Kostya: A Dark Mafia Romance (Zinon Bratva) Page 7

  Tiana lays her hand over his as they eat, and every little string in my heart tugs.

  I watch them together after breakfast, too, when he sits on the sofa reading from a file and she sits beside him holding an empty folder of her own and shakes her head at random intervals. Like her father. When she leans her head against his arm and closes her eyes. When he doesn’t move for an hour while she naps beside him.

  My plan is to wait for Kostya to leave, then lay out the blueprint for the nursery with Tiana. I want it to be what she’s happy with and since we’re all just getting to know each other, I can’t pick for her. And I can’t work much with Kostya here making my ovaries want to explode.

  But Tiana has caught her second wind and now she’s walking on the furniture, from her annoyed father to the arm of the sofa and back. I scoop her up because until now I’ve never heard Kostya growl.

  “Furniture is for sitting. Floors are for walking.” I’m stern but not angry. Forceful but not threatening.

  The line of her lips thins and narrows, and she squints at me.

  I squint back until she softens her gaze. “Come on. I need your help.”

  I take her to the former exercise room, now the soon-to-be nursery, trying not to focus on Kostya’s eyes drilling into me as we walk out.

  The efficiency of Kostya’s staff is intimidating. Someone’s already hauled out the equipment, and I walk in with Tiana and sit us on the already-cleaned white carpet. Before we can discuss the décor—mermaids and narwhals, or, as Tiana calls them, “sea-ni-corns”—the doorbell peals.

  Because the room has a glass door and floor-to-ceiling sidelights also in glass, I can watch Kostya move through the living room to the foyer and the door.

  He invites Yelisey Rusnak in, then crosses his arms as the man speaks. I can’t make out the words, but Kostya’s posture changes, stiffens, and though I can’t see his face, I picture his mouth thinning and his squint as Yelisey continues.

  Yelisey backs away as Kostya advances. His voice is low and I don’t know what they’re discussing, but Kostya’s anger is palpable. I hug Tiana close to my side. She’s unaware of her father’s mood, but I’m conscious enough for both of us.

  He’s powerful and frightening because he’s so focused. Driven. He could never be a second to anyone. Kostya will always be the guy in charge, the one who makes the rules, the one who calls every shot.

  Of course, that doesn’t mean he’s in charge of the Russian mob. That’d be ridiculous, for crying out loud. At least, that’s what I’ve always told myself. But it also doesn’t mean he isn’t who some of the raunchier tabloids like to say he is.

  That’s dangerous. For me. For Tiana. Probably even for Yelisey, whose news has convinced Kostya to leave without saying goodbye to his daughter. Thank God she’s too distracted to notice.

  And, while we’re counting small miracles, thank God that I finally have a minute to catch my breath without Kostya taking it away.

  6

  Kostya

  It’s been four fucking days and I can’t sleep knowing she’s so close. This was a bad idea. And I’m tired of tiptoeing through my own house.

  I like Charlotte. For more than her beauty, more than the way she is with my daughter. More than that soft look in her eyes when she gazes at me. She’s strong and smart. And that’s the problem.

  She’s smart. Too smart. And if she figures out I’m the don of the most powerful Bratva in the country … she’ll have to disappear.

  If there’s one thing I learned from Natasha, it’s that I can’t tolerate the blackmail. I won’t tolerate it.

  But that is a problem for another time. First, I must deal with the man in front of me.

  This Whelan bastard has been stubbornly hard to break. Yelisey is angered, but I cannot let him off the leash just yet. His anger will only add to the body count, and I am not yet ready to broker a full-on war with the Irish. I’ve sent him home for the evening to cool off. It’s my turn to take a crack at our captive.

  “Why do you want us to hurt you?” I ask calmly. I’m seated in a chair across from the man, legs crossed, playing with a knife. He’s tied to his seat, beaten to a pulp. His eyes are so bruised that they look like battered eggplants. It’s a wonder he can still see through them.

  “Fuck you, Russian pig,” he snarls.

