Page 2 of Cruel Russian Monster
Some digging turned up the rest: Katya was a Rykov
That made it Artyom’s responsibility, whether he liked it or not.
Artyom hated Katya from the jump. According to him, she was nothing but a mistake, leftover trash. So when Lev agreed to annul the marriage and send Katya back in exchange for Vera, Artyom readily agreed, and my gut went cold.
But none of that played out.
Because by then, Lev had already fallen for Katya.
I wouldn’t lie; I was relieved Lev found a woman he loved who wasn’t Vera.
The tightness that had built up in my chest over the past months faded.
Relief doesn’t come easy in our world, but that was the closest I’d come.
Then we found out Katya was pregnant.
And when Lev found out someone had snatched her from the clinic, he damn near lost his mind. Artyom swore he had nothing to do with it.
He demanded that he, Yegor, and Zahkar help us look for her since she was their sister.
Lev didn’t trust him. None of us Safin brothers did.
But we couldn’t afford to turn down help, even from snakes.
We found her, took out the bastards who’d grabbed her, and cleaned out the rest of the scum guarding the area. She was shaken, but had no physical injuries.
And just when we thought we could breathe, when Katya was safe in Lev's arms, Artyom, with his weapon raised, turned on us.
He demanded that Katya go back with them.
But she stood her ground, looked Artyom dead in the eye, and told him no. And if I didn’t respect her before, I damn sure did then.
She and Vera might look the same, might both carry Rykov blood, but only one of them understood loyalty to the man who claimed them. Only one of them knew what love looked like.
Though Katya was able to give us some information about her kidnappers and their plans to dismantle both the Safin and Rykov factions, we still had no idea who the hell they were, to this day.
Whoever they were, they were organized and smart, using mercenaries to do their dirty work. But they'll make a mistake, and when they do, the Safin family is prepared to do whatever it takes to wipe them out.
The worst part of all the drama we'd gone through?
Katya had nightmares about her kidnapping. She was seeing a therapist, doing what she could to cope, but with the fear of Artyom breathing down her neck, it’d been hell.
What pissed me off most? He was her goddamn brother. He should have been protecting her, not making her fight battles she never asked for.
In my opinion, she’d had enough of those to last a lifetime. And if I could find an opening to justify ending that motherfucker sooner than later, and give her a peace of mind? I’d do it without hesitation.
And as for Artyom? The bastard felt betrayed, even though it was Vera’s disappearance that lit the fucking match. He’d openly declared war on our faction, and he wasn’t playing games. He'd been cutting us off from other Bratva families, raiding our warehouses, ordering drive-by hits, anything to stir chaos and unrest.
Meanwhile, Vera and her siblings, Kira, Yegor, and Zahkar, lived carefree.
And Katya? She couldn’t sleep at night, too damn scared someone was gonna kick down their door and snatch her son right out of her hands.
Lev was training her, and there were guns stashed all over their house now, but a new mom should be bonding with her baby, not trying to survive a fucking war zone.
But that wasn’t even the craziest part.
The craziest part was pretending.
