Page 111 of Deviant Need

What are they talking about?

Mateo shakes his head, then drags his bloody thumb across his lip, eyes locked on me with an expression I can’t decipher. “When I was a kid, I had a front-row seat watching the Avrorins tear this city from my father’s hands piece by piece. I watched Roman Avrorin personally execute every single man my father had. Everyone who stood in his way. Everyone who refused to bend the knee to him.”

He tilts his head and takes another step toward me. “I had a younger brother. Adrian Nozares. My father’s bastard son from some whore he knocked up and kept hidden from everyone. But I knew about him. Knew I had a baby brother out there somewhere.”

Why does that name sound familiar?

His jaw tightens visibly. “Then Roman Avrorin found them. Killed her. Slaughtered her entire family. We received photographs. A dead toddler. Proof Adrian was dead and gone.” He’s directly in front of me now, completely invading my space. “So, you can imagine my shock when I discovered my brother survived. Not just survived—the Avrorins took him in. Raised him as their own son.”

“That’s not true,” Mikhail says sharply.

Mateo raises his eyebrows. “It is.”

What? That’s not true. No way. This can’t be real.

Brother.

He’s my brother.

Mateo turns around and locks his eyes on Yulian. “What made the Avrorins take a Nozares baby and raise him as their own?”

I’m a Nozares.

He closes the distance between them, stepping into Yulian’s space until there’s barely any room left. “We need to set something up so we can find time to figure all of this out. We could arrange peacetime through a hostage exchange.”

Peacetime?

“Leave while you still can, Teo.” Yulian’s voice cracks on the nickname. “I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t know until a few hours ago. We can’t talk about this here. Just go, please.”

Mateo shakes his head. “This is bad.” He backs up, hands going over his head. His burn scars down his neck gleam from the light above us.

“You have to go. Right now,” Yulian begs.

Mateo curses and turns to me. “If I’d known what they were doing to you back then, I would’ve stopped it. But I was just a kid. I’m only four years older than you… I couldn’t⁠—”

What is he talking about?

He stares at me with an expression I can’t read and struggles to continue. “What they did to you… Jesus. You were just a baby. So small.” He drags his hand over his jaw. “Adrian, I’m sorry. I wish things were different. That we’d met some other way, in some other life. I would’ve liked knowing you. Our families have bad blood, I know that, but I⁠—”

Yulian cuts him off. “Don’t say anything else.”

Mateo turns on him fast, bringing the gun up to press against Yulian’s forehead. “You don’t get it⁠—”

Voices suddenly echo down the hall, loud and urgent, and Mateo’s eyes go wide.

Turning around, I see men rounding the corner, but they’re not ours. Different uniforms, different weapons. Mikhail grabs my shoulder and drags me backward, taking off with me towards Yulian. We reach a table against the wall, and he flips it over, pulling me down behind it for cover.

Bullets start flying, and everything turns to chaos. Yulian pulls out two handguns, starts shooting with one, and slides the other across the floor to Mikhail.

Mateo throws something down for cover and runs away. Wood splinters fly everywhere as bullets punch through the furniture, raining debris. Bullets slam into the table, the walls, glass shattering from picture frames. One of the Nozares men goes down screaming, clutching his leg. Another drops silently with a hole in his chest.

Mikhail picks up the gun and starts firing down the hallway. Mateo throws himself around the corner just in time, disappearing behind the wall a second before the bullets tear through where he’d been standing.

Yulian’s shooting at guards but then stops to shout at us. “Don’t kill him!” Then shoves a gun into my hand. “Just in case,” he says, not looking at me, and then he turns around and keeps firing without stopping, unloading round after round.

I hear Mateo shouting orders from the other side, but I can’t make out the words over the ringing in my ears. Then I see Mikhail jerk twice, blood blooming across his shoulder.

“Shit,” he mutters and slumps against the floor next to me, blood pouring from the wounds, soaking his shirt. His eyes find mine, wide and unfocused.