Chapter Eight
Yuri grabbed Andria by the back of her hair and lifted her inches off the ground. She screamed in pain and closed her eyes. Yuri shook her until they snapped open again. “Look at me when I speak to you bitch!” He growled.
Andria spat in his face.
Yuri pulled his hand back and slapped her full force.
Andria cringed at the pain. “I thought the Bratva didn’t abuse women and innocents.”
“You are neither a woman of good standing nor an innocent,” Yuri stated roughly. “It will be easy to get the information we seek as we are not above giving pain when it is needed. I shall instruct my men to use whatever they desire on you. You have twenty years of misery and a murder to answer for.”
Andria began to tremble. She finally understood what she had done. Before she hid under the protection of her benefactor. Now she was on her own. Looking into Yuri’s eyes, she grew afraid.
His eyes were cold and dark.
Just before Kosta led her away, she noticed a younger man. He looked enough like Nikoli to cause her to gasp as she recognized that this must be the son she stole so many years ago. This was the baby she named Nicky after his father, the boy she left behind.
Yuri opened his bedroom door and saw her lying on the bed. Closing the door behind him, he crossed the room to her side and laid down behind her. Wrapping his arms around her, he held her while she wept. When there were no more tears, he continued to hold her.
“I’m sorry,” she finally whispered.
“You don’t have anything to be sorry for. Your mother is the one who should be begging for forgiveness.”
She shuddered. “Can we never call her that again? She’s not fit to be anyone’s mother.”
“Agreed.”
“So now what? Nikoli got his son back, you have Andria, and Carlos is custody, so where does that leave me? Can I leave now?”
“Leave? Where would you go?” Yuri asked.
“I still think Andria and Carlos have a deeper connection. I want to go to a place Carlos thinks is a secret. He keeps all his records there. I’ll bet I could find a connection, maybe even find out who is behind this whole thing.”
“Where is this place? I can send my men in and they will bring back any information that is there. Then we all can go through it. Nikoli and I both have so many questions yet to be answered.”
Raven shook her head. “Your men would never find this place. Carlos had it hidden very well. No one but him ever knew where it was.”
“Then how did you find it?”
“When Carlos was training us to become thieves, he taught us well. He used fear and pain to reward us or punish us. Most of the time, he enjoyed punishing us because that’s the kind of animal he was. Carlos taught us how to hide in plain sight, being a small girl I could hide very well. I could also sneak out of any room he put me in. Over the years, I have gotten out of many locked rooms, so you should know you really can’t keep me here against my will.”
Yuri chuckled. “The night you brought my wallet back wasn’t the first time you’ve been in this apartment was it?”
“No it wasn’t.”
“Care to tell me about it?”
“Not really.” She shrugged.
“I cannot allow you to go to Carlos’s place alone,” Yuri told her.
“As I said before, you can’t really stop me either.”
Yuri closed his eyes in frustration. “We could go round and round about this or we can both compromise and get the job done.”
“And how would you compromise?”
“I’ll let you go and I will go with you. Along with two of my men.”
Raven sighed. “That’s not much of a compromise, now is it?”
“It is the best I am willing to do. I will not allow you to go into danger without some sort of backup.”
“You aren’t going to let this go, are you?”
“No, I’m not. You belong to me now, and I protect what’s mine.”
Raven shook her head. “I don’t belong to anyone.”
“You gave yourself to me last night,” Yuri insisted.
Raven raised a hand and cupped his jaw. “Such a stubborn man you are.”
“Da, I am and this stubborn man is hungry. Nikoli and your brother are waiting for us to join them for breakfast.”
“I’m not certain I can face either of them ever again.” She groaned, hiding her face in the pillow.
“Are you ashamed of what we did last night?” Yuri had to ask.
Raven’s head popped up from the pillow. Turning her head to glare at him, she told him in no uncertain words, “No, I am not ashamed at what we shared last night. Andria just made it seem so sordid and dirty. What we did, I did freely and it was beautiful.”
“You gave yourself over to the pleasure between a woman and man, there is no sin in that.”
“Is it like that every time?” she wanted to know. “I mean I know you’ve had other women before but last night was my first time. I didn’t know it could be that way. It was incredible.”
Yuri shook his head. “I’ve never felt quite like that before last night. Sex is mostly pretty good but last night, as you said, was pretty incredible.” He hesitated. “I think that when a woman uses her body in such a way as Andria has no doubt used her own body, that’s when sex becomes sordid and dirty.” He reached out his hand and pulled her from the bed. “Wash your face and we’ll have something to eat. I know you’re hungry, you didn’t touch your supper last night.”
“Yeah well, I had other things on my mind, didn’t I?” she grumbled.
“Da you did,” he whispered in her ear. “And if you don’t get a move on, I’ll have other things on my mind and breakfast won’t be one of them.” She squealed as Yuri’s hand came down on her ass when she moved too slowly toward the bathroom. Yuri chuckled as he watched her go and when she closed the bathroom door between them the smile left his face.
He walked over to the telephone and dialed his security team. Speaking in Russian, he gave them an order, an order he expected them to carry out. She may not have wanted protection from him but she was damn well going to accept it. His security teams were the best and they would take a bullet for her if they had to.
