Total pages in book: 49
Estimated words: 47716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 239(@200wpm)___ 191(@250wpm)___ 159(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 47716 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 239(@200wpm)___ 191(@250wpm)___ 159(@300wpm)
He felt so numb. From the soles of his feet to the tips of his fingers, there was nothing. No sensation or fidgeting. Nothing. Everything was in his heart and head instead.
What was he going to do now? How was he supposed to handle this situation?
Anton was boss. Sure, they were in the privacy of their home where no one could see and his men would never know if he showed the emotion he was feeling or encouraged his son to do the same, but he was still boss. Groomed to be unfeeling when needed, cold with the blink of an eye, and unruffled in the face of others pain.
This was not the same.
It was his son—his boy.
The phone call from his son earlier had sent Anton into a tailspin.
“Papa,” his son had whispered through the phone with a voice thick from tears and panic. “Something happened. I need help.”
Oh, it was something all right.
Anton’s Bratva had been plagued with troubles from a rival gang over the last year. He managed to keep the issues to his brotherhood and far away from his family, for the most part. The gang had been warned repeatedly about staying off Bratva territory, but their violence wasn’t curbed by threats of retaliation.
An issue had gone down a little over a month ago at one of Anton’s clubs in the heart of the city. The gang, again. It was then Anton realized the idiots were no longer playing games with his men on the streets, but instead, starting to hit closer to home.
Tonight ... Christ. Anton’s thoughts dropped off with a painful shudder climbing punishingly down his spine. Tonight they had brought his son into it. Demyan had one of his high-school football games—his team won. After parties were always a given when they had a win. Anton trusted his son even when the kid didn’t give him a whole lot of reasons to so he didn’t say a word when Demyan never showed up back home after the game. Chances were, the kid was downing some good vodka with his teammates and smoking up. Gia was with him, as she usually was. It should have been like any other night, but it wasn’t.
The next threat that came from the gang wasn’t just the hint they were moving closer to Anton and his family, but rather, a show that they were right on top of him.
His son. That’s what they went after. Undoubtedly assuming a teenaged Bratva child would be an easy hit—a way to hurt the boss in the best way they could. To shake and shatter his foundations, make him weak.
It would have had they succeeded.
Only seventeen. Demyan was only seventeen-years-old. And he killed another human being. His son was younger than Anton had been when his first kill happened, but his had been because he was asked to, not because he was forced into it like Demyan’s current situation.
Was this how it had been like for Daniil when Anton was asked to do something that would irrevocably change his life forever? Had he struggled with an internal war for his son? Had he cried?
Anton couldn’t remember his father saying anything bad to him about his choices back then. But, of course, Daniil wouldn’t have been allowed and beyond that, his father had always been particularly good at hiding his emotions when he needed to.
At the time, Daniil was a Vor, as was Anton. It was their life—murder was an expectation, not a real choice that would be given to a man. It was always posed as a choice, but there was none behind the question. Just a demand that would either be fulfilled by the person being asked, or that man could expect punishment for his disobedience.
“Daddy?”
Anton’s head popped up at the sound of his thirteen-year-old daughter’s voice. “Ana, go to bed.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Go to bed, Ana,” he repeated firmly. “Don’t make me tell you again.”
Ana stared at him through sleepy eyes from her bedroom doorway. “Are you ... crying?”
Anton swiped at his face with the hell of his palm. There was no wetness from tears, but his eyes practically burned with the urge to let them fall. “No, I’m not crying.”
“You look like you are. What’s wrong, is it Ma?”
No. And that wouldn’t come for Viviana. Anton couldn’t let her hurt by knowing.
“Go to bed, Ana, please.”
“Dad—”
“I’m not in the mood to deal with your stubbornness and nonsense tonight. Do as I asked.”
Anton’s daughter’s eyes widened with sadness and shock. Ana was a little bit of a handful at times. Her father had no qualms admitting he had been the one to turn her like she was with his spoiling and constant attention. But even when she was being particularly difficult, he never spoke to her like he just had.
Guilt ate at him. “I’m sorry, Ana. I didn’t mean it like that. I really need you to go in your room and stay there until morning. Please, for me.”