Page 33 of Brutal Vows

“Really? Aren’t Dons a dime a dozen? It’s the same for the Bratva. Pakhans here, there, everywhere.” She chooses a croissant from the basket on the coffee table, puts it on a side plate and places it in her lap.

I smirk. “Come now, Milana, not in the Il Consiglio orbit. Not in Randazzo’s orbit. He was the top dog in Italy.”

“And where is this Randazzo now?”

“Died like a dog, as he deserved. Earlier this year.” I don’t share more. We’re not there yet. “He was into human trafficking. Sex trafficking. Drugs. Any Russians you know who has a flair for the same? Would like a piece of the Italian pie? Or shall we go with a slice of the pizza?”

“You know the Petrov Bratva isn’t into any of that, right?”

“I’d hope not.” It might have been the old Don’s springboard into business when he arrived in America, but Matteo started that deep cleanse over a decade ago. Now’s the time to say what I really would have said last night if the tension between us hadn’t reached boiling point. “We host camgirl sites, but that’s where it ends. And nobody is going to convince me it’s fucked up to have people working—anonymously—from the safety of their homes, doing a job that allows them to catch a break, pay for their kids’ kindergarten, or whatever other reason they have for choosing to make porn. It’s not our place to judge other people’s choices here.”

And some of them become very rich and money savvy, pulling their families out of generational poverty. I’m not messing with any of that ever.

Her hands still where she’s peeling the croissant to pieces. “I agree with you.”

“You do?” I expected her to contradict me, so her calm response leaves me stunned.

“I’m a woman, Luca, and I’ve already had to ask you for money for tampons.”

Fuck my life. I want to touch her hand, to reassure her somehow, but this conversation is too important to let it get derailed now. “I’m working on it, okay?” I say, keeping to myself that addressing her money issues was something I already arranged two days ago. “Now, which Bratva, princess? Tell me what you know.”

She bites her lip and shakes her head, staring at me. “The Sointsev Bratva? Orekolov, maybe. Chertnikov…even the Tambovs. Honestly, I don’t know.”

“Do any of them mark their women?” I ask, coming back to the reason we’re having this conversation in the first place.

“What type of marking? Did Ivan elaborate?”

“No. He shared no details. I can easily describe the tattoos Randazzo forced on his prostitutes, or the scarification some other Mafia are into. No details means the marking isn’t visible in places that are generally seen in public. It’ll be somewhere more private.”

I have a good inkling what and where it could be, but I’m not going there yet. If she knows, let her tell me. She will, soon enough.

A blush blooms on her cheeks, and she drops her gaze to the croissant she’s shredded without taking a single bite.

“No, I have no idea.”

And that, right there, is a lie.

17

MILANA

I glance away from Luca to the deck and beyond. It’s overcast today, threatening rain.

“We’re this close to Boston already?”

We’re cruising between the Boston Harbor Islands. I grasp at this straw to change the conversation. I can’t carry on with this interrogation, go places it will lead me to in my mind, shock still vibrating through my bones.

There’s only one reason Ivan would be in such a rage he’d phone Matteo Scalera, telling him Gabriella is marked by the Bratva. He didn’t give more details, because Gabriella is pierced, like Darya was—my brother’s first wife. Darya’s dead, but to find out your second wife is marked just like your first? Total mind fuck.

With Gabriella’s confession about speaking Russian, the pieces are slotting into place.

Chertnikov.

A quiver runs through me. I’ve lost my appetite, bile rising in my throat. I’m stunned and not surprised in the same breath. For more than six years, Chertnikov has been working to achieve his goal of seizing the Petrov Bratva, but in Europe, he would have been at it for much longer, infiltrating the crime rings there, taking over, grabbing land, forcing other rings into submission.

And Gabi was only thirteen. I want to vomit.

Darya’s jewelry, which I collected on behalf of Ivan at the morgue after her overdose, had several obscure piercings amongst millions of dollars of diamonds, all those glitzy loop earrings and heavy rings she loved to wear. We couldn’t tell the morgue to toss everything. The girls could want something of their mother one day. I shoved the box into the home safe, leaving it for Ivan to deal with. Her piercings could still be there. What with everything going on, he wouldn’t have given it a second thought, but it’s the perfect sample to use for comparison and check if it’s a match with Gabriella’s. With mine.