When they joined Nikoli and Nicky in the kitchen, Raven noticed a whole array of food the restaurant had delivered, scrambled eggs, bacon, sweet rolls, French toast and mounds of fried potatoes. All of that and a thirty cup pot of coffee. Raven was in seventh heaven.
Nicky and Nikoli were already eating when they joined them. Nicky looked at her with a red face. “Sorry sis, I got hungry.”
Raven chuckled. “You’re always hungry.”
Nikoli started to get up to his feet but she motioned for him to sit. “Please eat it while it’s hot. There’s nothing worse than cold food.”
Nicky disagreed with her. “Unless it’s no food at all.”
“Yeah,” she agreed quietly. “But those days are behind us now. We don’t have to think about them ever again.”
Yuri glanced over at Nikoli and caught the same expression on his face. Yuri burned with rage at the thought of the two children going without food.
He didn’t say anything and it was Nikoli who brought the subject out into the open. “You went without food?”
Raven sat down with a plate of eggs and potatoes and bacon. She nodded. “Andria never kept much food in the house and Carlos used food as an incentive to get as much work done as he wanted every day. About the only time we ever got enough to eat was when we lived with my grandmother. Then when we ran away from Carlos, we could barely manage to keep up with just finding a place to live and protect ourselves from life on the streets.”
“Yeah she wouldn’t let me steal our dinner,” Nicky added. “So between what little work we could do as kids, there wasn’t all that much to eat a lot of the time. We didn’t waste much in those days.”
Nikoli caught Yuri’s eyes and Yuri could read the deepening rage growing inside the other man. It was the same rage growing inside of him.
“Tonight I would like to have dinner with some friends of ours. I would like to introduce you to them.” Nikoli broke the silence.
“Really?” Nicky exclaimed.
“Of course, you must meet these men. I want them to finally meet my son.” He beamed. “After all, they have been searching for you every day of your life.”
Nicky looked at his father in awe. “I can’t believe you have been looking for me all this time.”
Nikoli laid his hand on Nicky’s shoulder. “Of course, I have been looking for you. You are my son and all I have left of your sweet mother. When she died the day you were born, I think a part of me died as well. Looking for you was the only thing keeping me sane.”
Nicky couldn’t speak for a moment. He just stared at his father with tears in his eyes. Then he looked at Raven and she nodded. Nicky leaned over and hugged Nikoli.
Nikoli held his son in his arms for a long moment.
It was Raven who broke the silence, “So who are these men?”
“They are my brothers, well not my brothers as we never shared the same family but they are my brothers all the same,” Yuri commented.
Nikoli laughed as he wiped tears from his face. “Back in Russia thirty years ago, I came across these five young men. Street urchins they were, trying very hard to be men as they faced down a bigger gang of older boys. The other boys were abusing a shop owner and his family, trying to shake them down for protection money when Yuri and his brothers stopped them.”
Yuri shook his head. “As I recall, we did them some damage but we also got arrested for starting the fight.”
“I think it was the fact there were twelve of them to your five that impressed me the most,” Nikoli went on. “And the damage was done to the other boys, not to you five. Anyway, these five young boys stood up for the shopkeeper and his family and they wouldn’t take their due reward.”
“We weren’t looking for a reward,” Yuri insisted. “We were doing what we thought was right.”
“Da, you did,” Nikoli agreed. “From that day on, I took them under my wing and I taught them everything I could. I was working my way up in the Bratva even then. They worked under me and when I was offered the chance to come to America, I brought them with me.”
“We still work under you, old man.” Yuri chuckled.
“Da, you certainly do.” Nikoli laughed. “But now the work isn’t so bad, huh?”
“No, now the work isn’t so bad.” Yuri glanced over at Raven. “Although we still work for Nikoli, we all own businesses and have grown to become wealthy on our own. I own this hotel and restaurant, and my friends have their own places of work.”
“And I would like them to meet the two of you.” Nikoli boasted. “No matter how hard you try, you will never find a better band of brothers than these five.”
“I would be honored to meet your friends,” Nicky told them.
“And you, Miss Raven?” Nikoli asked. “Would you meet Yuri’s friends?”
“Of course, I would.” She smiled.
“I owe you so much,” Nikoli told her.
Raven shook her head. “You owe me nothing.”
“I owe you my son’s life.”
“No you don’t.” Raven got to her feet. “When you love someone, you take care of them. You put their needs above your own. That’s how life is supposed to work.” Shaking her head, she looked upset. “You don’t do something like that for the reward. You do it because you love them.” Turning her head, she gazed at Nicky. “He was my brother and I loved him.”
“I’ll always be your brother,” Nicky vowed.
Raven went over to where Nicky was sitting and she knelt at his side. Raising her hand, she cupped the side of his face. “But you are Nikoli’s son and that has changed your life as it should. You are a grown man now and have been for some time. You don’t need my protection anymore and that too, is how it should be.”
“But I’ll always need your council. I’ll always need your guidance. I’ll always need the love you’ve given me freely all my life,” Nicky assured her. “There were times when that love was all I had. It’s been the one constant in my life.”
