Chapter 10: Mikhail

I’m not like them.

I’m not evil.

Her words seep into me as I walk away, leaving her in the snow.

I never allow anything to linger in my mind longer than necessary. Or people to get under my skin the way she has.

Nothing about this woman, however, seems to be following my usual set of rules. Of course, it wouldn’t, because essentially, she’s my captive and I’m forcing her to marry me.

I’ll have her ring tomorrow, and in two days, I’ll give it to her. That’s when things are going to feel stranger than they already are. Especially since I hadn’t seen marriage in the cards for me any time soon. Or at all. As to what we’ll do once we’re married, I don’t know, but I’ll cross that bridge when I get there.

I expect Sebastian to be back with José in a few days. I am, however, going to leave a few of my other subordinates there to keep things under control.

That’s Mexico taken care of for the moment. After the wedding, I’ll head back there to see how things are going, and I’ll take the princess with me—as my wife.

Aleksander meets me in the same businesslike manner I like him for when I walk into the dining room.

He’s worked for me for the last eight years and does what he’s told to do without expressing an opinion. Unless I ask for it. I trust him enough to ask sometimes.

I can tell he’s wary of Adriana and cautious of the situation here. I am, too, if I’m honest.

The whole Raul situation has me on edge. When I left my father, I put things in motion to continue my own personal investigation. I have my street guys checking things out, and a friend from the Voirik Brotherhood is meeting me tomorrow morning. He’s the last ace up my sleeve. If he investigates and tells me there’s nothing more to find, I’ll follow my father’s orders and focus on the cartel but keep my eyes open.

“Was the girl any trouble?” I ask.

“No. She doesn’t seem to be. Sorry the dog got loose. It doesn’t like being left alone.”

“No apologies necessary.”

“I just wasn’t sure if you’d be okay seeing her play with Talia’s dog.”

“I’m fine. Let her play with it. It’s not a problem.”

He dips his head. “Are you heading out again?”

“Yes. I have work to finish up at Dmitriyev Ltd.” That’s my work Ivan was taking care of while I was out of commission.

“You’ve had a hectic time. Are you sure you want to get back into the office today?”

I nod firmly, and he knows not to push me. “Yes. It’s best I go.”

Most things are in hand, but my brother is a man who will do anything to make me look incompetent. I’m not going to allow that to happen. I only wanted to touch base at home for a few minutes to make my presence known.

Ivan has been dealing with the high-profile clientele and investors Father entrusted me with when he first made me the Obshchak of the brotherhood. In that role my primary duty is to take care of all the money coming into the business.

Even though Dmitriyev Ltd is our family business, the company has served the brotherhood for many generations and has been the primary source of income.

As such, the Obshchak has always had the position of chief financial officer.

I’ve two meetings to attend and paperwork that will take up the rest of the day. I don’t want anybody questioning my capabilities in any way.

“I’ll be back around ten, or a bit later,” I tell him. “Make sure she eats. If she causes trouble, let me know.”

“Of course.”

I don’t think she’s going to cause any trouble today, but I have to prepare for it.

What I’ve done has caused a massive upheaval to her world and dragged her into mine. The conversation just now was intense.

I was intense, so I think she’ll be compliant for the rest of the day.

Pulling on my leather jacket, I leave him, and head out again to my bike.

As soon as I pull out onto the winding road that will lead me back to the city, her words come back to me. They continue to swirl around in my mind, screwing with me. It’s an odd feeling I want to shake, but I can’t because part of me believes her.

Part of me believes she’s not evil, and it goes back to what I first felt when we met. I sensed purity in her but couldn’t explain it because of who she is.

I felt it again just now as she spoke, and I saw it while I was watching her play with Snow.

Men like me are like fucking sharks when it comes to anything like that, for the simplest reason of being around something we shouldn’t have. In my case, Adriana Alvarez feels like a woman who is automatically off limits because of the darkness perpetually residing in me.

And that’s what’s screwing with me, because I can’t figure her out.

Seeing her with my sister’s dog grated on my nerves at first, but not because she was playing with it. It’s because of the memories she conjured of Talia.

I took the dog to remember her by, but the memories are also a curse.

My father kept Snow at his house while I was in the hospital, but I took over her care when I got out. It was me who bought it for Talia on her twenty-first birthday. That was only four years ago and after she first got accepted at the New York City Ballet.

My sister was the prima ballerina, and before she was killed, she’d just gotten the assistant choreographer position after being with the company for three years.

The dog was like a long overdue present, and she loved it to no end.

So did my mother.

That nightmare night when disaster struck, Mother was the first to get hit. One bullet to her head signaled the attack. Another went straight to her heart before I could even turn my head to figure out where the bullet came from. When I did, I saw Felipe on the rooftop of the opposite building accompanied by a bunch of masked snipers; I just didn’t know it was him until I came up against him face to face.

That night transpired two weeks before Christmas, so they never saw the new year.

Talia had just finished her first performance of the season in a ballet she helped choreograph.

The attack happened just as we stepped out onto the theater parking lot. We were one of the last to leave. Someone knew that.

Someone who was watching us.

Someone who knew where we’d be and what time we’d be leaving.

Talia screamed when Mother went down, and our bodyguards started dropping like flies. All I could think of was protecting her. We weren’t anywhere near our car to get away from the danger. With so many bullets flying I couldn’t risk her getting hit, so I shielded her with my body while I got her to what I thought was safety behind a hedge.

I pursued the snipers and found Felipe. From the sight of him I knew Raul sent him and what was going on.

That was also where I went wrong. When you’re under attack and ambushed like we were, the chances of survival are next to nil. It’s like flying blind while your enemy has you in a trap under their thumb.

Although I took down a lot of the snipers, I got shot twice before I made it to Felipe. He was trying to escape, but I gave him a good chase. I reached him when he jumped into his truck but couldn’t get close enough. I didn’t notice the detonator in his hand until it was too late. He released the trigger on a bomb that should have killed me.

It was a miracle I survived. I was told one of our allies found me in the debris. After that, while my father was investigating, he kept my survival quiet to allow everyone to think I died.

Of course, no one found Talia. Felipe’s men would have taken her while I was down. That’s the part that broke me. I couldn’t have done anything to save my mother. Part of me knows I couldn’t have done anything to save Talia either, but because I had a chance, I keep wondering what I could have done differently—or what I could have done better.

That night, Father, Ivan, and Sophia were supposed to be with us but weren’t because my father had a bad reaction to some medication and couldn’t make it.

Sophia was taking care of him at the time, and Ivan had to go to the office to cover meetings my father couldn’t attend during the day.

The ballet was one of the only times we would have all been together out in the open. That is why I think the assassination attempt was on the whole family. If we were all there, we would have all been gunned down like animals, which would have wiped out the entire Baranov leadership.

With no heirs to the Dmitriyev fortune left, Ivan and I are the last men left in the bloodline. Sophia never remarried after a tragic car accident years ago that claimed the lives of her husband and three kids.

If we’d all died that night, the result would have been chaos. It would have opened the door for Raul and whomever to take control over our brotherhood and the extensive wealth linked to our company.

Things are chaotic now, and they will continue to be so until I get to the bottom of this shit.