AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I stare at my little brother for a couple of seconds. The statement has me coming to the realization that he might be a bit more mature than I thought he was.
“Well, I hope it works out for you, Alexei.”
CHAPTER 9
Lucia
Iwas expecting the living room to explode into chaos as soon as Ivan walked out. Surprisingly, we all descended into silence instead. It takes a long moment before any one of us speaks. Of course, the first person to do so is my sister.
“What the hell was that?” she asks her husband.
He groans softly but doesn’t seem to have a reply for her. Adrian does, though.
“That, Aurora, was a madman.”
My lips twitch at that. I glance over to him and he still looks furious. He looks angrier than everyone in this room put together, which is odd. Adrian’s always so calm. He’ll make jokes, deflect, and do anything really to ensure no one can guess at his emotions. Right now, though, his mask is clearly off.
“You knew,” I say in a low tone. “You both knew he was coming here for me.”
“We suspected,” Nico corrects. “Yesterday, Adrian’s spies reported that Volkov was in the market for a wife.”
“In the market,” I repeat in a dull tone. “I feel like I’m being bid on at an auction.”
Honestly, I’m not sure I know how to feel about this entire situation. I’m more shocked overall that the man I slept witha month ago turned out to be some sort of Russian criminal mastermind.
In actuality, I shouldn’t be too shocked. I do have a way of picking them. I seem to attract danger wherever I go.
“Don’t. This entire thing is stupid,” my sister says to me. “You’re not getting married to that old man. That makes no sense.”
She seems a little hysterical about the whole thing. I try to look at things through her lens. Some middle-aged guy walks in and demands to marry her little sister. Of course she’s not going to take that lying down.
But Ivan’s age is the least worrying thing about this entire situation to me.
Nico seems to be thinking, that calculative glint that’s never too far off in his eyes. Aurora gets to her feet to stand in front of her husband with her arms crossed.
“Tell me we can refuse,” she demands.
Nico arches an eyebrow. “Sebastian might have been a bastard,mi vida, but he was still a part of this family. He held a seat at the table. Whatever deal he made is valid.”
“I don’t care. Lucia’s not marrying him.”
My sister’s a lioness when it comes to fighting for the people she cares about. I don’t even need to say anything; I know she’ll fight tooth and nail to keep this marriage from happening. Which is well and good because no way in hell am I marrying Ivan.
He’s insane if he thinks that’s going to happen.
“She’s not going to marry him,” Nico assures his wife. He finally looks at me, an apology swirling in the depths of his blue eyes. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you what was going on, Luce. I’ve been trying to figure out a way out of this mess.”
“I have the perfect solution,” Adrian drawls, settling down on the couch beside me. “We kill him.”
Nico frowns. “Murder’s not the solution to everything, Rossi. And you know as well as I do that we can’t kill him.”
“Why the hell not?” Aurora questions.
Aw. Would you look at that? Her husband must be rubbing off on her. Before she married him, her moral compass was much more rigid.
“Because,mi vida, the man controls a shit ton of power within the Bratva. We need to proceed with caution. Find out his weaknesses, and maybe then we can come to an agreement. I need to talk to Lukas. He’ll be able to advise us on the best path to take.”
I have no clue who Lukas is.