“And no matter what happens next in our lives, you’ll always have that,” She told him. “That’s why I have to do something you won’t like.”
“What are you going to do?” Nicky asked her.
“I think Andria was working with Carlos. She can follow orders but she hasn’t got the brains to be the mastermind behind the plot to topple Nikoli. I think Carlos has evidence as to who is the one behind this entire mess,” she told her brother and Nikoli.
“How do you know this?” Nikoli frowned.
Raven got to her feet and turned to face Nikoli. “Andria came here to this city every day. She was getting orders from someone who lived or worked here. I think it was Carlos. As bad as Carlos is, he doesn’t have the kind of power he would need for something like this. The other night, he tried to bluff his way to topple Yuri with the Council that runs the city but he lacked the one vital piece he needed to do that. Ten years ago, Carlos sent me to steal the Medallion, the Bratva has owned since the time you came here. It has been part of your organization, your badge of power, if you like. It has been the one thing you need to insure your place as head of the Council,” she paused then added, “The mistakes Carlos made that night was one…he held Nicky hostage and two… I overheard him bragging to his friends that once he owned the medallion he would be able to kick you out of the city and take over your powerbase. He had already sold Nicky to another sort of life and he was willing to sell me off as well.”
“But sis, that is all in the past—”
Shaking her head, she cut him off, “The other night Carlos came here looking to force Yuri out of the city. When he showed up, I gave the medallion back to Yuri and he took Carlos into custody. Now would be the perfect time to get into Carlos’s safe house and get everything your men need to bring him down.”
“I’ve already told her she cannot do this alone,” Yuri informed Nikoli. “I asked her to tell me where this place was but she told me my men would never find it.”
Nicky shook his head. “She’s right. No one has ever found this place and believe me, others have tried. How she knows where it is, is beyond me.”
“I followed him one night. That was the night I saw them together.”
“Who are you talking about?” Nicky wanted to know. “Who did you see?”
“I saw Andria and Carlos together. It was the last time I saw her before I noticed her in the park that day. She came to Carlos for more money.” She shook her head. “He just laughed at her. He told her he had the brat he’d been paying her to care for all these years and that he wouldn’t give her another penny.”
“So, they were working together,” Yuri said.
“I also need to stop by the apartment we had and clear out our stuff before it gets stolen. We may have not had much but I need a change of clothes and such.” She shrugged.
“You can buy all new clothes,” Yuri told her.
“I can’t afford a new wardrobe.”
“But I can,” Yuri remained her. “You are my woman now, and I will take care of you. In fact, it is my right to take care of your needs.”
“Oh boy,” Nicky muttered under his breath.
Nikoli looked over at his son and frowned. “What is it?”
Nicky held up his finger as if to tell him to wait. “He just blew it.”
Raven’s eyes flashed. “You do not own me!” She growled at him as she stood up from the table. “My needs are my own to take care of. I can earn my own way and I will earn my own way. There is nothing you can give me that I can’t get on my own.”
Yuri stood there and took her abuse then when she was done, he stalked his way over to stand in front of her. He grabbed her arms and hauled her into his embrace. When his lips crushed hers, he forced her to open her mouth against him. When he invaded her mouth, he kissed her long and hard. “You are my woman, get used to that fact because I will not let you go.” He growled at her when he broke off the kiss. “If you leave me, I will come after you. If you deny me again, I will prove to you and to anyone watching that you belong to me. I’m claiming you, body and soul, get used to that fact.” He allowed her to move away from him but didn’t release her completely. “You can collect whatever you wish to keep from your apartment but you will move everything here. This is your new home.”
Raven was dazed for a moment then she slowly nodded her head. “We need to get moving. We can’t wait forever to get the evidence Carlos has. Someone else might know about his safe room.”
“Then let’s be off.” Yuri picked up the phone and called his team in.
Nicky came over to her and hugged her close for a moment. “Things have really changed haven’t they? For both of us.”
“Yeah, well the jury is still out on that one.” She peeked over at Yuri as she shook her head again. “He makes a lot of claims that may not be real.”
Nicky chuckled. “From what Nikoli tells me, Yuri doesn’t lay claim to anything unless he truly believes it. And honey he just laid claim to you.”
“Yeah, but does he really mean it?” she had to wonder.
“He means it. As long as I have known him, he has never claimed a woman as his.” Nikoli had joined them. “Welcome to our family.”
Yuri came over. “My men are ready and waiting. We have to go now because I have a meeting later this morning with a Council member. We have to discuss a rash of fake money hitting the streets.”
“Fake money?” Nikoli asked.
“Da, there have been several fake hundreds showing up all over the city.”
Nicky frowned at the news. “Fake hundreds? Are you sure?”
Yuri turned to look at the younger man. “Quite sure, why?”
“It can wait.” Nicky shrugged. “I might have something to tell you when you get back though.”
“We’ll talk when I get back.” Yuri nodded at him then turned his attention to Raven. “Let’s go before you change your mind.” He grinned at her frowning.
When they left, Nikoli turned to his son and ushered him to the sofa. “What do you know about the fake money?” he asked.