  I sigh. I’d hoped we were past this point. Looking up at Geoffrey, who is standing behind the Irishman, I nod. Geoffrey reaches into his back pocket and retrieves the plastic bag. He yanks it down over the man’s head and pulls it taut against his nose and mouth.

  Screams, muffled, terrified. The screams of a dying man.

  I count off the seconds. Five, six, seven …

  “Enough.”

  Geoffrey releases the bag and removes it at once, then steps back. I wait while the Irishman sucks in oxygen in deep, rattling gasps.

  “I don’t like doing this, my friend,” I say politely. “But I will do what I have to do.” I lean forward and prop my elbows up on my knees. “I’ll ask my questions once more: who told you to shoot at me? What did you hope to gain by my death?”

  The man does not reply.

  I heave another sigh. He is testing my patience, but I will not let him see my frustration yet. I rise to my feet.

  “So be it. Perhaps you will be more amenable to a conversation tomorrow.” I tilt my head towards Geoffrey again. He hits the lights, plunging the man into darkness, and we leave the room.

  An hour later, I am still restless, sitting in my car in the drive outside my mansion. I can’t see Charlotte when I’m so on edge. She makes me want to take the edge off, and I can’t do it with her. She’s too important to Tiana—and to me.

  That she’s avoiding me is a concern. Could mean she’s stumbled onto some detail she thinks she can use against me. Some leverage, some weapon.

  No. Charlotte can’t hide anything. Her face is too honest, her eyes too clear. She’s incapable of deceit. I should know; deceit is my job. And I see none in her. But I need to watch her, just the same.

  I need to go inside, but I’m keyed up now. Thinking of Charlotte in ways I shouldn’t be thinking of her. Imagining her waiting for me to come home with that unmarked skin, that tempting curve of her ass. With desire making her body tremble until I take her in my arms and …

  “No,” I growl, out loud this time. I cannot risk her when she’s become so important to my daughter. I shouldn’t. I won’t.

  Get out. Go inside. And don’t lay a fucking finger on your daughter’s caretaker.

  But I can’t.

  I’m a fucking slave to the thoughts of Charlotte bared before me. I can feel my cock straining against my zipper, so I undo the clasp of my pants and free my erection. I close my eyes and lean back as I stroke my length.

  All I want right now is to push Charlotte to her knees and make her open her mouth for me. All I want is to feel the curve of her ass under my hand. All I want is to fuck her and claim her and mark her as mine, to find my release inside of her and to unleash those moans I know she keeps buried within. I want them to echo off the fucking ceiling. I want her to scream my name.

  I come, roaring inside my car.

  When I am finished and my breath has finally settled back down, I return to my senses.

  What the fuck was that?

  Rather than answer the question, I clean up with a tissue and go inside at once.

  I stop at the half bathroom in the foyer to wash my hands. As I dry them, I look up in the mirror. I recognize the face looking back at me. The same dark brows as my father, the same jawline as my mother. But there is a light dancing in my eyes that I do not remember seeing ever before.

  I don’t fucking like it.

  As soon as I open the bathroom door, Tiana scampers around the corner. She raises her hands to me and I know what she wants. It warms my heart to hug her. To feel her little arms wrapped around my neck as she kisses my cheek and welcomes me home.

  “How was your day, little one?” She has my face between her hands and she’s squeezing my cheeks so my voice is distorted and she giggles and struggles out of my arms to be set down.

  When she’s on the ground, she slips her tiny hand into mine and tugs. I follow her to the nursery.

  Charlotte has transformed the room. The glass door and wall are now covered in a sheer gauzy fabric and fairy lights are strung at the ceiling around the perimeter of the room. There are boards and fuzzy letters covered in glitter hanging on the wall, a dollhouse built into one wall from floor to halfway to the ceiling. The carpet is rainbow-colored with piles of pillows for seating and two small tables—one with a tea service, and the other with crayons, markers, and a stack of papers.

  “And where will you sleep?”

