Page 9 of Devil's Vows
Grunts.
“No records. No paperwork. Nothing.” Flick in, flick out. “Nobody misses you when you don’t arrive on the other side. Nobody asks questions.”
The reek of more piss fills the air. I thought they’d be done pissing themselves. Okay, it’s time. No more ceremony.Slick. I slice one throat, then the next, and the next. Three men crumple where they’ve been swaying, blood spewing and heading for the deck drains.
“Toss them.”
Kostya and Igor hook their guns over their chests. It’s heavy work, what with the chains around the dead men’s legs, butthey heave one after the other over the deck railing. Lifeless bodies slump over, hitting the trawler’s sides and ending with a final splash in the ink-black water. For all that the sea is calm, it’s a frenzy. Just under the surface, sharks smell blood and hunt, without mercy.
My work’s done here. We turn and cross the deck to where the captain is steering in the wheelhouse, turning a blind eye. He is, after all, on my payroll. We, the Petrov Bratva, have a long legacy with the sea. Our main business is in shipping, imports from and exports to Russia around sanctions, but none of us forget our humble roots in fishing in the Barents Sea.
I salute the captain, and he salutes back. As soon as we leave, this trawler goes back to being a working fishing vessel, washing the last remnants of tonight’s business away.
First, we’ll head back to the cruising yacht drifting just off Long Island, made to look like some rich fucker is spending a night out with his mistress on the water. We’ll dinghy between the two and motor back to shore just before daybreak.
It’s been finely planned and perfectly executed, but nowadays, I can’t be too careful.
It’s one of the many lessons I’ve learned these past months. Someone’s trying to move in on us, trying to take over, treading over our territory and lines. Not on my watch. You touch what’s mine, you die. More fuckers will meet this fate in the coming days. I won’t rest until I have the top culprit under my boot.
The next afternoon, as I walk into my home office, I immediately spot the brown envelope. With a curse, I reach for my switchblade and wedge it under the glued flap to cut it open. The last time I had a brown one exactly like this waiting for me, it wasn’t content I expected. Or wanted to explore. Or cared to ever see again.
Lately, my life has been a series of fucking letter-sizedenvelopes—doctors’ reports, updates from the rehab center, and now this. The unmarked brown envelope. It’s never good news. I sigh as I slump in my chair, sounding like an old man. I’m only thirty-seven, for fuck’s sake.
I peek inside, hoping for white paper printouts of writing, but my jaw clenches.
Photos.Sigh.Not a-fucking-gain.
I dealt with this earlier in the year. Had it scrubbed off the internet by some hacker who advertised on the dark net. I pull the two photos out of the envelope. The glossy paper will hold no fingerprints. There won’t be a trace of evidence to lead me to the fucker spreading this shit on the internet. Of all the things I’ve been through this year, this is one of the lows haunting me the most. To see the person I promised to protect whatever it takes exploited like this.
Let’s just say, a surprise delivery of nude photos of your sister is never the way to end a day. I give the two images a cursory once-over only to make sure they’re not the same as the first batch—they’re not—drop them onto the desk, lean back, and drag my hands through my hair.
For a long moment, I just sit like this, hands fisting the short dark strands, breathing deep as I try to get a grip. My mind wanders, and instead of calming down, my pulse spikes. This office used to be my sanctuary, but it’s become haunted by every decision I made this past year. I’m suffocating in them.
Far off, high-pitched voices sound. Feet patter, and then without a knock or any more warning, my office door swings open. I have just enough time to flip Milana’s images over before my two princesses in light pink tutus bundle through the door.
“Papa!” they squeal in unison as the grandfather clock in the hall starts to chime five o’clock.
I push away from my desk to make space and to get distancebetween my young, innocent daughters and the filth currently spread face-down over my keyboard.
“Katya,” I murmur, opening my arms wide and catching my three-year-old as she throws herself at my leg to clamber on. “Irisha.”
I laugh as my four-year-old gets on my knee, ever conscious of her little sister and that she should make space for her first. That she should never hurt her. That she and Katya are the most precious beings in the world and I love them both equally, always and forever.
I’d never known this intense need to protect someone—or that I was able to love unconditionally—until I held Irisha in my arms. When Katya came along, I worried I wouldn’t have the same capacity to love her like I loved Irisha. Then she was born, and the interior walls in my heart shifted and rearranged themselves to make space for her.
I am so thankful they’re back home with me. I heave Katya up to sit properly and spin my office chair at the same time, and they squeal with delight. We do a few turns, until Yuri, my right-hand man, stops in the doorway.
Fuck. He seems harassed and I get it. It’s not his place, or right at his age, to be looking after energetic little kids. I need a long-term solution, which is basically the definition of a wife.
If something has become crystal clear over the past months, it’s that I need a wife to be a mother to my girls. A proper wife to give me sons, oneI’vevetted this time round. I have to strengthen the Petrov line, and I need to do so quickly. I need to secure my girls’ future by ensuring they have brothers who will look after them when I’m no longer here.
I’ll never be entitled to more than an arranged marriage, a simple business arrangement to strengthen the Petrov Bratva’s alliances, but a man should leave this world in peace, knowing things are taken care of.
With the thought brewing, I hug my girls close and presskisses to their golden-curled heads, one, two, and then ever faster with so many kisses as I start to tickle them and they squirm with giggles. With a happy sigh, I pull them close as I stand, shrug them up, arms supporting them as they hug my hips with their legs. They cling to me, safe for another day.
With closed eyes, I inhale a deep breath of childhood, the sweetness of little girls who spent the whole day playing, napping, and then getting dirty, pieces of leaves and grass stuck in their tutus’ netting, their legs dangling tired with dirt on their knees and feet.
They’re home. They are actually home, and I’m holding them close.
