Page 199 of Ripped Veil (Ripped Bratva)

“Grave’s just about ready, boss,” Konstantin notes, stepping back and letting the others finish the job.

Matvei and I move forward. I squat down in front of Vitya’s body.

The boys have cleaned him up as much as possible and wrapped him in a white cloth nestled inside the coffin. It’s better like this—we don’t have to see how broken he is.

I put my hand on his chest and sigh. “Goodbye, Vitya,” I say. “I will remember as you used to be: laughing with your daughter, holding your grandson.”

Then I stand and direct my men to lower him into his grave.

They work quickly and silently. Once he’s been laid to rest, they start shoveling the soil back on top of him.

I listen to the sound of shovels scraping through dirt. The grunts of the men working. The breeze whispering through the treetops. It’s almost meditative, in a strange way. I find myself just starting to drift off into memories better left forgotten…

Until someone in the distance catches my eye.

My gun is out and up in seconds. Trained on the target—a man emerging from between the broad trunks of two trees.

For a moment, I think I’m going mad.

His features are so similar that I actually believe that Hitoshi Sakamoto has risen from the dead.

“Do you see him, too?” I whisper to Matvei, who’s standing right beside me.

“Yes,” he growls.

The man moves closer. He’s alone and unarmed. “I merely came to pay my respects,” he says in a quiet Japanese accent.

Despite the fact that there are half a dozen Bratva guns aimed at his skull, he’s remarkably relaxed. Not with arrogance but the quiet confidence of a man who knows that it’s not yet his time to die.

And then it comes to me. Who he is. Why he’s here. The name rolls off my tongue.

“Eiko Sakamoto.”

He smiles in acknowledgment but it’s ice cold. His eyes appear dead. Completely devoid of emotion.

Well, no. That’s not quite true. More like his eyes are filled with the promise of death.

“You killed my brother, Mr. Kovalyov,” he says, the courteous smile still plastered onto his flawless face.

I hear a barrage of guns cock in unison.

I glance to the left. Then to the right.

Eiko’s men surround us.

“It wasn’t personal,” I tell him.

“Haven’t you learned by now, Mr. Kovalyov?” Eiko says. “In this life… everything is personal.”

41

Elyssa

Mary And Solomon’s House—The Sanctuary

“Father Josiah.”

Those two little words feel unbelievably heavy as they pass my lips.

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