  Tiana takes my hand again and pulls me toward a wall panel. She pushes a button marked with a picture of a bed. A piece of the wall slides away and a bed folds down over the carpet. Tiana crawls beneath the blanket and covers up.

  “Night, night!” she chirps, giggling.

  She’s a living reproduction of her mother. I ignore a pang of regret. I don’t regret losing Natasha for my sake, but for Tiana’s. That is another reason why Charlotte has to stay off-limits. It’s clear that my daughter likes her and responds well to her. And Tiana has lost enough for one lifetime. I won’t jeopardize her relationship with Charlotte over desire I can control.

  I’ve built an empire on the back of my ability to control what would conquer other men. I will not succumb to weakness now.

  I tighten my resolve. It lasts right up to the minute Tiana takes my hand and leads me through to the living room. There is a blanket draped between two sofa cushions, held in place on one side by the coffee table and by a kitchen stool on the other. “This is a princess fort. And
I am Princess Tiana and you are King Daddy and Charlotte is the queen.”

  Because she’s as compelling as she is insistent, I follow Tiana into the princess fort, finding Charlotte waiting inside. As soon as we’re seated, Tiana takes Charlotte’s hand and lays it over mine. The softness of her hands reminds me of silk sheets and I can’t help but picture her, naked, spread wide for me.

  Fuck me, sir.

  But I dispel those thoughts. Charlotte will remain strictly off-limits. I’ll repeat it like a mantra until my body and mind are in complete agreement about the woman whose fingers are still threaded through mine.

  “How was her day?” I ask Charlotte over Tiana’s head.

  Her day, not your day. Minimize attachment. Maintain distance. Push away, push away, push away.

  Charlotte smiles. “It was good. Tiana learned five words that start with the letter A and five for the letter B.” She nods to my daughter—a signal to demonstrate her knowledge.

  Tiana carefully repeats the same words as I translate them into Russian and slowly walk her through the pronunciations. Hearing my native language in Tiana’s tiny voice makes me smile. Hearing it in Charlotte’s sweet but husky voice makes me hard again. On an impulse I don’t bother to rein in, I start to bring her hand to my mouth to press a kiss to her knuckles.

  I stop with her hand halfway up to my lips. She’s looking at me with a curious tilt to her head, and a tightness to her face that I don’t dare to delve into.

  This was impulsive foolishness; a sickness from which I apparently now suffer. I wouldn’t abide it from an employee and I can’t let myself succumb to it either.

  Playtime is over. I’ve ruined it.

  “Come, Tiana. It is time for bed.”

  Discipline won’t be easy with this one. She’s already taken a spot in my heart, so I’m grateful when she doesn’t argue or complain at my order. And because I need to remember and reinforce who is the employer in this relationship with Charlotte, to not blur the lines for either of us, I glance at her. “You’re dismissed for the evening.”

  I sound pompous. Arrogant. As if she hasn’t worked to make my house into a home while simultaneously dealing with Tiana. I owe her my gratitude at the very least, but I’m not a man who’s going to drop to my hands and knees to thank her for doing the job I’ve hired her to do.

  Period.

  By the next afternoon, I’ve moved any residual weakness for Charlotte to a sealed black box in my mind.

  It’s easy to do when she’s at home with Tiana and I don’t have to see her ass disappearing around every corner. When her fuckable lips are far from my sight.

  I have important things to worry about right now. Business things. Whelan things.

  Specifically, I need to prepare for the meeting I’ve agreed to. A Whelan courier visited two days ago, after they received the mutilated remnants of the men who dared attack me after the fundraiser. He requested a parley, a chance to sit at the negotiating table across from those Irish scum and make my demands very clearly heard.

  A number of possibilities exist. Perhaps the attack was unauthorized by the Irish leadership. A rogue lieutenant, or a faction of malcontents. Perhaps the attack was a test, a foray into my defenses to see if my kingdom is vulnerable for the taking.

  I doubt both. More likely than not, this parley is merely the next stage in a larger Whelan scheme. I plan to sniff it out and crush it—ruthlessly.

