After a ride in uncomfortable silence, and Deva asking again to be dropped at her apartment, a tenuous agreement was reached among the men for her to grab a bag from her place, and for them to then go to Lance’s apartment to regroup. He was the wildcard of their group, and it would take a while for people to discover his name and retrace his whereabouts. Even his truck that was probably dismantled in pieces by now was a rental, under a fake identity.
Deva didn’t dare ask why Lance was so cautious, she was just glad he had been by her side when she was in dire need. Tiredness pulled at every cell of her body, and she longed for a bed; lack of sleep was starting to play games with her wits. Again, and again, her thoughts circled about the encounter with Finch. Something was off, but now, she wasn’t sure her instinct could be trusted. And Aleksei simmering so close wasn’t helping.
Lance’s place was in the business district. The sun was slowly coming up, and people were starting to mill around. Lazarus parked in the back alley, and Lance got out, checking the area before gesturing for Deva to get out of the car. Aleksei rounded the car, his gun discreetly hidden along his thigh, flanking Deva, his other hand on the small of her back. She stepped away from his touch, but the stubborn man circled her hip with his arm, pulling her side against his. The hold was almost painful, and then she knew she could tell her bed goodbye as she was probably going to be pulled into another Russian storm soon.
They all entered by the ordinary-looking building’s back door, and went up a few flights of stairs and at the end of the corridor, Lance unlocked his door. The place was quaint but clean. No frills. Fully furnished, the kitchen was small, but the living area sported a large couch. One functional bathroom with a master bedroom and a smaller guest bedroom.
The four of them stood there, immobile for a good minute until Aleksei snarled and put his fist through the sheetrock wall. Well, he didn’t stop at one punch and repeatedly groaned as his frustration, anger, and skin went through the widening hole.
Lance remained back and shook his head, probably thinking about the repair fees on his lease. Oz was hovering nearby, debating what to do. In the meantime, Aleksei was destroying the wall and more seriously, injuring his already wounded hands. Deva wasn’t about to wait for him to wind down like the other two seemed to be doing.
“Aleksei!”
The sound he made would make a lesser woman run out of the apartment, but she wasn’t about back down.
“Aleksei, stop!” She grabbed the waistband of his pants and pulled hard. It didn’t completely move him away from the wall, but the rampage was about to restart. As he swung his arm again, blood dripping from his knuckles, she rushed in front of him and put her own hands over his fists, ignoring the blood.
The man before her was almost past of rescue, his eyes wild and the pain wasn’t even registering with him. She’d seen her father’s men in that state, adrenaline pumping through their veins, just after a killing spree. Not a surprise as the man before her was still pumped from a quick fight, surprised by her arrival, torn with his confrontation with Finch...
His arms were trembling with restraint and his gaze not quite focused on her yet.
She could have forced him to lower his arms, but the fighter was much stronger than she was and power would only trigger him more. Instead, she let go of his hands and walked into his arms.
His body radiated heat, sweat, and tension, each muscle so tight she thought he would break. When she pressed her ear against his chest, Deva heard thunder, but still held on. It was the only way she could get to her brother after a fight, and she hoped it would do the same for Aleksei too.
Gently, she started running her hands over his back until layer by layer, his muscles relaxed, and his heart slowed. His arms lowered to his sides. Only then did she loosen her grip to let him go, but muscled arms banded around her, preventing any movement.
The threat must have lowered significantly as she heard Oz and Lance moving around. And she was alone. As quickly had it had happened, Aleksei had stepped away from her, the unyielding mask of stone back on his face.
He positioned himself to encompass all three people in the apartment.
“Now, explain what is going on. You seem too cozy for this to be a coincidence. And you.” He pointed at Lazarus. “I told you to stay away. I told you I wasn’t interested in you helping me.”
Lazarus racked his short black hair in frustration. “Do you think I would intervene in your life if I didn’t have a good reason too?”
“And that reason would be? Jamieson Finch?”
“Don’t tell me that you trust the man?”
