Page 180 of Tarnished Tyrant (Zhukova Bratva 1)

The longer the silence stretches, the more ridiculous it all feels.

“You… you love me?” she stutters.

“I called off my wedding, didn’t I?”

Belle shakes her head. “That wasn’t my question.”

“I flew hundreds of miles at the drop of a hat to save you from a rapist,” I grit out. “I chased your sister around when she ran away—twice. She crashed my car into a field of horses and I didn’t say a thing.”

“Actions speak louder than words,” Belle says softly.

“And mine have been clear as crystal since the beginning,” I fire back. “You’re the one who chose to leave.”

“Because you were getting married!”

“And now, I’m not.”

“So what?” Belle blinks frantically. “What do you want from me, Nikolai? What am I supposed to say?”

What a question. What an impossible fucking question.

But I don’t need to know her answer. Asking the question itself is answer enough. So I turn and walk away, and I leave the worst mistake I’ve ever made behind me.

I make sure I don’t look back.

Even though it kills me not to.

45

NIKOLAI

HOURS LATER

It’s after midnight, but I don’t give a shit. I pound on Giorgos Simatou’s front door as hard as I can.

“Open up, you spineless bastard!” I shout. “I know you’re awake. If you’re waiting for your men to come back with a prize, you’ll be waiting a long while.”

When the door opens, a man I don’t recognize is standing in the threshold. He’s young with a patchy beard and wide, timid eyes. A lackey in every sense of the word.

“I want to see your boss,” I bark. “Now.”

“Don Simatou isn’t available.” His accent is thickly Greek.

I kick the base of the door hard. The man stumbles back, and I march past him into the entryway.

“Hello?” My voice echoes off the high ceilings and marble floors. “Someone is here for you, Giorgos.”

“Giorgos isn’t available,” the man says again as he scurries up from behind me. He’s breathless, fumbling for a weapon at his hip.

I swat it out of his hands and pin him against a wall with an aggressivethump. “I just killed two of your friends for intervening in my affairs. Are you really so eager to become the third?”

I hear a gun click behind me. I turn just as a second man points his weapon at the center of my chest. “We don’t want any trouble, Don Zhukova,” the man intones.

In one swift move, I reach out and twist it around so the muzzle is now pointing at the man’s neck.

“Neither do I,” I hiss. “Which is why you’re going to get me your boss. Now.”

The man’s eyes are bulging from their sockets. He’s trembling already, the coward. Pitiful. “The boss isn’t available. It’s late.”

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