The Bully (Kingmakers)

by Sophie Lark

  I thought Dean might be irritated by Caleb, since Caleb is brash and loud and desperate to prove himself. But Dean responds to him with surprising patience, even consenting to meet Caleb on his favorite basketball court, despite Dean barely having played before.

  It reminds me of Dean’s strange protectiveness of Kade Petrov.

  I always thought Dean was a bully. But in actuality . . . he’s got a soft spot for the underdog.

  Soon Dean, Caleb, Leo, and Miles are all playing basketball together on the outdoor courts almost every morning. With his typical determination and total disregard for his own physical safety, Dean is picking it up much faster than anyone expected.

  When Dean teams up with Leo, the best player of the bunch, they’re fairly evenly matched with the Griffin brothers.

  “Dean’s gonna be better than you soon,” Leo teases Miles.

  “I’m not exactly practicing on the regular,” Miles scowls. “I’m running a business, not fucking around taking three months off like the rest of you.”

  “Oh, you’re working right now?” Leo says, pretending to look around the court. “That definitely explains the score.”

  All four boys are sweating under the sweltering summer sun. Dean and Leo join Miles and Caleb in stripping off their tops, though it’s supposed to be shirts against skins.

  When Miles sees Dean’s back he grimaces.

  “Jesus, Dean,” he says. “There’s easier ways to get a tattoo removed.”

  Dean lets out a huff of air that’s something like a laugh. “Well, that’s Penmark for you—he didn’t respect my safe word.”

  He tips me a wink.

  I shake my head at Dean, surprised at his willingness to find the dark humor in anything.

  That was one of the most painful and impactful experiences of my life—the agony of watching the man I love be tortured, but also the moment that I finally understood how much Dean loves me.

  The boys asked Zoe and me if we wanted to play, but Zoe said it was too hot and I was in the mood to sketch. Zoe is stretched out on the park bench reading a novel. I’m filling some of the last pages in my sketchbook with yet another drawing of Dean—this time, sweating and laughing as he manages to sink a shot over Caleb’s head.

  Caleb scowls, but acknowledges that it was a pretty good shot.

  “I had a good coach,” Dean says, punching Caleb lightly on the shoulder.

  Once the boys have thoroughly exhausted themselves, we all pile back into Caleb’s Escalade and drive back to the Gallo mansion for breakfast.

  Since it’s Saturday, Sebastian Gallo has a half-dozen pancakes sizzling away on the countertop skillet. Yelena is making fresh-squeezed orange juice, filling the kitchen with a fresh citrus scent that reminds me of Kingmakers.

  Leo scoops baby Natasha up out of her highchair to stop her from fussing. Unlike Leo, Natasha inherited her mother’s fair hair and violet-blue eyes. Her curls are wild and puffy as dandelion fluff, and her little eyebrows point upward in the middle in a way that makes her look perpetually quizzical.

  Leo sits his baby sister on his forearm and pats her back until she stops squawking. Then he gently rubs his nose against hers and blows little puffs of air in her face until she giggles and tries to grab his cheeks with her chubby hands.

  Dean watches all this with a strange expression on his face—part curious, and part pained.

  If my research was right . . . Dean has a little sister, too.

  “Go ahead and sit down,” Sebastian tells us. “The first batch of pancakes is ready.”

  We arrange ourselves around the farmhouse table, Leo depositing Natasha back in her highchair so Sebastian can drop a pancake on her tray.

  Yelena sets a glass of juice down in front of each of us. As she gives Leo his glass, she ruffles his hair affectionately. Then she rests her hand lightly on Dean’s shoulder and squeezes it in turn.

  Dean and Yelena have been spending a lot of time together. She’s been telling him all about her and Adrian’s childhood in Russia—their summer holidays on the Black Sea and ski trips to Krasnaya Polyana. She tells him about distant cousins he never met, and talks about his grandmother that Adrian Yenin never mentioned.

  I’ve likewise been catching up with Zoe. I told her most everything that happened this year at school, other than a few things between Dean and me that are too private to share.

