Lawless 2 (The Finale)

by Amarie Avant

  “What’s going on in there?” asks an unfamiliar voice.

  Planting myself between the toilet and the door, I unlock the knob. A Russian enters, and I shoot him in the head.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I mutter.

  The dead man isn’t wearing the standard uniform of Irek’s men. Did Oleg have his own protection? He’d complained about a decrease in funding after the Resnovs terminated him. Which should indicate that he cannot afford his own detail?

  Fuck it, Simeon didn’t save me.

  Luka is MIA.

  If I die, I die.

  I stalk out of the bathroom across the area where Oleg defiled me. I sift through the pictures and pick up the picture of the Invisible Thing, sliding the photo into my pocket. Nightmares were my fuel to survive, to save the Invisible Thing, and other women and girls like her. Now, I’m superwoman.

  Adrenaline pumps through me as I open the bedroom door. “Where the fuck are you, Oleg?! I’m coming to get you!”

  My eyes land on him down below. The banister spans across the entire length of the house. Stairs are at the far end, offering me the perfect vantage point for the man whose life I plan to tear apart.

  But. He. Is. Not. Alone.

  The idiot who died by my hands, along with Irek’s guards, aren’t the only ones. Five men, along with Oleg, rise from a table. Cards go flying as the table is toppled over.

  These mudak’s have guns.

  Big ones.

  And more ammo than the handgun I’m toting. Cursing Oleg’s entire lineage, I wheel back on my heels. Bullets rain in my direction. Wooden splinters fly from the banister right before me.

  “Don’t kill her!” Oleg screeches. “Get—”

  I slam the door to the bedroom, which seconds ago had been my prison cell.

  “Okay, so you’re a hothead,” I tell myself, removing the clip of the .9mm to confirm the amount of ammunition I have. “You’ve warned Simeon of how not invincible he is. What the fuck, Asya, with seven bullets, you’re far from invincible!”

  A stampede charges up the stairs. I’m torn between dying and placing every last bullet in Oleg’s head. And if I can’t get to him?

  When the table flipped, his crew were the first to show themselves. What’s to say he won’t keep himself hidden until the prized moment they strike?

  And if I don’t fucking die!

  “You’re fucked in so many different ways, Anastasiya,” I grit to myself.

  Eni-mini-mini-mo . . . I dash toward the picturesque window. Looking out, I verify freedom down below.

  The door strains against the frame and hinges.

  Thawp! Thawp! Someone’s kicking it in.

  Grunting, I grip at the windowsill. Tiny nails are wedged down into the grooves of it. Screeching, I run back, my calves touching the bed. I shoot out the window, and the lump in my throat falls. At least it wasn’t bulletproof.

  The door crashes open. With a running start, I jump and free fall amidst a sparkling shower of broken glass. A bank of snow welcomes and engulfs me, sending my body into instant shock.

  “What are you doing?” Simeon cocked his head to the side as I lay down in the snow. We weren’t children anymore. I’d claimed every part of him, and he’d claimed every part of me.

  “You’re telling me that you’re spending how long at the Black Dolphin in another month?”

  “Four years . . . I’ll see you every chance I get, Anastasiya. Now get up.”

  “Are these four years of torture for all the times I’ve asked you to walk in the snow with me? Because of the book Snow Falling on—”

  “Nyet. I have a plan.” He kneeled before me. The peacoat framed his chiseled jaw. Sparks of light twinkled in his dark gaze. “I have to show my loyalty, moya milaya. When I get out of prison, I’m marrying you. Doesn’t matter if you say nyet. Dah, I’ll spank your ass all the way down the aisle to the altar.”

  My arms and legs continued to cut through the snow. “Sheesh, will God allow you in a chapel?”

  He shook his head, a smile fading fast, though I’d captured the essence of it. “What are you doing, Asya?”

  “Oh, this?” I glanced around me. “A snow angel. For your protection.”

  “My protection?” He cocked a brow. Then he claimed my thigh, stopping me from scissoring the soft, lush coldness. Simeon’s knees planted around my hips. He pressed his gloved hands over my shoulders and pinned me down.

