. A black suit coat is thrown on the side of the desk, and his gun is next to it.

"Brother," Adrian says, and they pat each other on the back. Obrecht is four years older than Adrian. Our fathers were brothers.

"New tattoo?" Obrecht asks and points to an abstract design on Adrian's arm.

"Few days ago."

"Slick."

Adrian nods. "How did you get them here?"

"Don't ask. I gotta tell you, though, Zamir didn't pass his brains on to Wes."

"Why? What happened?" I ask.

"Took me a day to convince his thug I just got off a plane from the motherland. Told him his grandfather sent me. Within an hour his boy led him straight into my trap."

"You're shitting me?" I mutter.

Obrecht arrogantly shakes his head. He rubs his five-o'clock shadow, and his dark eyes focus on me. "You know the balance is going to be way off."

"We'll just have to fix it," Boris responds.

"The Rossis will have significantly more leverage. And Zamir will go hard recruiting."

"We will deal with it. I will not let that piece of shit get away with what he did to my krasotka. And those other thugs will pay for touching her friends as well."

Adrian snorts. "Apparently they don't know how to abide by 'no' either."

Sergey's eyes turn to slits. "What happened?"

"Skylar said she told the bastard who's lap she was on to let her go before we got in the room. He responded by shoving his hand up her shirt."

Obrecht holds his hands in the air. "I wasn't suggesting we let them go. I'm just stating the facts."

"Enough of the chitchat," I say. The visual I have in my head of the snake biting Aspen's arm and her lifeless body in my arms drives every ounce of rage I have within me. I open the door and step into the back room.

Wes, his three thugs who were with him, and the bodyguard Adrian had by the throat, all hang in the air naked, upside down.

Their faces are red from the blood rushing to their heads, and two of them already pissed themselves.

I put on my gloves, take my knife out, and walk up to Wes.

"You mother-fucking, Ivanov," he spouts in Russian.

I'm tempted to spit on him, but then my DNA would be on him. Instead, I kick him in the face with my boot.

He screams, and blood spurts everywhere. I'm positive I broke his nose and possibly his cheekbone.

"Should I slice your balls first?" I run my blade over his scrotum, tearing at the skin so blood wells to the surface. The thing about that area of the body is, once you draw blood, it never seems to stop. As Zamir taught me, controlling the depth of your blade so you only nick the skin is important for drawn-out torture sessions.

"Argh!" he cries out.

I drag my knife down his torso, cutting him open but only slightly, leaving a trail of blood. I crouch down in front of his face. "You think snakes are bad? Hmm?"

He spits more Russian out, calling me all kinds of names.

I don't flinch and press the flat part of my blade over his eye. "They say snakes come from the devil. But the man who cuts the devil in two is no man. He's Satan himself. That's me. I grabbed your snake with my bare hand and chopped it in two. The serpent you sent to destroy my krasotka."

Piss dribbles down his body and mixes with the blood. He winces, I'm assuming from the sting of his urine on his open skin. He attempts a few more insults, but they come out weak.

"Your father created me. Every lesson he ever taught, I will demonstrate on you. I'm going to torture you as long as I can then I'm going to stretch it out some more. You'll be begging me to kill you. Before I am through, rats will feed on you in your final moments. Dogs will chew on your bones. And I will watch every moment, listening to you scream."

The room fills with the men shouting in Russian. I step back and turn to my brothers, Adrian, and Obrecht. Boris hands me a shot of vodka. I hold it high in the air. "We have waited patiently to seek revenge on the Petrovs. This is the beginning of the end."

"Nostrovia," they all say, hold their glasses in the air, then drink their shots.

"Nostrovia," I repeat, enjoying the burn of the liquid as it slides down my throat.

I return to Wes. His chest shakes. I crouch down. "And the entire time, you can think of my krasotka. You had no right to her. She would never have been yours. You should have known a woman of her caliber was too good for you."

He attempts to spit at me, but it barely flies out of his mouth.

I promised my krasotka I would use every piece of the devil within me. She wanted me not to make decisions tonight with my heart. But everything about this involves my heart. It's to avenge what Wes did to her. It's for what Zamir put my family through. It's to acknowledge everything the Petrovs represent and how they make their mark on the world.

I lean into his ear. "My krasotka told me to be extra ruthless with you."