  “So you really love him?” she asked me. “And he makes you happy?”

  “Extremely happy. Sort of sickeningly happy, actually.”

  “Perfect,” Zoe laughed. “That’s all I care about.” She wrapped her arm around me to pull me close, and kissed me on the temple.

  With only a few weeks left before September, Dean knocks on the door of the Gallo’s lovely guest room on the top floor, in which I’ve been staying.

  “Hey,” he says, poking his head inside. “Do you want to come somewhere with me?

  “Of course,” I say, setting down the book I was reading.

  It’s a gray Sunday morning—one of the only inclement days we’ve suffered over the summer.

  As I follow Dean down two flights of stairs, I see that he has Leo’s car keys in his hand.

  “Is Leo coming with us?” I ask.

  “No,” Dean shakes his head. “Just you and me.”

  Dean looks especially pale under the gloomy sky as we stride across the driveway to the waiting car. Almost as soon as he fits the key into the ignition, raindrops begin to spatter against the windshield.

  “Where are we going?” I ask him.

  “Gillson Park,” he replies.

  We drive north of the city, up through Lakeview and Lincolnwood. As we pass into Evanston, I know where we’re going. But I stay quiet, feeling the tension in Dean’s fingers as he grips my hand harder and harder.

  Gillson Park is located right on the rim of the lake, with a sandy beach on one side and a wildflower garden on the other. Dean parks the car, his hands paper-white where they grip the wheel. I can almost hear his heart hammering.

  “Did you talk to her?” I ask him.

  “Yes,” he says. “Last night on the phone.”

  “She’s meeting us here?”

  He nods.

  We cross the parking lot hand in hand, making our way toward the garden. As the rain drums down, the park empties out, until we’re some of the only people left walking the paths.

  It’s easy to find the lone woman sitting on a park bench, dressed in nurse’s scrubs and a light jacket. She holds a blue umbrella open overhead.

  As we approach, she looks up. Slowly, she lowers the umbrella and stands, uncovered, in the rain.

  Rose Copeland is smaller than I expected—only a few inches taller than me. She’s beautiful—I knew that from her photograph. But unlike Yelena, long, unhappy years have worn themselves into her face. She’s one of the saddest-looking women I’ve ever seen.

  The rain beating down on her head darkens her hair from honey-blond to light brown. She can’t tear her eyes off Dean’s face.

  Dean walks up to her, rigid and blanched.

  I don’t know what he’s feeling in this moment. I don’t know how he’ll react.

  Mother and son look at each other for a long time.

  Then, finally, Dean manages to say, “I missed you.”

  Rose’s face crumples. She collapses against Dean, sobbing against his chest. Dean puts his arms around her, stroking her back gently, not unlike how Leo comforts his baby sister.

  We all sit down on the bench together, sharing the umbrella overhead.

  I can’t help crying, but I try to do it quietly so I don’t draw attention away from Dean and his mother.

  Dean puts his arm around me anyway, holding his mother on one side and me on the other.

  “I could never . . . explain to you . . .” his mother sobs.

  “It’s alright, mom,” Dean says, quietly. “I know why you left.”

  She looks up into his face, her pale blue eyes as translucent as glass unde
r their film of tears. “You do?” She says.

  “Yes,” Dean says. “Because of her.”

  He nods toward a willow tree a dozen yards away. In the protected shelter beneath the low-hanging branches, a little blonde girl sits on a picnic blanket, headphones over her ears, reading a chapter book.

  “That’s Frances,” Rose says.

  “You were pregnant,” I say, understanding at last.

  Rose nods. “Adrian was . . . deteriorating. The pregnancy was accidental. When I realized it was a girl . . .” A shudder runs down her slim frame. “I know how the Bratva treat their girls.”

  Dean’s lips tighten.

  He might have dismissed that fear several months ago. But he’s spent enough time talking with his Aunt Yelena to understand what her life was like, growing up as the only daughter of a Bratva boss. Her experience was much different than her brother Adrian’s.