Aleksei shook his head. “You think I lived my life waiting for you to save me? Where were you when I was born in the dead of winter in a shed in St. Petersburg? Where were you when I had to steal to put food in my belly? Where were you when I was 14 and holding my mother in my arms as she died!”
Deva closed her eyes as Aleksei spewed his pain and regret to his brother. People like them were filled with it, it was what drove them, pushed them, made them survivors.
“I’m sorry for what you went through, Aleksei. If I could, I would take it all on me. But I can’t change the past. Hate me for it, if you want, I don’t care. But even if you hate me, even if you despise who I am, what I do, my allies and my enemies, you are my brother. Nothing, nobody, not even you can change that.” Lazarus’s expression was one of a man tormented, making her heart squeeze in compassion.
Aleksei cursed as he started walking the small space. Deva’s head started pounding, and she let herself fall on the couch, a shiver going through her body.
Lance, who still remained silent, went into his room and returned with a large flannel shirt. Smiling at him, she put in on. Aleksei’s eyes narrowed as he looked at her and then at Lance. Sensing another storm brewing, she decided to deflect.
“What do you want to do Aleksei? What was that agreement with Finch?”
“You are asking questions, but answering few of my own.”
Deva let her head fall backward for a moment. “If I answer, will you believe me? You don’t trust your own brother, what about me? I’m a complete stranger. I like my head right where it is, thank you.”
“It’s my brother who hired you, who put you in my path?”
“It’s more complicated than that.” Lazarus stepped forward, ready to take any sort of blame, but she wasn’t about to hide from anything.
“It’s not. Your brother was scared for you, especially since Finch tried to kill his mother a few months back.”
Aleksei’s stormy gaze flashed to his brother’s. “Is that true?”
Lance came to sit on the couch arm near Deva, raised his hand. “I can confirm. I participated in the rescue. Lazarus is telling the truth.”
Aleksei blinked and turned to him. “You and Lazarus already know each other?”
“I was part of the team asked to save his mother. And after I almost croaked due to loss of blood, I needed a break. I started traveling. My only goal when I came here, was to start training with Rusty. But it seems that working for Beatrice Dante is a little like Hotel California. Destiny can be a bitch. Just to be clear, I jumped in to help Deva. But now I’m more concerned about Finch, I know first hand what he’s capable of.” Lance turned to the bearded man. “What’s his deal? Why has he returned?”
Lazarus’s expression turned dark. “Jamieson Finch was a name I knew even before I learned that he was my father. He approached me years ago, telling me I was his son, and asking me to be part of his organization, his heir presumptive. I refused. There was something sketchy about it. While I was part of MI6, we kept an eye on him as his power grew. What we didn’t expect was for him to grow that quickly, and to have so many threads intersecting into so many fields. When we started moving on him, his political ties were too strong, protecting him as he moved to the US. All we could attack, we did, but he’s some sort of hydra, you cut one head, two more take its place. That’s when I decided to branch out, to quit MI6. In the shadows, I could have moved more quickly and with some degree of success. That’s when he decided to retaliate and attack my mother. With the help of friends, such as Lance, Gabrielle, and Beatrice, we rescued her, and some kids whom Finch used as collateral. That’s my Achilles’ heel; family. And you are family to me, Aleksei. I know you are somehow linked to the Bratva, and you have made some kind of deal with Finch. I’m willing to do whatever it takes to help you out, but Finch needs to be stopped. I’m laying down all my cards for you to see. There is no trick. All you can give me, I will take. And if you decide not to, all I ask of you is to lay low until I can take this rabid dog down.”
Deva almost whistled at Lazarus. The man was taking a serious risk for a brother he didn’t really know. Or which side he was on. But she understood. One thing Aleksei didn’t tolerate was tricks and lies, so Lazarus offered him the truth. All of it.
The Russian stayed silent, deep in thoughts. Then he turned to her.
“And you? What’s your part in this?”
