Page 124 of Ruthless God

“Our friends in the East are getting brave,” he said in greeting. We were always careful about what we said on the phone in case someone was listening in.

“What do you mean?” I asked.

“I found a rat loitering about in one of our places.”

“You don’t say.”

“Should I call in the exterminator?”

“No. I’m coming over to see for myself.”

“Great. We’ll wait for you.”

It didn’t takeme long to reach the abandoned factory we had purchased a decade earlier using a shell corporation.

On the outside, it looked as abandoned as it had the day we bought it. The land stretched out for miles, and the surrounding area was free of any other buildings or people.

But the inside hid a lot of our merchandise—things many people were willing to die for, things they had died for.

I pulled my car to a stop and got out, letting my gaze move over the expansive stretch of land and making note of my men standing at their posts. They weren’t quite hidden from view, but they weren’t out in the open either.

Inside, the factory was bustling, with more men getting ready for our next shipment. The De Luca control the drug and gun trade spanning out into the West. One of the reasons why the Devil’s Wings MC was so easily enticed to work with the Bratva and Andre.

In their mind, we were encroaching on their territory. But my business had been there before they even formed their first chapter. Just because we weren’t there in California didn’t mean it didn’t belong to us. And the Devil’s Wings MC didn’t have the manpower to take us on.

I found Romeo in one of the rooms located at the far back with the man he found loitering about in my place of business,his hands tied behind his back and kneeling on the ground. His lip was fat and bloody, and a large bruise was already forming on the side of his face. The man’s face paled when he saw me walk in. I patted him on the shoulder, and he flinched.

“Now, don’t be like that,” I said. “The fun hasn’t even started yet. Why don’t you tell me your name?”

He spat on the ground by my feet. “Fuck you.”

I let out a small sigh and looked at my brother. “They always feign bravery.” I pulled out the same blade I had used to kill my father. It was my most prized possession, and every time I used it to end another man’s life, it brought me satisfaction that even sex—beforeLuna—couldn’t compete with.

Now if I wanted that thrill, that feeling of being alive, I looked for it in my wife.

I brought the cold blade up to the Russian’s face, watching his pale-blue eyes darken in fear.

“How brave do you think you’ll be?” I asked, bringing the knife down to the man’s shirt. He shook where he was as I slipped the sharp edge through the buttons of his shirt, from one to the next to the next, revealing a tattooed torso.

I didn’t stop until I found what I was looking for.

A small script with the wordsNovikov Bratvawas located just beneath his pec, on his right rib.

I pierced the blade over it, slashing my knife over the tattoo, ruining it until the words were no longer recognizable.

“You want to tell me now?” I asked as the man cried out in pain.

I shook my head. I’d seen Matteo take a worse beating and hadn’t made as much noise as this fucker.

“Denis Agapov.”

I patted his cheek with the hand that had his blood on it. “Good boy.”

I didn’t much care what his name was. But if I asked a question, I expected an answer.

“And what are you doing here,Denis?”

He opened his mouth, but when no words came out, he shook his head. I pierced the top of my blade onto the wound I had just caused. His back bowed, and he would have fallen to the ground had I not had one hand over his shoulder.

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