Total pages in book: 106
Estimated words: 108119 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 541(@200wpm)___ 432(@250wpm)___ 360(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 108119 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 541(@200wpm)___ 432(@250wpm)___ 360(@300wpm)
“I’m Russian.” My answer.
He burst out laughing. It always sounded strange, the one that had the most pain laughing, but there he was, in my hell filling the room with its odd sound and making this life look easy as he strangled people with the same hands he used to make love to his wife.
Italians.
All of them were insane.
“You need me to wait outside?” He lowered his voice.
“No, she won’t escape, will you, six thirty-two?” I taunted.
“No.” She gulped. “No, I won’t escape… um…”
“Petrov,” Chase offered for her, his voice filled with disgust. “He’s your new heaven, your new hell, your god, your devil, I’d learn his name and know not to forget it lest he get pissed off and ask you to spell it and kill you for doing it wrong.”
“Thanks, Chase.” I muttered a curse.
“No problem.” He slapped me on the back. “You got your shit?”
“All my shit.” I looked at her one last time and gave her my back. “You have zero tact.”
“Compliments? Bro, it’s only noon, I’m touched. Now let’s go find some De Langes and see how much blood we can spill. I don’t want to miss dinner.”
“Italians, always thinking with your stomach.”
“Russians always thinking with your tiny dicks, oh wait, you still have one, right? It hasn’t withered away from all that vodka?”
“Sometimes I wish I didn’t like you more than the others,” I grumbled, locking the door behind me and walking with him down the hall.
“I like killing, you like killing, I have rage, you have rage. We’re pretty much married by now.” He seemed oddly happy about that, and then I realized he was in a better mood than I’d ever seen him in.
I stopped walking.
He sighed like he knew what was coming.
We were around the same height. I was leaner than he was, he’d packed on a lot of muscle in since the loss of his wife eighteen months ago. Her betrayal was the reason we hated the De Lange family in the first place. They tried to betray everyone by doing a deal with me. I was in on it, knew what was going on, and had always worked with Luca Nicolasi, the only mentor in this world I ever had, the only man I would die to protect.
The rest was history.
I, Andrei Petrov, was somehow more Italian than I was Russian, if anyone could believe it, though I refused to claim it.
And ever since I was given that second chance by a man who should have shot me on sight.
I’d been paying the price.
Playing both sides.
Helping my enemy.
Helping my friends.
It was almost too hard to keep everything straight and like Tex pointed out last year, I knew I was getting in too deep, allowing what I did to affect me in a way that would one day kill me if my gun didn’t do the trick on my next birthday.
“Out with it.” I waited.
Chase actually grinned. “Luc’s pregnant again.”
“You have sex more than anyone I know,” I stated matter-of-factly. “I’m not surprised. The question is why are you smiling about it when we still have a line of De Langes in hiding, and worse, ones who like to hurt their own women?”
His smile fell. “What?”
“Ah, Tex didn’t tell you.”
“Tex was eating lunch. You know how he is when he’s eating lunch…”
I frowned and then realization dawned. “With Mo, he was with Mo. Just say that next time, and he was already here, and we talked things through. I’ll debrief everyone during family dinner.”
Chase’s eyebrows shot up. “You bringing a date?”
“I’m this close to punching you in the dick and making it so you can’t have any more kids. This close, Chase.” I shoved him against the wall.
The guy enjoyed violence. He just shoved me back and tried to hit me. I ducked and slid my knife from the sheath at my ankle.
“Save it for the De Langes.” Chase grinned. “And I want to hear all the details about six thirty-two in the car. I still don’t understand how you name all of them with numbers; fucking awful way to live, man.”
“It’s easier when you don’t know their names.” We continued walking.
“Easier for them, or you?” Chase asked.
I didn’t answer.
Because I knew the truth.
If I named them, I wanted to save them all.
And I knew, I would never be able to.
As long as a Russian ran this club, this demented club, I could save some of them, and that’s all I wanted, to save who I could, until I could rain holy hell down on the people behind the scenes.
The only problem?
I still had no clue who was grabbing the girls and bringing them to me, only that they showed up every day at the same time, barely clothed, shivering, and half dead.
I had cameras.
They were careful.
And the payments were all offshore accounts.