Page 5 of Hate to Love You

Igor nods in the direction of another one of my enforcers, Oleg, standing in the kitchen.

“Bring them in here,” he mutters in Russian.

Them?

But as Oleg pulls Murphy O’Brien into the room, I hear terrified cries coming from the kitchen.

A woman’s cries.

“No! Please! Don’t take him!” She wails as a bloodied Murphy is dragged into the living room. “He’s innocent!”

“Someone shut her up!” Cal shouts beside me. “Why the fuck didn’t you gag her too?!”

“Because,” Igor grins, biting his lip. “Me and my men might want to use that pretty mouth of hers. Among other things…”

If I thought the woman was crying before, it’s nothing to the frightened scream she immediately lets out, suddenly thrashing and clawing at Igor, trying to get away.

“Shut up, bitch!” he shouts, backhanding the crying woman across the face. Her head spins around violently and she falls immediately to the floor, unconscious.

“Jesus, Igor,” Pasha scoffs, looking at him in disgust. “You’re such a pig. You seem to have forgotten you have a fucking wife. You know, Polina? My sister?”

“And it seems you forget that your sister doesn’t fuck me anymore,kid,” Igor laughs as he grabs the unconscious woman’s hair and starts taping her mouth closed.

He tosses her limp body into an armchair.

“…And that she’s a royal bitch,” Oleg jokes beside me.

That cannot stand either.

Without thinking I crack Oleg hard in the jaw sending three of his gold-plated teeth flying out of his mouth. He falls to his knees, and I kick him hard in the ribs before grabbing the back of his hair and yanking his head up.

“And you seem to have forgotten your place,” I thunder at him. “You don’t get an opinion. You don’t even get a fucking thought! You are a servant, and you’re here to respect and obey. So if you dare to mutter another word about my sister, I’ll cut your tongue out and fuck your corpse with it!”

“Y…yes, Boss!” Oleg sputters, blood dripping down his nose. “I’m…I’m sorry!”

I shove him to the ground, my blood thumping in my veins and my adrenaline spiking.

“And you,” I snarl, pointing at Igor. “You’ll watch your fucking mouth too. I don’t give a shit if you are my brother-in-law. I don’t care about your marriage problems, or if she is a bitch. She’s still an Antonov. Which is more than can be said for you. So if you don’t watch your step, you’ll end up like your toothless friend.”

Igor nods, shifting uncomfortably. Pasha glares at him before locking eyes with me from across the room.

Neither of us like Polina.

No one in the family does. Because she is a royal bitch.

But that’s not the point. The point is, you don’t fuck with the family. And that’s why we’rehere this evening—to deal with a rat who attacked my family.

I yank my gun from its holster and fire one bullet into each of the four men cowering wide-eyed on the couch.

The gunshots, although muted by my silencer, seem to startle the woman awake. She screams into her duct-tape, screwing her eyes shut, burying her face into the tattered old armchair.

That’s when I turn back to a shaking Murphy O’Brien, who is now sweating profusely.

“And you, rat, are vermin.” I growl, a wicked grin spreading across my face. “Would you like to know what we do with vermin?”

I nod at Calvin who steps forward carrying a bag of bright green pellets.

“We exterminate them.”

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