  “It’s a little too cold down here for you to stare at me like that,” I murmured, the fog from my mouth kissing his lips.

  A yelp stole across my mouth as I was launched into the air. Snow danced across his dark hair. Simeon looked up at me. “How about this? I plan to fuck you every morning, noon, and night before I leave.”

  “You already do,” I giggled.

  Simeon meticulously pulled at the leather of his glove. His thumb glided across the vulnerable silk of my throat. “We have to start searching for a better home for us to live in. And prepare you for the time while I’m away. Do you understand?”

  “You mean a home for me to live in.” Orbs filled with animosity, I looked away from him.

  “Those angry eyes remind me of the sunrise.” His voice started soft with a bit of satin, then rough, like when satin is stroked all wrong. “But you will make me bite them out of your head. Keep rolling them.”

  I pressed away from his chest, and Simeon clasped my wrists. The rom-coms and romantic literature I adored having him read to me were dead. We weren’t children anymore. “I love our loft. I love what we have, Sim. You gave the university two million to expand the library a few weeks ago—”

  “Bratva money.”

  I chortle. “You’re teaching there part-time. You’ve made friends with deans. Simeon, you’re a benefactor for museums and libraries! I want to continue living at our loft.”

  We had created two worlds. One belonging to him solely. The other belonging to us. We were normal people.

  “Shhh . . .” Simeon reached up and kissed the complaint from my mouth. He lifted me, biting softly at the apex of my sex. My pussy throbbed, my stomach flipped, and my heart flopped in my chest.

  “Fuck me, Anastasiya. Right here, right now.”

  Suddenly, the cold disappeared. The frigid air felt warm and pleasing to my skin.

  “Alright.” I placed my hand across his throat. The muscles in his neck tightened beneath my hardening grip, and my sex ground down on his stiffness. “One condition.”

  “Dah?”

  “Never leave,” I murmured. “Stay with me forever.”

  Chapter 23

  Simeon

  I’m not drunk today.

  Nyet, far too many important tasks on my agenda, such as Chutin signing his life over to me. Then my fingers will curl around Anastasiya’s throat. I’ll remind her who her true love is before asking if she had run to him or if he had stolen my matryoshka doll.

  As her eyes fill with blood, I’ll weed through the truth within all her lies.

  And if Chutin stole what was mine, he will be taken to the brink of death a million times without touching peace.

  And if it’s a lie? Same scenario for Chutin . . . and my Anastasiya.

  Dressed in all black, I sit on the balcony with my mother.

  She’s calmed down immensely since I tossed the vase of red roses over the side of the balcony upon arrival. Daintily cutting her eggs, she asks, “You’re having tea with Irek Chutin? Have the two of you come to some sort of agreement?”

  “Mom, I’m not here to discuss Bratva matters with you. How’s breakfast?”

  “Despite your barbaric ways,” Sofiya’s gaze flits over the ledge at my example, “you’re my son. What are our intentions? Reaching out to him so soon after Anastasiya left?”

  “A few weeks ago, I was dead to you, Mother. Ahem, ‘you should kill yourself, syn?’ ” I cock a brow.

  She clasps my hands, the bandages around her wrists on display. I take her frail, chilly fingers and place them on my j
aws.

  I sigh, “I know, Mom.”

  Sofiya’s gaze shoots away from mine, then returns, gleaming azure, filled with tears.

  “I know you didn’t mean the things you said.”

  “Thank you.” She lowers her eyes again. “I haven’t been the best over the years . . . Your father hurt you, my words hurt you… my needs . . . desires. If something were to happen to you, moy syn, Mama would fight to the end of the earth! I would—”

  I grab the knife in her hand, which had only been allowed in my presence for breakfast today. “You wouldn’t rest until I was vindicated. Same goes if the situation were reversed, Mama. I’d fight for you.” Same for Anastasiya, my conscious warns, brain at war with my heart.

  “I’ll miss him forever. You will have to understand that.”

  I arise abruptly. “I’ll consult with Garbovsky for his opinion about your siblings’ requests to visit.”

  “You are Tsar.”

  Dah, but I’m no shrink.

