“Whoever said the Russians weren’t a charming people.”
She scoffed as she stomped past me and out the front door.
Looking back at Dimitri, I sarcastically tipped my invisible hat at the brigadier. He looked like he was barely restraining the urge to whip out his gun and pump me full of lead. With one final seething glare, he stormed from the room and disappeared.
My driver took the suitcases from me once I reached the black town car parked in the driveway. Of course, Lexi insisted on handing him the third suitcase herself, bypassing me with a ball-shrinking dirty look.
Then the strangest thing happened.
I actually wanted to…laugh at that.
Her indignant expression, her scrunched up nose, her pouty frown. Something about that stubborn attitude made the weight that had formed in my chest the second Sergei said the word “marriage” feel lighter somehow.
And yes, it made my dick twitch, too.
“Do we…?” Her words trailed off as she stood in front of the open car door, her back facing me. Conflict was etched in every tense muscle of her back. She was clearly debating something inside her head.
“Do we what?”
Squaring those tense shoulders, she whirled around to face me. “Do we have time to stop by the Red Gate Orphanage?”
I quirked an eyebrow. “Thinking of adopting a child now that we’re married?”
“As much as I loathe denying a child the opportunity to have such a brilliant role model like you as a father”—I swear to God, I almost smiled at that—“no. I know many of the children there, and I’d like to see them once more before I leave.”
I glanced back down at my watch. “Traffic is going to be a bitch this time of day, and we’re already running late as it is. Sorry, legs, but no go. You’ll see them when you get back, once this whole charade is over.”
I was stunned when her eyes got a little shiny just before she turned away. She acted genuinely hurt that we wouldn’t be stopping. What the hell is that about?
“Bugger.” Turning around again, she rushed back toward the house. “I forgot something. I’ll be right back.”
“If this is an attempt to run away or hide,” I called at her retreating back, “let me save you some time and tell you that I’ll find you no matter where you go. I was the hide and seek champion as a kid.”
She narrowed her eyes at me over her shoulder. “Hiding implies that you want to be found.”
“And you don’t?”
“Not by you.” Then she disappeared through the door.
A small chuckle did escape that time.
I had just pulled my phone out of my pocket to check my messages when the loud crack of gunfire erupted from inside the house, splintering the otherwise quiet afternoon.
And Lexi had just run right toward it.
“Shit!”
I yanked my .45 1911 from its holster and took off at a dead sprint.
My first instinct when I heard the shots ring out was to drop to the ground and cover my head, like I’d learned to do at a young age. But then I realized the sounds were coming from the floor below me. There weren’t bullets zinging past my head. Yet.
Still, I probably shouldn’t loiter about.
The phone charger I’d come back inside for definitely wasn’t worth losing my life over.
I was halfway down the second-floor hallway when the shooting started. I immediately switched directions and ran back for the main stairwell, retracing my steps. These hallways were like those in a museum—ridiculously long and wide enough for a city bus to fit inside. The gunfire got louder and louder the closer I moved to the foyer, intensifying the pounding of my heart.
Who was shooting? And why? How had they gotten passed security? No one should have been able to breach the grounds without proper access.
Oh, God.
I hoped Batya hadn’t returned from his business meeting yet. What if he’d gotten caught in the crossfire? What if he was—
Focus. You put yourself at great risk once you let fear guide your actions.
He had often spoken those sage words to me when I was young. Back when I’d still been having nightmares of what had happened to me at the orphanage in Siberia. I repeated them to myself over and over as I rushed down the hall, keeping myself plastered against the wall, in case a gun-wielding psychopath happened to come stampeding around the corner.
My father had always made it a point to distance me from his life as the leader of the largest organized crime syndicate in Russia. I never asked questions, because I didn’t want to know the specifics. But I knew the basics. And I knew some level of risk always surrounded me, being the only daughter of a Russian mobster. We’d had some security concerns over the years, though nothing truly serious had ever involved me.
I never thought I’d have to worry about people shooting up my own home.
This was unprecedented. You didn’t break into Sergei Kozlov’s house and directly threaten those close to him without signing your own death certificate. I knew Batya had killed men for much less.
As I was about to round the last corner before I came upon the main stairwell, a hard body slammed into me, nearly knocking me flat on my arse. Two strong hands caught me in the scuffle, just as a scream climbed up my throat. One of those hands clamped over my mouth, preventing the sound from escaping.
That’s when I looked up into two exotic amber eyes.
“Shh,” Nico whispered in an urgent tone. His eyes were wide and alert as they quickly inspected my body. “Are you okay?”
I was so shocked that he’d run back inside the house after me—toward the bullets—that all I could manage to do was nod.
“We need to get out of here now. My driver is armed, but he won’t be able to barricade himself near the car forever. We have to hurry up.”
My voice was strained when I was finally able to find words. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t fucking know. All I do know is those aren’t warning shots. Whoever is firing, they’re doing it with purpose.”
Meaning, they have a target. Or multiple targets.
