Page 11 of Bratva's Secret Girl
What does it say about me that I still adore him? Maybe even more.
6
MAXIM
I’ve just confessed to the one woman I love more than anything in the world that I’m a thing from her nightmares.
Avoiding her gaze and her response to my plea—I can’t bear to see condemnation there—I open the encrypted chat group. It’s named the London Maths Club today. There’s an ongoing argument and it’s a toss-up whether it will be the ridiculous nickname because of that time the kingpin of Canary Wharf made everyone pretend they weren’t mafia bosses, or the official name of the London Mafia Syndicate.
Ignoring the threats of death over pizza toppings, I press to make a voice note. It’s quicker. “The little sister of malishka has gone missing. Urgent.”
It automatically sends when I release my thumb.
In only a few seconds there’s a cascade of messages, mostly creative swear words and a question—where?
I answer with the name of a restaurant in central London where the London Mafia Syndicate have met before. It’s around halfway between Richmond and Greenwich, so it’s on the way back to getting Hayley safe. For all his being part of the core of London, Grant Lambeth is alright, and respects me as a fellowSouth of the river mafia kingpin, so I’m confident he won’t object to my choice of location.
Starting the car, I check that the portion of my men, who weren’t sent to Payton’s university buildings, sorting the repair and protection of the Love girls’ house or ahead to search the meeting venue, are behind me and drive.
When we walk into the hotel I named, the room is already full of familiar faces.
“Thank you for turning up so quickly.” I’m staggered, actually.
“Children do not go missing in a London run by the London Mafia Syndicate,” grits out Westminster. “How long has she been gone?”
“Uh.” I turn to Hayley. Westminster’s eyes bulge in shock when he takes in my blood-covered girl. “It’s okay, it’s someone else’s blood. Specifically, the son of Feliks Rykov. Beckenham,” I add Rykov’s territory, but I can already see Westminster sucking in a breath and calculating how to deal with this. Beckenham isn’t part of the Maths Club.
“Artem—” Westminster might be powerful, but he’s English as they come, and this needs another Russian.
“I don’t know him well,” Artem, the Russian kingpin of Mayfair interrupts tensely. “He’s fucking crazy, even for Bratva. And his son?—”
“His son isn’t a direct issue anymore,” I say. Given he’s congealing on the floor of a coffee shop.
“He looks better on your clothes than he did alive,” Mayfair says with a dry nod to Hayley, who blinks and edges closer to me. “What do we think happened?”
“Maybe she was snatched from her class?” Hayley says. “She’s not answering her phone.”
“She has a phone at school?” queries Lina, Artem’s wife.
“She’s twenty-one,” Hayley replies, non-plussed. “She’s not?—”
“What?” Westminster scowls at Hayley.
I move nearer and glare back. No one messes with my secret girl.
“She’s not really a child,” Hayley adds.
“You said class?” Westminster frowns.
“A university class,” Hayley replies, a little nervously.
“She’s a university student? Wouldn’t she be out partying?” Lina checks her watch. The day is getting on, and she’s right that plenty of students will be drinking by now.
“False, not all students party,” Anwyn says from beside her husband, Westminster.
“When did you last see her?” Artem asks Hayley.
“This morning.”
