Page 1 of Brutal Vows

Chapter 1

Loretta Giordano

Pain blasts across my cheekand my mask flies off my face as my head whips to the side from the behemoth’s backhand, but I catch myself on the edge of the operating table and clutch the bags of plasma to my chest, saving them from falling to the floor and becoming unusable, before swinging hard eyes up at the terrifying brute.

“Is no blood,shlyukha. You no give,” he snarls.

His heavy Russian accent and the fiery heat spreading through my face make understanding him difficult, but monsters like him view any signs of pain as weakness, so I return his glare with one of my own and snarl right back at him.

“It’s plasma. He needs it. You. Move. There.”

I jab a finger at his chest before pointing at the corner of the room. Amusement lights his eyes and the thick scar running from his eyebrow to the corner of his mouth twists his features into a terrifying mask. Nausea grips me and a chill runs down my spine.

He reaches out, pinches my chin with his forefinger and thumb, and lifts my face. My skin crawls. He may be the first person to touch me in over two weeks, but he’s the last person on the planet I want to alleviate my touch deprivation. I’d ratherspend a year without skin-to-skin contact than have his hands on me. My disgust and fury lend me strength.

When I don’t flinch, his smirk widens. He leans down and rubs his thumb over my chin, smearing his filth on my face.

“Be careful,suka, or I take you with me,” he sneers.

I quirk a brow and glance at the gun dangling from his other hand, then shift my attention to the giant man overflowing the operating table. Caked in soot and blood, with multiple gunshot wounds and burns covering over half of his body, the probability of the man’s survival is low. Which makes the scarred monster’s threat even more terrifying.

“Before or after your buddy dies?” I quip.

The surgeon, my identical twin sister and younger sibling by three minutes and nineteen seconds, calls out in warning. The machine near the head of the table beeps. I shoulder my way past the caveman, relieved when he lets me go, and check the monitor for the patient’s stats before swapping the empty blood bag with a full bag of plasma.

Tension coils through the room as I recalculate and adjust the flow of his intravenous medicines as my sister and her assistants rush to save the man on the table.

Our lives depend on it. Even though we’re a tiny outpatient clinic on the outskirts of New York City without the proper equipment or staff for such an acute emergency case, when Russian thugs burst through the door and demand we save their leader at gunpoint, we have no choice but to try.

I don’t know how we landed in this hell, but we need a savior. I’d even take one of those antiheroes from my sister’s dark romance books.

With my luck, we’re more likely to end up with someone way worse, like a local gang leader, a corrupt cop, or—my brain screeches to a halt as the absolute worst-case scenario runs through my mind.

If these men are involved with the mafia, we’re fucked. My sister and I won’t survive if they figure out who we are.

I startle as the door bangs open.

On instinct, I reach into the bond with my twin and suck all the surprise from her.

Her eyes never waver from her work and her hands remain steady as she continues the operation.

Another Russian man staggers into the room. Even with the smell of blood and antiseptic permeating the air, his stench punches into my nostrils. He reeks of alcohol, urine, and fear sweat. With eyes full of hatred, he lifts his pistol.

I lunge in front of the table. My ears ring as several weapons fire, but other than the throbbing in my face, no pain rises.

The newcomer falls to the ground. I turn.

My sister looks up and meets my eyes with her hands still buried in the patient’s abdomen. With the bottom half of her face covered by the surgical mask, the top half hidden behind her protective shield, and the magnifying glasses obscuring her right eye, I can’t read her expression, but I don’t need to.

After a grateful nod, she dives back into her work. Her assistants’ screams ended a few seconds after the gunshots rang out, but the women rise with obvious reluctance when my sister demands their attention. With shaky hands, Tabitha, her lead assistant, passes her a sterile scalpel.

My sister’s annoyed glance spurs the team into collecting themselves and giving her their best.

A shadow falls over me. Ice fills my veins. I stiffen and step backward toward the IV stand as I swing my gaze up to the monster encroaching on my personal space.

He grabs my hair and yanks my head back so hard pain spears up my neck and reverberates through my skull. An embarrassing squeak escapes my chest as I flail, but I shufflemy feet, regain my balance, and curl my hands into fists, barely resisting the urge to lash out.

I flinch as he skims the barrel of his pistol along the base of my throat, the warmth of the metal shocking.

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