His muscular arm banded over my waist and pushed me up against the wall as he peeked around the corner. His body was vibrating with adrenaline. I could feel it emanating from the hand he placed on my hip. But he wasn’t shaking in fear. He didn’t even seem nervous. He seemed…practiced?
That’s when I noticed the gun in his other hand. A gun he looked very capable holding. The weapon looked like an extension of his body, he seemed so comfortable handling it. Batya said Nico’s family had connections with the New York Firm. Did that make him mafia, too? Or was he just indirectly affiliated with it? Either way, he didn’t seem to be a novice at knowing what to do in a dangerous, possibly deadly, situation.
“Did you see my father anywhere out there? Or Dimitri?”
“No,” he said absently. “And I’m pretty sure your boyfriend can handle himself.”
It was on the tip of my tongue to again insist that Dimitri wasn’t and never had been my boyfriend. But that wasn’t even in the realm of priorities right then, so I kept my mouth shut.
Nico took another few seconds to assess the hallway before stepping away from the wall. “Okay, I think we’re clear. Let’s move.”
He grabbed my hand and hauled me behind him before I had the chance to even take a breath. We ran down the stairs, his hand maintaining that tight grip on mine. My pulse was thundering so loudly in my ears I could barely hear the gunfire in the background.
I have no idea why my brain went to this place in that moment—life or death situations warp the mind, I suppose—but I couldn’t fathom why a man like Nico had bothered to come in after me. We’d barely been married a full hour. We didn’t know each other. He was in no way responsible for my well-being. He had no loyalty to me.
Yet he’d taken his own life in his hands by running into a gunfight to save me.
Why?
What did he care whether I lived or died?
He shouldn’t have. In fact, he should have been praying that I’d get struck by a bullet so this whole marriage contract would be null and void.
After what felt like an eternity, we reached the black town car that was still parked in the driveway. The driver was using his open door as cover, gun raised, clearly preparing for an attack. The fact that the shooters clearly hadn’t come through the front door—otherwise this car would have been riddled with bullets and the driver likely left for dead—disturbed me.
From what direction had they gained entrance? There was dense forest at the back of the property. Had they somehow managed to hide in there undetected? There was also that weak spot in the security fence near the West Wing entrance. But no one outside of our household and security team would have known about it.
Nico whipped open the back door without taking his eyes off the house. “Get in!”
“Wait, I have to make sure my father isn’t inside,” I yelled frantically. “What if he came back and got trapped in there? I can’t just leave him.”
“Your father charged me with keeping you safe,” he barked. “He wouldn’t want you to go looking for him. Get in the fucking car, Lexi.”
When I still hesitated, he planted his hand between my shoulder blades and shoved me forward. The move sent me tumbling into the back seat, head first. Just as I righted myself and looked back at him, Nico was tackled to the ground by some black-clothed behemoth wearing a balaclava over his face.
A scream flew off my lips as I watched the two men exchange punches, rolling around on the ground in a vicious wrestling match. Nico delivered a right hook to the giant’s jaw, snapping his head to the side, and sending blood spewing from his mouth. I flinched whenever the masked man got in a good hit to Nico’s face, followed by a swift punch to his ribs.
I wasn’t sure why the sight horrified me.
Nor why I was even concerned.
Nico was more than holding his own. In fact, he barely even grunted as he absorbed those blows. More than anything, it just looked to rocket him from mildly angry, all the way up to furious-fucking-mad. Nico’s quick rabbit punch to Goliath’s kidney had the man doubling over with a pained groan and sprawling out on the ground.
Nico sprang to his feet and didn’t spare his sparring partner another glance. He dove into the backseat with me as blood trickled from his lip.
“Go!” he shouted.
The driver slammed on the accelerator, tires spitting out gravel behind us.
Nico kept his eye on the back window as the car careened off my father’s estate and onto the highway. He still held his gun up, finger near the trigger, knuckles torn and bloody—
“Blyad’!” Fuck! “Are you okay?”
I instinctively reached for his hands, but pulled them back at the last second. It wasn’t my place to care for him. He probably wouldn’t have appreciated it anyway.
Brow furrowing in confusion, Nico followed my gaze and scoffed. “I’ve had much worse. Fucker’s jaw was made of glass.”
Okay, so that clearly hadn’t been his first fight. He’d handled himself with too much expertise to be a rookie at throwing punches. And I begrudgingly had to admit that I felt the teensiest bit better about being in this man’s company, knowing he was capable of defending himself and those around him.
Not that I was expecting him to be my protector or anything.
It was just nice to know that my new husband wasn’t a wimp.
Once we got far enough away from the estate, he turned around in his seat to face forward. Cracking his neck from side-to-side, he pulled his phone out of his pocket, looking highly annoyed. He didn’t seem to care that hanks of his hair had fallen loose of his bun and were hanging over his ears. He also didn’t pay any attention to the blood on his knuckles, nor to the small trail running from the corner of his mouth.
Does he not feel pain?
Trapped inside this tiny space together, I couldn’t escape his scent. Woodsy and smoky at the same time, with a hint of leather. Not smoky like cigarette smoke, but smoky like the flavor. As if he’d dabbed his fingers inside a bottle of rich whiskey and rubbed it all over his neck. It reminded me of the inside of the barrel room at a winery I’d toured in England with my girlfriends a few years ago.