  Steam rises from a tea set fit for the Romanovs hundreds of years ago during the grandeur of their reign. I slide the book I haven’t been able to concentrate on, on the silk brocade seat cushion. This room is fit for royalty. Fit for a woman like my gorgeous Anastasiya.

  I hate it.

  Everything is silk, diamond-encrusted, glass-vaulted, or red.

  The red ruins the scheme of things because that very color is what this room should be painted in.

  Or will be painted in, in precisely five minutes.

  As Irek Chutin is escorted inside, I arise from my seat. His entourage consists of reinforcements. Ten of his closest, all brick necked, muscle-bound, and fully armed. The lack of trust causes my smile to widen.

  “The new Tsar… excuse me. Not novel anymore. You’ve held your role, for what, almost two years now?”

  He reaches me, hand extended. Fuck you gleams in my gaze. I gesture. A byki steps forward with a rectangular shaped gift. Red wrapping paper taunts me, beckoning me to warm my hands with Chutin’s blood. The gift is awkwardly placed in Chutin’s awaiting hand, promising that there will be no handshake.

  I reclaim my seat.

  My enemy taps his index finger over the edge of the gift before sitting down. “I have something for you as well.”

  “Me first.” I don’t want your filthy gifts. The only recompense I require is your cold heart in my hands as I mash it into nothing.

  Chutin places the gift on the table and settles into the seat across from me.

  I eye the gift and then smile at him. With the flick of my wrist, a maid begins to pour us both tea.

  Irek glances at the tea, picks it up, and sets it back down. The you-first half-smile he offers in return is evident by his unwillingness to take a sip. Paranoid mudak.

  “Open your gift,” I order.

  “I think I will.” Irek plucks the box back up, gives it a little shake.

  “Nyet ticking,” I laugh sarcastically.

  “Nyet, not with me sitting across from you, I presume. Nyet big bangs.” This time, he loosens up with a chuckle before sliding his finger into the seam of the paper.

  Irek tears into the red paper, tossing the Twenty-four-karat gold ribbon over his shoulder. Unlike Dominicci’s men, who stood behind him to keep him safe, Irek’s men take an interest. The president slows his curiosity and opens the top. Then he whistles.

  “A knife…”

  “Not just any knife…”

  “Let me see if I have change. One of you must give me change.” He smiles over at his team. Receiving the gift of a knife is taboo for us Russians.

  “Won’t be necessary.” I shake my head. The saying goes, giving a knife as a gift turns friends into enemies, unless the receiver has a small coin to offer the giver.

  “But I insist.”

  “But you mustn’t. As you’re well aware, the two of us have never been friends, never will be friends,” I growl, then my voice returns to normal. “Let’s resume with tea. Then we will discuss the most pertinent matter of all.”

  Attempting to speak over me, Irek chortles. “Someone, please, give me a coin. I’ve discarded less money. I can at least give you a coin for this.”

  Ignoring the joke, I retort, “After tea, we will discuss, moya Anastasiya.”

  “Who? Oh, the little girl. Let’s discuss her.” Steam fizzles from Irek’s teacup as he lifts it. “Surely, such a beautiful piece is a worthy topic during tea. As I recall, she had a fondness for art too. Actually, the years are returning to me. I instilled those values in moya Castle Girl.”

  Chapter 24

  Mikhail

  My aunt Sofiya had various addresses for Oleg, which she shared too quickly. She was too cooperative. I had it in my mind to ask what was behind those cold blue eyes. Instead, I rent a cross between a four-wheel drive and a hatchback and amazingly spent all morning on one tank of fuel.

  At a quarter of a tank left, and one last address, in a rural area, I deign to return my father’s call.

  “Moy syn, I’ve received voicemail after voicemail from my old colleague, Dr. Dunn.”

  “Oh, you’re chatting with friends now? How are you, Dad?” I feign innocent, toggling from the call application to the map. I’m not discussing Dr. Dunn, who’d been the hard-ass riding all the residents when I was once wet behind the ears. The Chief of Medicine continued to keep me under his wing. He offered even more support than my own father when my brother died.

  “I said voicemails, Mikhail. I’m not up for conversing with anyone. But when I receive concerned messages from a man whom I once esteemed, I react. You were supposed to begin at County?”