  “I thought Adrian would take care of you at least,” she says, quietly. “His heir.”

  “I saw him push you,” Dean says, his face darkening.

  She nods. “I hit my head. And that night I had spotting . . . I thought I might lose the baby. When I didn’t . . .” her face contorts in misery, and she has to work to regain enough control to get her words out. “I didn’t want to leave you, Dean. I knew he’d never let you go. I never meant to choose between you and Frances. I thought you’d each have one parent. It seemed like all I could do, under the circumstances. But I’ve regretted it . . . every day since . . .”

  She breaks down again, the rain washing her tears away as quickly as they fall. I try to shift the umbrella to cover her better.

  Dean holds her, his hands trembling from how tightly he’s squeezing her.

  “I don’t want to be angry anymore,” he says. “I don’t want to be full of regret. And I don’t want that for you, either.”

  “I’ll never stop being sorry,” she sobs. “I missed you so much. It almost killed me. If I didn’t have Frances . . .”

  She looks across the stretch of field dotted with blue and yellow wildflowers. The little girl is still utterly absorbed in her book, her expression as serious as Dean’s.

  “Can I meet her?” Dean asks, quietly.

  “Yes,” Rose says. “That’s why I brought her.”

  “You weren’t afraid to bring her here?” Dean asks. “You weren’t afraid what I might be like now?”

  Rose looks up into Dean’s face, shaking her head.

  “I know who you are, Dean. I know you would never hurt us.”

  With Rose’s approval, Dean crosses the field and ducks under the low, reedy branches of the willow. He sits down on the blanket next to his little sister. Frances sets down her book and shifts her headphones from ears to shoulders. I can’t hear what they’re saying, but I can see the identical expressions of concentration on their faces.

  Rose takes a tissue out of her purse and tries to clean her face.

  “I’m sorry,” she says. “I haven’t even said hello.”

  “Oh, it’s okay,” I say. “I’m Cat, by the way.”

  “Dean told me about you,” Rose says. “He said you were the one who found me.”

  I can feel myself blushing.

  “Yes, uh, sorry about that . . .” I say, realizing how drastically I breached the privacy of this woman who hid so well for so long.

  “I’m grateful that you did,” she says. “I didn’t know that Adrian was gone.”

  She looks across the lawn to her daughter. I feel her relief that Frances is safe now, truly safe. And I understand what an impossible choice she had to make.

  “You’re right about Dean,” I say. “He’s a good man. The best man. No one loves harder than him.”

  “That’s how he was as a boy . . .” Rose says, softly. “He felt things so intensely. I never knew if it would make him, or destroy him.”

  Frances is showing Dean a particular passage in her book.

  Dean’s silver-blond hair falls down over his left eye, his expression intent. In the gray light, his skin glows pearlescent and his body looks immense and powerful next to the slim girl. I’ve never seen him look more god-like. Yet he’s gentle and careful as he turns the pages of the book.

  Rose and I sit side by side, loving him with all our might.

  Ready for Chapter 1 of The Spy? →

  The Spy

  Three Years Ago

  I wake to my mother’s hand clamped over my mouth.

  “There’s someone in the house,” she murmurs in my ear.

  I slide out from under the light summer sheet, moving silently and listening for whatever sound might have alerted her. I hear nothing at all—not even the whir of a fan, or the mild hum of the appliances down in the kitchen. Glancing at the digital clock on my nightstand, I see only a dark face.

  The power’s been cut.

  That’s what she heard—not a noise, but the sudden absence of sound as everything in the house shut off.

  I’m wearing boxer shorts and an undershirt. It’s been sweltering in Poseidonia, the sea breeze barely managing to cool the villa by midnight. I bend to retrieve my shoes. My mother gives a swift shake of her head.

  She’s barefoot beneath her silk pajamas, padding noiselessly toward the window. She checks the garden below, and the deck to the left, without ever bobbing her face into view. Then she motions for me to follow her toward the door, staying against the wall where the boards are less likely to creak. She glides along like a shadow, her dark hair tousled with sleep.

