“She’s here somewhere, she came with Mother and Father, I think.” I shrugged, my gaze on a sexy girl in a short black dress balancing on what had to be four-inch heels. She smiled shyly as she passed. I liked my women just like that; ripe and ready for the picking. I’d never had to work for sex, and I wasn’t about to start. “What about her? She may have a friend, and if not, we could share her if she’s down for it.”
Nik and I had shared many a woman. I’d seen his cock more times than most women over the years since he rarely went back for seconds with a woman.
“She’s only 15, Alexander. Her father would cut off your dick and feed it to you if you touched her,” he barked out a laugh.
“You’re fucking kidding me, right? 15? Jesus, what are they feeding women these days? And who the fuck is buying a 15-year-old a dress like that? I’m all for women dressing as they please, but she’s still just a kid.”
“Not in our culture,” he replied.
“Things need to change.” I threw my drink to the back of my throat and nodded towards the small bar area while shaking my now empty glass in the air between us. “I need another. Are you coming?”
He chuckled and nodded, and we made our way over and ordered two more drinks. We stood casually watching the women and figuring out who would be our dates for the night. Both sons of powerful men, though Nik’s father died years ago, we could have pretty much any woman that we wanted. It was only choice that hindered us. Of course, even if Nikolai had his eye on a piece of tail I wanted, he wouldn’t stand a chance against me.
Vasiliev royalty was my trump card. He’d always be second best, though it never seemed to bother him. He took the devil-may-care to a level even I envied sometimes.
My father and mother were sitting at a large table near the front of the room and were surrounded by powerful businessmen and their wives. Every once in a while, my father and the man he was talking to would look over at me and I knew that they were discussing me settling down. The guy probably had a daughter that was of marrying age and so was trying to pin her to me, the son of Eduard Vasiliev and prince of the Bratva. I was without question a good catch for any woman. You couldn’t really blame the guy for trying.
Not that his efforts would bear fruit. If the future held a wife for me, then she would be of my choosing… and a damned goddess.
I’d do anything for my father and the Bratva. Anything at all. This was my father’s legacy and my future, but marrying for fucking business reasons was where I drew the line.
My twin sister, Katya, passed between some tables, briefly stopping to talk to some friends before heading in our direction. Her long dark hair was swaying at her waist, fresh highlights catching the glow from the lanterns overhead, and her figure-hugging burgundy dress was too short and too tight for my liking, but there was little point in telling her that. She had the same defiant streak I had, and I’d only be playing into her hands by bringing it up. She relished controversy, lived and breathed it like the wild child she was.
Things were even harder for her though. Father respected me enough to let me have some say in my future. I was prince of the underworld, soon to be King, but Katya was the Bratva princess, and her kingdom cage was smaller than my own. I had big plans to change things when I was in power. As much as I respected my father and the Bratva, things needed changing. We weren’t living in medieval times now.
I loved women, and it was that love of women that wanted them to have some say in their own lives.
“Brother,” she said, eyeing my two-thousand-dollar suit, “could you not be bothered dressing up for the occasion?”
“Katya,” Nikolai replied, drawing her attention to him. “Could you not be bothered looking for a dress that fit you?”
“Is there something wrong with my dress, Nikolai?” she said with a bat of her long black lashes and I rolled my eyes at the two of them.
“Is it a child’s dress?” he asked, and I smirked at his retort.
She traced her hands over her hips and Nikolai watched with greedy fascination. Her hand reached out to stroke along the lapel of his suit. “Do you really think I should cover all of this up?” she asked, stepping closer to him.
“Well, you don’t want to be mistaken for a hooker now do you, Katya?” he replied, gripping her hand in his and kissing her knuckles.
Katya’s eyes narrowed and she threw us both dirty looks before storming away, leaving Nikolai and I laughing between ourselves. It had always been this way with the two of them. My best friend and my sister hated one another, and that was fine by me. I couldn't imagine anything worse than the two of them hooking up.
“I think I won that one,” Nikolai smirked.
“Yes, but she’ll make you pay for it at some point. I don’t know why you waste your time arguing with her.”
Nikolai’s gaze was still on my sister as she walked across the room and I cleared my throat drawing his attention away from her swaying hips.
“Sorry,” he shrugged with a smirk, “can’t deny that she’s hot, even if she is the most annoying woman on the damn planet,” he laughed.
Nikolai was still laughing as Ivan Volotov and his wife of little more than a year came into the room and all eyes turned to them. I didn’t know much about the woman, other than her family had been disgraced and Ivan had swooped in to save the day before she met the same fate they did. A quick, brutal death. The judgement had happened while I was overseas, so I hadn’t had the pleasure of meeting her during that time and the execution had fallen to other trusted soldiers.
Ivan was powerful and influential among our family. Few others could have gotten my father to show mercy. It didn’t matter that the daughter had been off at school, that she didn’t have much to do with the Bratva. Her parents were betrayers, and she was forever stained because of it.
But Ivan headed a lucrative division of a shell company, and he was late to settle down with a wife, so my father did him the favor of sparing the woman. Marriage came to us all in the end, even Ivan, who’d seemed like the eternal playboy. Other than my own father, I’d always respected him in the sense that he brought good business to the family. Yet, I’d never trusted him, or particularly liked him. Similar to most Bratva men, he was a tireless chauvinist who treated women as possessions. But beyond that, there was just something about him… something below the surface that gave me pause.
Yet in that moment, mistrusting Ivan was the last thing on my mind.
Because the woman tucked against his side was fucking breathtaking.
I could see why he’d saved her, and I could see why he’d kept her somewhat out of the spotlight while the dust settled. Hell, I’d hide her away from the world regardless, though I’d heard that she’d accompanied him to a few Bratva functions. Ones I had not attended, either away at business or too consumed with being the unredeemable playboy.
“He’s really lucked out with her, huh?” Nikolai said from next to me, but I ignored him, barely able to take my eyes off the beauty on his arm. “I had to stop by one of the Antonov parties a few months ago and she was there. She only spoke to the wives, though they didn’t seem inclined to include her.”
“You never mentioned her,” I replied, my mouth dry and my eyes focused solely on her.