Deva shrugged and cleared her scratchy throat. “Lazarus and I have a common friend, Beatrice, who rescued me years ago from my father’s MC, you’ve seen my tattoo anyway. She offered me a new life. I owed her my life. So, when she reached out to me, and Lazarus told me who you were, I decided to help. And then I saw what you were doing, trying to get your life back somehow, fighting demons like I did years ago, I knew what it felt like. I was only there to make sure you stayed safe and try to find out what Finch’s intentions or plans were for you.”
At her words, Aleksei snorted in derision. “Protect me? A woman?”
Anger rose inside her, her throat tickling she started to cough. “You think protection is only muscle? It takes a good amount of knowledge and brain to survive in this world. They needed someone who could think like those monsters, so they hired a monster’s spawn.”
Ignoring her tired body and pulsing headache, she got to her feet, discarding Lance’s shirt to show the tattoo on her back. “My mother died of cancer when I was twelve years old. That’s when my childhood stopped. Abruptly, for lack of better word. I got tattooed with the MC crest and family symbols the next year. They strapped me to a table and gagged me. When it didn’t work, they forced gin down my throat to calm me down. To this day I can’t smell that liquor without gagging. When I thought the worst was over, I was denied education, no more learning for me as an MC princess is in no need of such a thing. I was sixteen when my older brother started fighting in the cage. In underground tournaments for my father. Exactly like you. They trained him, but the rage wasn’t in his blood. He couldn’t back down, he was Johnny, the son of the almighty Mex Johnson. Almost every night he came in battered and bloodied, and I was the only one, with my cousin Sasha, able to take care of him. He tried to escape, but apart from being beaten up even more by our father, it didn’t do any good. Then, one day, he just disappeared. Without a word, not even to me. A year later, we learned that he had joined the army when a man came to our house and announced that he was dead. Stepped on a mine and he blew up. Do you know what my father did? He didn’t even shed a tear. He just turned to me and told me that I was now the one to secure the family line. And it meant getting married to another club prominent member. A tactical merger as he called it.”
The memory made her throat raw with emotions, making her coughing even worse, but she didn’t stop. “You suffered, oh mighty Aleksei Voronov? Big deal. We all have. But at least you have someone by your side. That’s more than I ever had. So, get your head out of your butt and do something about it.”
Her throat and chest burned, and she was caught in a fit of coughing. Her eyes filled with tears, blurring her vision, and it took all her might to push panic down until she could finally gulp a decent inhale of air.
Once she blinked a couple of times, Deva realized that she was on her knees surrounded by three panicking men. The image made her laugh and cough some more.
A water bottle was shoved in her hand, and she tried to thank Lance, but her voice sounded like a croak.
Gulping the cold liquid down, it felt good but didn’t alleviate the ache in her chest. Ignoring it, she pushed herself off the ugly carpeted floor. Aleksei and Lance each grabbed one of her arms and helped her sit down on the couch again. Lazarus crouched in front of her, and she could swear Aleksei growled. The man sounded more and more like a wolf.
“Are you alright?”
Deva nodded, trying to sound reassuring. “Yeah, I’m just tired. I can’t think straight. I’ll take a nap in your guest room Lance if you don’t mind.”
“No trouble, Deva. Take my room. The bed is more comfortable.”
She could have made a thousand jokes about it, but every passing minute made her more achy and tired. A shiver went through her and immediately, Lance’s shirt was pulled more securely around her shoulders, thanks to Aleksei. The man hovered, but she was still too angry at him to allow his body so close to hers.
As she moved toward the room, she stopped in her tracks when she realized she was the head of a choo-choo train, with the three men on her heels.
Turning slowly, minding her throbbing head, she frowned.
“Okay, I’m going into this room alone. I’m fine, just tired.” When Aleksei opened his mouth, she shushed him. “Alone. You guys need to talk. And I mean talk. When I come out, the situation better be clear and sides taken.” She winked and smiled at Lance. “I meant the crazy brothers, obviously, not you. Okay, I’m blabbing. Nighty night.”
And before any of them could respond she shut the door on Aleksei’s incredulous face. And she was certain the Russian words she heard from behind the door weren’t him wishing her goodnight.