Page 80 of Marked By the Devil

I forced a hard swallow, determined not to throw up.

“Nope. I’m fine,” I lied.

He kissed the top of my head once more as they left the room, already on their phones and calling whoever could still be moved.

Act on it.

Do what you can to spare more damage and deaths.

I cringed at the pressure to vomit.

Do what you can and then handle this truth later.

29

VIKTOR

Wren didn’t quit.

She stayed up all night, at the computer, typing away and maneuvering through all the windows and apps and programs. Without taking a break, without considering a pause, she stayed with it and fought in a creative way that blurred defense and negotiating and deceptive communication.

It was a path that was more outside the box than what any of us considered, and I imagined that only she would be able to pull it off.

I checked on her again, worried that she was getting dragged down by the stress of the situation. She looked… frustrated. But also something else.

A headache was the only thing she admitted to, and I brought her water and painkillers. I had food arranged for her, too. Adrik had set up both her and Elena with whatever they would want to eat or drink as they worked throughout the night. A maid and guard waited outside Elena’s office, ready to get them anything they needed.

Elena insisted on sticking with Wren, and Trojan was pulling his weight remotely too. While Elena was a supportive backup, she wasn’t as versed with navigating all the programs as Trojan and Wren were. But she stayed and helped.

I didn’t linger, despite how worried I was about Wren and the stress of it hitting her so hard. She was brave. She was strong. She was smart. Yet something about her seemed off.

“Ready to go?” I asked the men in the car with me.

They confirmed that they were.

While Wren, Trojan, and Elena worked to scramble the communications and mix up the wires, so to speak, the rest of us headed out to protect the residences of the Bratva men on the list. Stefan Rossi, the Mafia boss from New York who was an old ally of ours, assisted too, sending out cyberattacks to the buildings that had coded entries so no one could easily break in. For the more spread-out homes, we relied on more of guerilla warfare, taking out the perps as they approached the houses our men called home.

Some were captured. Lev and Alexei headed up that part of the counter-operation. So far, most of them seemed like independent hires and wouldn’t be able to direct us to who had ordered this massive plot against us.

“I don’t think it’s Smithson,” Nikolai said once we were driving home after it was all over.

I shook my head. “I don’t think he was the original mastermind behind it all either. Not this time.” He had a part in it, orchestrating the toned-down law enforcement response. But someone else had stepped up to fill in the shoes for Yusef Antonov, Gregori’s former second-hand man.

“But it’s all the work of Gregori,” I said with a tired sigh. “I can’t wait until he is dead.”

“Again,” Nikolai quipped just as tiredly.

It’d been a while since I’d pulled an all-nighter like this, and while I was tired, I couldn’t shut down until I knew that Wren was okay.

I came back to the mansion, finding her in a guest room. Elena must have led her there once the time of the scheduled attack was over with. I showered as quickly as I could and joined her in bed.

It was different to be in a guest room with her since she’d always been at home with me, but I wasn’t surprised or concerned that she wanted to sleep in.

I let her be, knowing she’d more than earned it with her ingenious plan to save the day. Literally, she’d saved so much damage and death from happening. I couldn’t wait for her to wake up and I could confirm that we hadn’t lost a single man last night. She had to have gone to bed too tired to wait for me, but she was in contact with us all throughout the night.

I couldn’t wait to praise, reward, congratulate, and worship her to show how much she meant to me and my family. But if she needed to sleep, she could sleep.

It’d been a while since I’d stayed in the mansion. It was a large residence that my father had built and added on to over the years. With more than enough room for him to raise all six of us boys, since he had taken Alexei and Lev under his wing when Gregori “died” the first time, it was more like a hotel than a house.