Page 1 of Tangled Souls

PROLOGUE

MIKHAIL

I can feel my father’s ire from the afterlife. I’ve spent so damn long putting all the pieces into place to get revenge for my father’s death. With a sneer, I turn away from the weak men who I have surrounded myself with.

Even my cousin, Adam, is an idiot. He wasn’t raised in this life, and it shows. If I didn’t have the need for more manpower, and if he weren’t so easy to manipulate, he wouldn’t be here.

“I just don’t know what you’re waiting for,” Adam whines.

And not for the first time.

When I glare at him, he cowers back and away from me slightly. As he fucking should.

“I told you. We need a little more time,” I grit out through my teeth.

“I’ve been hearing you say that for months now,” he pouts.

Before I can think twice about it, I backhand him which causes him to stumble as his head whips to the side. His mouth opens in surprise when he looks back at me. Even with all the plans we’ve already put in place and the amount of blood which has already been shed, he seems to think this is some sort of fucked up movie instead of real life.

“We can’t go at Volkov directly,” I tell him. Again. “We have to destabilize his power base and then go after his weakness.”

He looks at me like he expects me to apologize for hitting him. I won’t. His mother, my father’s sister, made him weak. If taking a few slaps to the face, like a little bitch, toughens him up then so be it. It’s not my fault that his mother wanted to keep him far away from the life and power my father cultivated.

There’s no way he’s escaping this life now. Either he’s going to get himself killed from his own stupidity or he’ll become expendable to me. I don’t really care which happens at this point.

I look toward a few of my other men and barely swallow down my groan of annoyance. I’m not even sure what all their names are. Why would I care when they’ll be replaced as soon as they’re caught by the mercenaries working for Volkov or step out of line and piss me off?

Being the one left standing at the end of all of this is all I care about.

“What is his weakness?”

With a roll of my eyes, I pin my cousin with a hard stare. “The woman. Pussy is every man’s weakness. Volkov made a mistake by putting a ring on the bitch’s finger.”

“I thought that was all about the contract with Chambers?” Adam has the fucking gall to look genuinely confused. “He doesn’t really care about her.”

I pull my gun out and level it in his direction before I can think twice about it. His hands go up in surrender, but he doesn’t move. I’m not sure if it’s smart of him or the stupidest thing he could do.

“I’m only going to say this one more time,” I ground out the words, pissed because he’s not getting it. “Chambers was dead long before Volkov married that whore. If he didn’t care, he would have cut her loose after the failed ambush Lev should have been able to pull off with the help of Chambers.”

Adam doesn’t look convinced, but I don’t need him to buy into what I know is true. A man like Kirill would not have married her if he didn’t want to. Chambers was always trying to pawn her on whoever he could think off.

That Richard bastard even got my father to agree that I would marry that shy, skittish, waste of a pussy. I caught glimpses of her sometimes when dad dragged me over to that mausoleum disguised as a house. Finding out there was an agreement about marrying that girl pissed me off.

When I found out, I was sitting in the back seat and brooding next to my father. Before I knew what was happening, his hand was wrapped around my neck and his dark eyes were boring into mine.

“You look at that girl and think she’s just a pawn, but it’s only because you’re no fucking better than her father and have no vision,” he snarled. “I don’t give a fuck if you like it, but you will marry her when the time comes. Richard is useful even though he’s insufferable.”

“I’m not marrying her. She’s a child,” I gave it right back to him, no longer afraid of the man.

When you grow up terrorized and broken down to be rebuilt into a savage weapon, there were times when I wasn’t willing to bow down. Not even for the blood loyalty that pumped through my veins.

My father, Anatoly, threw his head back and roared with laughter. Only once he calmed down did he release me, but I knew that didn’t mean the danger had passed. Not when dealing with a man like him.

“She won’t be a child forever,” he pointed out with a casual shrug. His voice turned darker, “And who the fuck cares if she is?” I curled my lip, but he wasn’t done. “You just have to marry her. Whatever else you do with her once you’ve put her in her new cage is up to you. You could spend your nights slicing her skin off for all I care.”

Even though there was mischief in his voice, his eyes glittered with truth in his suggestion. He was hoping that is exactly what I would do.

And I couldn’t think about anything else for a long time. As time passed, she was no longer a girl. When she was in college, I heard whispers about her growing into a woman worth looking twice at.

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