There were too many thoughts in my mind. Too many emotions filling my head like fog.
If I spoke, I feared I might reveal the darkest crevices of my heart.
“It seems you have already made up your mind,” I said, not letting my exterior reveal the storm of anger and madness that was stirring inside of me. I barely heard my own voice; all I could hear was she called me, she called me, she called me. “Why does this concern me?”
All three of them shared a look. Danika was staring at me.
“Tell him the rest,” Dmitri hissed.
“There’s more?” Roman demanded.
Before anyone could say anything, Danika’s sweet voice rang out. “If Elena is in danger, shouldn’t we help her?”
There it was. Her name.
Elena.
Three syllables, five letters, the title of a formidable woman.
Some part of me howled at the thought of her in danger. Who would dare to threaten a hair on her head? Who would endanger that which belonged to me?
But Elena did not belong to me. She had made that very clear.
I don’t love you.
I, like most men, was a creature of ego and pride. The arrogance came with the territory; you wouldn’t very well want a nervous, self-conscious leader, would you? No. You wanted someone who made the decisions, who held their shoulders high.
But Elena had kneed my ego in the balls.
“We are currently tracking the chip in her phone,” Artyom said carefully. “Once we nail down her location, we will go.”
“Chip in her phone?” This came from Roman. “What the fuck are you going on about? When did you get the chance to chip her?”
Dmitri scoffed.
“Nearly a year after she left.”
I lifted my gaze to Artyom. But it was Roman and Danika who did the talking for me.
“You’ve seen her–”
“–how did she look?–”
“–did she mention me?–”
“–does she miss us?–”
“When I saw her, she was fine. Physically,” Artyom added. “She made it very clear how she felt about returning to this family. Her opinions hadn’t changed.”
Danika looked down at the floor. From the bobbing of her throat, she was forcing herself not to cry.
“Did she say why she left?” Roman asked. He was talking to Artyom, but it was Danika he was looking at.
“We know why she left,” I said. My voice settled over the room like dust falling from the ceiling. “Once you locate her, you’re to go and help her. The Bratva’s resources are at your command.”
Artyom thinned his lips. “You don’t want to come with us?”
“Elena and I have parted ways. It is you who now connects her to this family.”
“Boss...you will want to come.”
I crossed my hands over my chest, feigning casualness. “And why is that?”
Artyom and I interlocked gazes.
“Because...because of the child.”
There was only a moment where I registered my temper coming out, the Tarkhanov beast I kept locked up breaking free from its prison. I could hear the snap echo through my skull as the monster broke forth.
My vision was red; my blood boiled hot.
I lunged.
5
Konstantin Tarkhanov
Artyom and I crashed to the floor, the desk toppling over with us as we hit the ground. The study rumbled as our strengths clashed, bringing down books and dust.
His skin split beneath my first punch, but my ribs ached as he struck them. We exploited each other’s weaknesses and avoided each other’s strengths. It was almost like fighting against myself–that’s how well Artyom and I knew each other.
We had been fighting against each other since our boyhood. Every day, every month, for decades. There was nothing in his arsenal he could surprise me with and vice versa.
“Stop! Stop!” Danika’s voice rang out. “You’re hurting each other!”
Her cries were lost in my rage. I couldn’t see anything through the red, through the fury.
All I knew was: Artyom had betrayed me.
And traitors didn’t get very far in the Tarkhanov Bratva.
Artyom’s fingers wrapped around my throat as I buried my knee into his chest. Through his strangled gasp, he squeezed and said, “She needs you–”
I threw my fist into his cheek, rendering him momentarily speechless. Air returned to my lungs as his grip on my neck loosened.
“Stop it, stop it!” Danika’s voice slipped through my wall of wrath for a second time. “Stop, stop! You’re hurting each other!”
“Dani, do not–!”
I felt soft hands grab the back of my neck, but they fell away as Artyom and I rolled. Loud crashes circled us, paintings falling from their hooks and plaster groaning beneath our weights. I briefly heard a cry of surprise followed by Roman swearing loudly.
“Enough!”
Stronger hands gripped my neck, wrenching me back. The person who had grabbed me and I went sprawling backward, the both of us losing our footing.
I saw Roman wrap an arm around Artyom’s neck and yank him backward, the two falling into a bookshelf. A heavy novel dropped onto Roman's head and he swore loudly.
I started forward but Dmitri shoved me to the side, blocking my view.
“Boss, I know you’re angry. But Elena is in danger. In danger–do you hear me? She needs your help.”
His eyes were imploring me to listen. The blue of them was so shocking I suddenly found myself torn back in time, viciously reminded of the lake near my childhood home that used to freeze over in the winter. I could still feel the sting of ice beneath my palms as I toppled over and hear the ice splintering apart as my knees hit it.
Careful, Kostya, my mother's voice crooned in my mind. If you break the ice, the monsters will be able to swim up and capture you.
I fell in once. When I made it to the surface, lungs filled with water and fingertips blue, my mother had clucked her tongue from the edge of the lake.
That wasn't the first time I felt unsafe in the care of my mother.
“You’ll never forgive yourself if you don’t go now. You won’t be able to live with yourself.” Dmitri's voice dissolved the memory in my mind.
My temper still threatened to take over, still threatened to absorb me whole. I carried the Tarkhanov beast low in my belly, and while I had always been good at keeping the monster inside of me on a leash, there seemed to be a single woman who could easily let it out. Who could easily set me off.
Rationality gripped my mind, as cold as the brisk wind that stung my cheeks on the walk back to the house after I fell in, and I felt my body calming down.
The words rung through my head on repeat. Elena, Elena, Elena.
Child, child, child.
"You okay, Dani?" Roman asked.
I turned and spotted the young woman. She had a hand to her cheek, nursing a patch of reddening skin.
Danika must've been the soft hands that tried to pull Artyom and I apart. In the flurry of the fight, one of us must've accidentally hurt her, causing a bruise to form on her face.
Guilt swirled up inside of me, darkening the already horrible parts of my soul.
I had hurt Danika; I had hurt the girl I had cared for since she was a teenager.