I started breathing through my mouth.
I didn’t need to like how this man smelled.
“Where are we going?” I asked as I watched the countryside flash past the windows.
The nature of my new situation was beginning to dawn on me. I was about to be taken away from everything familiar to me and dropped into a foreign world, on foreign land, with a foreign man. Unease swirled inside me, originating from a number of different directions. I’d just escaped a gunfight in my own home, I had no clue where I was going, nor who I was even with.
Oh, and let’s not forget that I was now married.
In a matter of hours, my life had become one giant mad lib. There was a vague description of what was to happen next—I was going to New York with my new husband, where I would wait for an unknown number of weeks, or months, for my father to give the all-clear so I could return home. But that left a lot of blanks to be filled in. What was I supposed to do once we got to Brooklyn? Sit in his house and twiddle my thumbs? What would Nico be like behind closed doors on a daily basis?
“I have a private plane waiting,” he replied, furiously typing out something on his phone.
“To take us to New York?”
He shook his head, gaze still focused on his device. “I have business in Istria for the next two days. We’ll leave for the U.S. from there.”
“Istria?” I blurted out. “As in, Croatia?”
I was unable to contain my smile. Which was beyond ridiculous, considering we’d just fled a hail of gunfire, and my husband had beat the shit out of some bloke. And Nico seemed pretty calm for someone who was just in a highly-charged situation. He was already talking about his next business meeting, for crying out loud.
His head jerked up at my exclamation. “Is that a problem, legs?”
I didn’t even care that he’d reverted back to calling me by his smarmy little nickname. “I love Istria.”
I’d taken a trip there once with some of my university friends years ago and gone ga-ga over the aqua blue waters of the Adriatic, the rugged coastline, the colorfully-painted buildings. Oh, and the food. The whole region was simply utonchennyy. Exquisite.
Nico’s gaze dipped to my mouth, his lids noticeably drooping.
When I realized I was still smiling like a goof, I quickly wiped the enthusiasm off my face.
He blinked several times before averting his eyes, as if coming out of a spell. “Good. You wouldn’t have had a choice either way, but at least you won’t be pouting the entire time.”
I rolled my eyes. “Because I’m sure you’re an absolute joy to be around.”
“I’ll grow on you, legs. Don’t be surprised when it happens.”
“Yeah, you’ll grow on me like a tumor, maybe.”
“We’ve really got to do something about that smart mouth of yours.”
“Funny. I was just about to say the same thing to you.”
He chuckled darkly as that gaze slid over me in a frustratingly sensual move. “Believe me. You’ll want my mouth to be in full working order.”
I rolled my lips inward, fighting for patience. “Thanks, but I’m good. I don’t want anything from your mouth.”
“You sure about that?” he rasped, provocatively dragging his tongue across his lower lip. “Because want and need are two different things. And the latter often tends to overpower the former.”
“If I need anything, I assure you I have an entire arsenal to take care of that problem.”
His pupils dilated. “Oh, I hope you managed to fit it all in one of those suitcases, legs.”
“Why? You’ll never see it.”
In my peripheral vision, I saw his knuckles turn white as he tightened his grip on his phone. “For your own sake, you mig
ht want to reconsider that at some point. Because I guarantee I know how to use those toys on your body better than you do.”
My traitorous nipples reacted to his words without my permission, puckering beneath my thin sweater. Heat pooled in my belly, and my thighs clenched together. I still didn’t believe he was as skilled as he professed, but he was just so…convincing. So confident that it made me wonder.
Could he actually be that good?
Nah.
Maybe in his mind, but not in reality. He just probably never saw the woman’s disappointment because he’d already hit it, quit it, and lit out the door before waiting for the so, how was it for you? post-coital breakdown.
“We’ll never know now, will we? As you Americans say, sorry, Charles.”
Amusement glinted in his eyes. “Charlie.”
“Pardon?”
“The saying is, ‘Sorry, Charlie.’”
I flushed with embarrassment. I didn’t appreciate being corrected by this pompous man. I had more scathing rebuttals on the tip of my tongue, but he’d sort of taken the wind out of my sails.
I played it off with a casual shrug. “It hardly matters.”
We remained silent until the car pulled into a large clearing and onto what looked to be a small airstrip. A single plane waited on the makeshift tarmac, stairs already lowered for its passengers.
That’s when it hit me.
I was about to spend eight hours confined on a plane with this man.
Only this man.
I think I’d rather have taken my chances with the bullets.
Okay, I couldn’t figure this girl the hell out.
Shouldn’t she have gone all hysterical back there after fleeing her home, where an unknown number of gunmen had been shooting up the place? Where were the tears? Where was the fearful shrieking? Shouldn’t she be scared for her life and pummeling me with questions about what the hell was going on in Moscow?
Because I’d sure as fuck like some answers.
Instead, Lexi was smiling about a trip to Croatia.
Booze and Bullets (Brooklyn Brothers #3) Page 4