Page 48 of Ruthless King
When I shake my head, he grabs my hand, bringing it to his chest.
“Please,” he says in a tone I’ve never heard from him. “Do this for me, please. If he hurt you… Let me protect you, Willow. Give me this one thing.”
Let a doctor examine me. He’ll find nothing, but maybe that’s the point. I’ve been so wrapped in myself; I haven’t stopped to think about what my parents must be feeling. Their pain.
Their fear.
Extending it any longer would be cruel.
So I nod.
“Good girl.” I’m in his arms before I know it, crushed against his chest as he shoves the tray aside. I don’t resist the embrace. He feels so different from Donatello even as he had back then.
Don was warm and light, his laughter infectious.
Mischa is solid, rigid, but unyielding. A brick wall that won’t crumble easily. A permanent fixture I’m not afraid to trust, relaxing into his grip.
“I know he hurt you,” he says, smoothing his hand over my hair. “I do not know how, but I will make him pay. You say the word, and I will.”
He tilts my face to meet him, inspecting my expression.
Slowly, he nods again. “Fine. You let the doctor examine you, and I will hear what the motherfucker has to say for himself. Deal?”
I nod, but I find myself leaning into him again, pressing my cheek against his shoulder.
And he doesn’t let me go.
16
DON
Meeting Mischa Stepanov, unarmed and on his terms, is one thing.
Looking the part of a fucking sycophantic patsy while doing so is another. I couldn’t stand to face myself in the mirror before leaving the house, but I’m sure I look every bit as ridiculous as I feel. This emerald, piece of shit jacket was Fabio’s idea, and already I’m tugging at the collar, feeling my body strain against the confines of the cotton. To be fair, I figure no designer in the world constructed a suit specifically with this type of meeting in mind. Groveling before amafiyaleader in the hopes of convincing him that I didn’t violate his daughter.Fuck,what a mess.
A glass of whiskey couldn’t soothe my nerves.
Deep down, I’m partly convinced it’s all a trap. I’ll walk into this neutral territory and find a bullet lodged in my skull before I can even utter a greeting. Hell, I’d deserve it for being stupid enough to fall for it.
That fate would be a fitting end, all things considered. Once again, little Safiya is smirking at me from the grave. Once again, because of her, I’ve stumbled, jeopardizing everything I’ve strived to create for myself. I will never outlast her memory.
I feel her presence now more than ever, haunting me down the narrow hall of Fabio’s downtown offices in the heart of the city. Its location makes it difficult to ambush. With Fabio’s connections to the governor, no man would dare mount an attack on him directly.
It’s as figuratively safe as a mother’s bosom, but I’m not naïve enough to trust in it completely. Mischa isn’t known for his strict adherence to the typical rules of engagement, be them explicit or otherwise. The man made his mark by clawing at every bit of his sizeable empire that wasn’t handed to him out of fear. He waged a bloody war against an oil magnate he believed wronged his family, and as the rumors go, his own wife was once his captive, brutalized and scarred for his amusement.
As cold a thought as it is, I have to wonder if the man truly even cares about his daughter’s supposed predicament out of love? Or just anger at what it looks like on the surface? Another man dared to defile what is his, leveling a slight no true leader could ever let go unchallenged.
Though, even I can admit another man wouldn’t show this level of restraint. Antonio Salvatore would have already tried to tear me to pieces were one of his daughters found in the same state.
And what a state it was. The blond, fiery-eyedtigrewho just so happens to be mute. What grudge could she have against me?
My brain dances around the answer. It could be the whiskey in my system, or sheer twisted logic, but the more I mull over her, the more solutions come to mind. Like the fact that Mischa Stepanov is the type of man to run in the same circles as Nicolai Baryshnikov, a well-known money lender to the Russian mob. Could Mischa have a fetish for children and procured a girl for himself? My Safiya, raised as his own?
No. I shake my head, laughing at the possibility. My black heart might get some peace from the ending, but it’s too much like a fairy tale to ever be real.
Isn’t it?
Lost in thought, I tug on my tie, and I barely register a man’s voice, addressing me from up ahead.