  “Yes.” I usher out a breath, contemplating my departed little brother, though fleeting. “I’m okay, Dad. Anastasiya’s missing.”

  Malich exhales heavily. “Simeon will find her. Where the fuck are you, syn?”

  “Helping Simeon . . .” I murmur.

  “Moy syn was never a liar.” His accent chimes through. It’s as if he’s sitting right beside me in mother-fucking-Russia.

  “Sim isn’t using half his brain right now, Dad.” I slow around a road, windier than where Sofiya resides.

  “Stop. Come home now! Yuri is the joke of the family. My beloved Igor is deceased. You’re the only tie I have to this earth, Mikhail. I’m living to watch you marry, have children.”

  The GPS prompts me to take a left. On the screen, the passageway snakes into a smaller, curvier road.

  “I have to go, Dad.”

  “You’re a fool, Mikhail. No son of mine.”

  We hang up at that, at least, I have to assume the old man intended to have the last word.

  The GPS calls out, offering the same prompt. A good-sized truck wouldn’t gather enough clearance or width, but I begin to drive. Overgrown branches tap against the side of the windows. The wheels glide over battered roots. Five minutes in, there’s a clearing. Farther up is a road running parallel to the dirt gravel I’m on, which probably leads to an easier route here. Little less than a kilometer away, a lone house stands. In the driveway are three trucks, and the sort of windowless van little girls should steer clear of.

  It's the perfect remote location to hide an abductee.

  “God, let her be here,” I murmur.

  Birds summersault into the sky in the rearview behind me as popping sounds come from the house. Glass fragments and a figure flies from the side of the structure.

  “Nastiya!” I shout, tugging the wheel to the right. Venturing off the gravel, I stall precariously close to a mound of snow.

  “Anastasiya,” I shout, shoving the door open. Leaning over, I reach into the glove compartment for a gun I hadn’t anticipated using. Not unless it was on a man named Oleg. Immobile, she lays there. The nozzles of two Simi automatics tilt outside of the broken window. “Nastiya, fuck, wake—”

  Their intent is not to kill her. Bullets chop at the ice near my front door. Anastasiya pops up into a sitting position. The shooting ceases.

  “Not t
he girl!” comes a hard voice.

  Then a fusillade of bullets flies in my direction, riddling the car. I zip forward, scraping the vehicle along the side of the wall as Anastasiya comes running. She opens the trunk of the hatchback and climbs in.

  Her stark light brown eyes blaze through me. Even with pain laced across her face, she has this remarkable way to get under my skin. She asks, “Good Doctor, where’s Simeon?”

  “Sim isn’t here. You have me.” I turn forward, the muscles beneath the skin of my jaw moving in overdrive as the trunk slams shut.

  “Where are you going?”

  “Saving us,” I grit.

  She roars out in pain, then snaps, “The road is back—”

  “That road leads toward those trucks. They probably have reinforcements and bulletproof windows. While all I have is . . .” I hold up the gun. Anastasiya grabs it.

  “Will we fit? Oh, fuck?” She laughs as I zoom back through the trees.

  “The real question, Nastiya, is, will they?”

  Anastasiya mumbles about how “I’m her kind of crazy,” as she rolls down the back window and begins to shoot.

  Eyes darting, I drive through the dense trees. I breathe easier when a truck rams into a root, creating a barricade for the others to follow.

  I glance through the rearview again. Her ass is tooted in the air, while half her body is leaning out the window. She’s shouting for them to “come get us,” threatening to murder them all.

  “We’re good. I hope,” I mutter.

  “You’re good. I’m not,” she grits, sliding back into the seat. A streak of blood follows.

  “Nastiya.”

  “Yes!”

  “You’re bleeding.”

  “I know.” She fists the gun. “Oleg is back there, Mikhail. Thanks, but you defeated your purpose. Where is Simeon?”

  I stop glaring, mash on the break, then ease around a tree. “I’m here, Nastiya. Not Simeon.”

  “I see.” She seethes, snatching her hand along her ribcage where blood is seeping. “Again, we’re headed in the wrong direction. Oleg—”