  She’s left the door cracked. I join her, waiting for her to scan the hallway in both directions before we move.

  She’s about to head toward my sister’s room when I grab her shoulder.

  “She’s not in there,” I murmur. “She fell asleep in the study.”

  I saw Freya passed out on the chaise with an open book splayed across her chest. I covered her with a blanket before I went to bed myself.

  My mother curses silently. The study is at the very top of the villa, accessible only by the staircase on the other side of the house.

  Changing direction, she heads toward those stairs.

  My father intercepts us, dressed in sweatpants and no shirt. His broad chest is heavily inked with the tattoos I know as well as my own face, crossed by the strap of the AR hung over his shoulder. He passes a second rifle to my mother, who sets the stock against her shoulder and assumes a low ready position.

  They split apart, creeping down the hallway with my father in the lead, my mother covering him. They duck under each window we pass. I’m careful to do the same.

  I still haven’t heard anything. I’m hopeful that my father’s soldiers will deal with the threat down on the grounds. We always bring at least six men with us, even when we come to the summer house. As my father’s wealth has increased, so has his caution.

  We’ve almost reached the stairs.

  I hear the creak of someone coming up. My father motions for us to fall back. He gets low, his rifle pointed at the doorway.

  The hulking figure holding a Beretta is instantly recognizable to me—my father’s cousin Efrem, big and bear-like, with an incongruous set of spectacles perched on his nose. His shoulders drop in relief when he sees the three of us.

  “Where’s Jasha and Maks?” My father demands.

  “Unresponsive,” Efrem says, tapping the radio on his belt.

  My father’s face darkens. That’s not good.

  “We need to—” Efrem starts.

  He’s cut off by the sharp crack of shattering glass and a thudding sound. My father grabs me by the shoulder, yanking me to the ground as an explosion blasts through the house. The whole floor heaves beneath me, a wave of pressure and heat roaring out from the direction of our bedrooms.

  Now that the silence is broken, the night comes alive with gunfire and shouting. The sharp staccato of automatic weapons bursts up all around us, seemingly from every corner of the grounds. I smell smoke. Not pleasant campfire smoke—the acrid stench of
paint and fabric and carpet burning.

  “We’ve got to get to the helicopter!” Efrem says, trying to grab my mother’s arm.

  She shakes him off impatiently. “That’s where they’ll expect us to go,” she says.

  We flew in on the helicopter. It’s parked on our private pad on the west side of the grounds. But my mother is surely right—anyone attacking the house would have blocked that route first.

  “The garage, then,” my father says.

  Several vehicles are parked in the underground garage, including Efrem’s Land Rover.

  “No,” my mother says, quietly. “The gardener’s shed.”

  I don’t understand at first, and then I remember that the gardener has his own ancient Jeep, and the shed is located directly beneath the study. We still have to retrieve my sister.

  My father heads up the staircase, trusting my mother’s judgment.

  We follow after him, Efrem guarding the rear.

  As we reach the top floor, I see two figures ducking into the study. These are not my father’s men—they’re dressed in tactical gear with balaclavas over their heads and rifles on their shoulders.

  My mother gestures for me to follow her. While my father and Efrem circle around behind the men, she and I exit onto the balcony. We creep along the open deck, carefully avoiding the lounge chairs and the empty glasses and sun-bleached books my sister forgot to bring back inside with her.

  I peek through the French doors. Freya is no longer asleep on the chaise. She’s nowhere to be seen at all. The two men are searching the room, using the lights mounted on their scopes.

  My mother covers them with her rifle, but she isn’t firing. She knows any noise will draw the whole invading army down on us. She’s giving my father a chance to handle them quietly.

  In tandem, my father and Efrem sneak up on the men. Efrem’s knife is already drawn. My father is bare-handed. He seizes the first soldier from behind, ripping the man’s own Bowie knife from his belt and cutting his throat in one slash.