  But caution is in the cards for today. The last thing I need right now is a war with the Whelans, but neither will I back down to their aggression. If we can’t reach an agreement, I will do what needs to be done.

  I don’t have time to think about the consequences or the blowback from not finding a way to coexist. Jack and Collin Whelan will be here shortly to bargain for power. I could end them the same as they could finish me, but neither of us will make that move. Not here, in broad daylight, in a building with my name across the top. The risk would be too great for our businesses—both the legitimate ones and the ones we hide in the shadows.

  The electric door opens a moment after a light signals their arrival. I press the button under my desk. It turns on the video camera that will document their expressions and their words so I can analyze every moment later and decide what further action to take.

  Jack Whelan enters first—tall, imposing, his once-red hair faded with age into a stark white—and his eyes betray his smile. He’s not here as a friend. Not here to find a solution to our turf dilemma. He’s here to measure me and my strength against his, to show his son—a smaller, more weaselly redhead—that there is nothing to fear if he stands his ground.

  But Jack Whelan is wrong. Standing his ground against me, against Kostya Zinon, head of the Russian Bratva, will bring him nothing but pain. I have the power and influence to make certain no one connects his disappearance to me. If I need to, I’ll remind him of what I can do. But first, I want to see how he behaves, whether he will submit to me, or force a battle neither of us really wants.

  “Kostya.” His accent is old country, more suited to the Atlantic coast than here. I take his hand firmly in mine. “You’re looking well.”

  I return the smile because respect is everything. His son, behind him, hasn’t mastered the art of tranquility or feigning it when necessary. His scowl is deep and telling. He doesn’t want to be here. He would rather be in the streets, asserting his power with fists, with knives, with guns. Despite our similar ages, he’s a foolish child, not yet a man. But I shake his hand and nod accordingly. He presumes to deserve the respect he refuses to give, and his smug smile says so. Time will show him the error of his ways.

  “Please, sit.” I motion to the chairs I’ve put in front of my desk. Chairs with hard backs and no stuffing to the seat cushions. Let no man be comfortable in your presence—that is a lesson I learned from my father.

  Jack’s ramrod posture says he knows what I’m doing, that he expected the discomfort. Collin shifts as he tries to find a position that will accommodate his size—bony and slight.

  The older Irishman watches me, distrustful. This could be an ambush, a luring of these men to my private office where I can make sure they disappear and are never found.

  But only a fool would believe I would risk such a dangerous move here. This meeting is important for both of us. Although not important enough that the elder Whelan would give me the absolute respect of shutting his phone off. Instead, he sets it at the center edge of my desk as it vibrates. His business is as important as mine and he’s letting me know he won’t be cut off from it.

  He stares at me and I wait. Patient. Always patient.

  “Kostya, it is in our both our best interests to maintain peace between us.”

  “I agree.” Ostensibly, that is one of the purposes of this meeting, to find terms we can agree to. The other purpose—for me to measure the validity and longevity of any agreement we make—is less obvious, but infinitely more important.

  An agreement is only as good as the ability to keep it. I know this. He knows it.

  “What do you hope to accomplish with this peace?”

  He cocks his head, the angles of his body still razor sharp, matching the intelligence in his eyes. “A greater power between us. An understanding. A camaraderie.”

  Fignya. Bullshit. He doesn’t care about an understanding. He cares only about power. Only about the respect he feels he’s owed.

  “Camaraderie cannot be bargained, Jack.”

  His smile fades. I’ve let him know there will be no friendship between us, no allegiance. There can be an understanding only.

  Collin narrows his eyes and surveys my office. The opulence here is for show. I need none of it, but for the purposes of my meetings, it’s a tool, like anything else. It shows my preference for nice things and makes my enemies underestimate my fortitude.

  I came from nothing and am not afraid to go back. But this office says otherwise.

  He states his terms. More area. More control. Less interference from my men at the street level. He’s underestimated me. And I nod—not in agreement, but in disbelief. This meeting isn’t a negotiation. It’s a way to keep a war from breaking out until I’m ready for such a battle.