Page 33 of Jetmir

He managed an air of confidence and assertiveness, and somehow that pissed me off even more. This fucker was too comfortable in his own skin for someone who’d lied to my daughter and caused so much strife.

Then his eyes darted around, scanning the crowd before finally stopping on Anya, watching her with the kind of possessiveness that bordered on predatory.

Oh, he was definitely dying today.

I pointed the gun at his forehead. “You know what, I think I’m gonna kill you regardless. Fuck this truce.”

His gaze returned lazily to me, and he smiled smugly. “I couldn’t agree more, Mr. Santos. Fuck this truce.”

Why did something about his words feel off? I couldn’t be sure whether I was biased when it came to this motherfucker, because he married my daughter. He. MARRIED. My daughter. A sense of nausea rose in my chest. The thought of his filthy paws on my little girl was enough to send me off the deep end.

“Want to continue this war, Volkov? Or is it Tijuana?” I gritted, pressing my finger on the trigger. “Because I’d love to extinguish both names.”

A rush of familiar footsteps echoed behind me, growing louder with every heartbeat. Before I could turn, I heard the sharp intake of breath that I knew better than my own.

“Papa… what are you doing?” my daughter hissed.

A second pair of footsteps stopped just behind her, bringing with it my wife’s voice, strained with fear but fighting to remain calm.

“Raphael…” she whispered, her eyes fixed on the young man opposite me, which only worked to further piss me off. I didn’t move and my wife’s gentle hand wrapped around my bicep, her scent enveloping me. She added gently, “Put the gun down. Now.”

“Papa, please. Put. It. Down,” Anya echoed in a low, stern voice.

For a long moment, no one moved and the confined space we stood in filled with suffocating silence, broken only by my daughter’s uneven breaths and the pounding of my own heart.

“This motherfucking punk should be dead for…” God, where should I even start? “For breaking my daughter’s heart.” Anya thought she fooled us all, but how many nights had I had to listen to her heart-wrenching cries? How many days did I have to watch my girl pretending to be happy when her eyes were shattered like a broken sky. “And for blinding Gabriel,” I added, knowing Anya was too selfless to care about herself, but when it came to Gabriel, she’d rip a person’s heart out of their chest to protect him.

“Nobody can punish Jetmir for breaking my heart but me,” Anya said in a hard voice, and to my horror, she stepped in front of Jetmir, shielding him from my gun. “And Gabriel is the only one who can demand revenge for the damage to his vision. He decided against it, so forgive me, but you’ll lower your gun.”

She carefully met my gaze, refusing to back down.

Fuck. Me. No, no, no.

For the past three years I pretended, ignored the signs, but now seeing her stand there tall and proud, I could no longer lie to myself. Yes, this fucking bastard broke her heart, but Anya… Christ. She still loved him.

And judging by how the prick stared at her with those heated eyes as if he might devour her, the feeling was mutual.

Kill him, my mind whispered. It was the only solution to get my daughter rid of this man’s spell. Right?

“Step aside, daughter. Now.”

“Papa,” Anya warned.

The top of her head barely reached Jetmir’s shoulders, so I could just as easily shoot him in the head. She couldn’t protect him and my daughter was smart enough to know it. But she also knew I would never risk firing any weapon around her.

“Raphael!” Sailor protested, her nails digging into my bicep. “Put the gun down.”

“If I were you, I’d listen to your wife,” he commented dryly.

“Shut the fuck up, boy.”

This fucker stole my only daughter once; I wouldn’t let it happen again. She was too young. Not ready for… anything, and especially not this smug asshole.

Nobody—especially this fucking gangster—was good enough for her. Didn’t my wife and daughter see that?

“Papa, can you please put the gun down?” Anya demanded once again, while Jetmir subtly moved her behind him. “And you… what the hell are you doing?”

“I don’t want the senile bastard to shoot you by accident,” Jetmir reasoned coldly.