Total pages in book: 100
Estimated words: 96417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 482(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 482(@200wpm)___ 386(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
I smile warmly at Emiliya. “Little sister, I only do what Father commands, which is something you need to work on.”
“He has a point,” Father says, trying to hide a smile.
Emiliya rolls her eyes, grinning, and digs into dinner. “It’s good tonight, Momma,” she says with a mouth stuffed full of puff pastry.
“Thank you, darling,” Mother says.
Father leans toward me. “Your siblings do have a point, Maxim. I appreciate your work ethic, but there’s still the question of your marriage potential.”
I grimace slightly. “We tried that with the Balestra girl, remember?”
“Perhaps I give you too much leniency. Maybe it shouldn’t be a choice.”
“That’s right, Father,” Jasha says, waving his vodka in the air. “You should force him into a marriage. Don’t you need grandchildren?”
“Careful,” I say, frowning at him. “It starts with me, but you’ll be next.”
Jasha turns pale. “You wouldn’t. Would you?”
Father grins. “If I force Maxim into an arranged marriage, it’s only fair for the rest of you, and that includes you too, girls.”
“He’s not like the rest of us,” Feliks says quietly, but loud enough for everyone to hear.
There’s an awkward moment of silence. Emiliya frowns at me, and Galina stares death at Feliks. Mother gives me this pathetic, pitying smile, and even Jasha seems to feel guilty. Feliks, for his part, keeps eating as if he hadn’t said anything rude.
He’s not wrong. I am different. But the fucker doesn’t need to remind me all the damn time.
I lean forward. “He’s right, I am different, which is why I won’t roll over and let Father pick my wife. So stop trying to shoot yourselves in the foot.”
Emiliya laughs, and that breaks the tension. Father smiles at me, but I see the warning behind his eyes. While we’re joking around as a family right now, there’s always an undercurrent of honor and respect behind our words. Which is to say, oaths come before blood, and my pledge to obey my Pakhan supersedes any familial relationship we may have.
When he gives me an order, it’s as the leader of our bratva, not as my father. And I do not disobey my Pakhan.
Dinner wraps up. I kiss Mother on the cheek. “Lovely meal as always,” I say, and she beams affectionately at me. Emiliya and Galina head off to watch a movie together, bickering like always, and Feliks disappears to do whatever the hell Feliks does. He’s been a moody bastard lately, and I’m not upset that he skips dinner more often than not. Jasha and Father go to talk business, and I slip out of the Kremlin and climb into my BMW.
I take a drive. It’s quiet in Dallas at night. I like the big, wide streets, and the green lawns around the lake district as I swerve and veer and try my best to keep my thoughts from Siena. Talk about marriage put her right back into my brain, which isn’t hard considering she’s never far from top of mind. I do have the privilege of some say over who I marry and when, but there’s a line that I can’t cross.
My life is my family’s. My future is my bratva’s. And my father is both my family and my bratva. He is the Pakhan, and I’ve sworn on blood and honor to obey him. If I want to take a wife, he will have to approve whoever I choose, and there’s no way he’ll let me settle down with a girl that doesn’t bring the family some kind of gain, whether that’s political or financial.
And it’s not like I want to marry a girl like Siena. I don’t need that sort of tongue in my life. She’s mouthy and defiant, and I know she’ll make my world a living hell if I bring her into it. I want a good bratva bride, a woman that understands her place in the hierarchy off the family, and Siena seems like the exact type that wouldn’t understand.
It’s stupid, thinking about marriage and Siena. It’s insane, and I shouldn’t do it.
Especially not when I drift the BMW into the parking lot of The Velvet Rope and take the spot at the far end in the shadows of the trees.
I kill the engine and stare at the building.
What am I doing here? I should go. She told me to leave. She made it clear she doesn’t want me here, and I still can’t tear myself away. I keep seeing that last conversation in my head over and over, and how her words didn’t match the way she looked at me, like what she was saying was the exactly opposite of what her body wanted.
My father would kill me if he knew that I kept coming here, pining after a girl. My brothers would use it against me. My sisters would look at me like I was some kind of pathetic lovesick puppy, even if what I feel isn’t love. At best, it’s a compulsion.