Page 88 of Devil's Vows
I get busy with the girls’ breakfast, glancing every now and then at Milana where she’s dropped into a chair at the table, gripping her coffee mug as if she could wring the answers to all life’s problems out of it.
Kostya walks in with a pile of wedding magazines, followed by two men who push a clothes rail of wedding dresses into the room.
How on earth?—?
Ivan. Money. He’s throwing thousands at these weddings, and I’d rather he wouldn’t.
It hits me that this is real. I haven’t even spoken to my brothers. Cornered them about how they cornered me.
The girls’ eyes go wide, and energy seems to rush into the room, but I still need to mentally adjust to this new reality.
“I need to talk to Dominic, because clearly, I have some news to share with my family,” I announce, needing a moment alone to pick a bone with my brother.
Yuri looks up from his laptop, giving the new arrivals a cold stare, but at my words, his lips curl up in one corner. He holds his phone out to me.
“I have my own phone, in my room.”
“Sure,” he says with a shrug. “You’ll be Mrs. Petrova soon enough. We’ll look after the girls. Take your time.”
Milana chews her thumb, her eyes tracking my every move, knowing she’s at my mercy. I could give her secret away to my brothers, and then this whole plan of hers would go up in flames. As I take the stairs, I tally the pros and cons, but it doesn’t matter which side wins. This is no longer about me. It’sabout every girl in that cellar, chilled bodies hugging close, petrified.
I’ll see the wedding through for Milana’s sake. Her situation is desperate, and I can figure my life out after the fact… After my vows. Vows I never intended to make.
I dial Dominic’s number, and he answers within one ring.
“Gabi—”
“You already know I’m getting married, so consider this a courtesy call,” I cut him off, not wanting to even give him a chance to wade through our usual small talk. “I suppose you’re all invited.”
Two seconds of tense silence scream over the line.
“I didn’t want this for you, Gabi,” he says softly, the agony in his voice scratching crevices into my skin. “I wish— If I knew— If I— If we could stop it, we would.”
Nobody is stopping this now, but I have some rights, surely. “How did this happen?” I ask, my voice raw. “I just want to know what hold he has over you?”
“I killed Milana’s fiancé, and you get to pay the price.”
I sink down on my bed as the words fall into the deepest parts of me, confirming what I always suspected but dreaded to confirm: my brothers kill when they need to kill.Cruel, calculating, ruthless.
“Fuck, Gabi, I live with a shit ton of regret for a lot of things, but this…I don’t think I can live with myself if you—if Petrov—” he breaks off.
The raw truth, the deep regret, and the agony in his voice sting.
In my mind’s eye, images of Dominic as he walks into Mother Lucia’s office flash by. My first impressions of him were that he was a protector to the core. Then at Lake Como, he proved he is so much more than that, showing me what it means to have a brother. And then I got to know him and Ariana together, watching their love bloom, so pure andperfect, and it hurt knowing I was observing something, a mere outsider, that I’d never experience.
Dominic has his own tortured past, of which I only had glimpses. Surely he wouldn’t kill anybody without good reason. And there was no love lost between Milana and Boryslav Petrenko.
Now is the time to tell him of my engagement to another Russian, but I clam up. I won’t bring that mess into the mix and endanger everybody. Or give up Milana’s one chance to get away. Whatever happened between Ivan and my brothers, I pushed to come here for my own reasons.
I swallow, close my eyes, and whisper, “It’s okay, Nicky. Ivan Petrov is a good man.” Chalk and cheese to the other Russian I’ve been promised to. “I’m going to be fine. Please don’t beat yourself up about it.”
“You have no idea how this situation has tortured all of us, but at least with Milana and Luca, we know Petrov won’t do anything rash.”
I wipe at my eyes, the knot of lies twisting tighter in my stomach. “He isn’t cruel,” I murmur into the phone. “There’s been nothing to fear, so please, really, please don’t worry about me. I just wanted to understand how?—”
“Boryslav meddled with our plans to kill Franco Fiore and that’s how he ended up dead.” He groans into the phone. “Matteo won’t like me telling you, because the less you know the better, but Franco Fiore came up that day in Mother Lucia’s office. It wasIl Consigliowho…neutralized him.”
I’m stunned into shocked silence. The world is so small. What else have my brothers been responsible for?
