Page 53 of Twisted Prince
Sometimes, I question whether it’s the right choice to keep him from Gabby. It feels selfish to have her all to myself. I can just picture them together, serious eyes watching each other, forming a deep, silent bond that they seem to develop without effort.
But every time I reconsider my choices, I come to the same conclusion. To protect my daughter, I need to keep her far away from that world—his world. The world of men. Because, just like me, she will only become a thing to possess. And once I open that door, I hand over the control.
I have to be strong for my little girl.
Stand my ground.
Maintain my independence.
She’s going to have a good life, a safe life. One in which no man will ever hurt her.
I’ll make sure of it.
“I love you so much, Gabby,” I murmur, brushing her silky curls back from her forehead. “Mama’s never going to let anything happen to you. You’ll get to grow big and strong and happy. You can dream as big as the moon and the stars, keiki, and together, we’ll make it happen. Okay?”
Gabby nods softly in her sleep, nuzzling against her pillow, and my heart squeezes. Leaning in, I press one last kiss to her temple. Then, I rise slowly from her bed to wash the night’s events from my body.
22
GLEB
Sitting with my back to the brick-enclosed window of the cafe along Beacon Street, I watch the passersby. A paper mug of black Americano steams between my palms, chasing away the chill of the early morning.
Propped casually against the back of my chair, I won’t draw attention from my position, but I can see everything that’s happening up and down the busy lane—the pickpocket standing at the crosswalk a block away that just slipped a businessman’s phone out of his briefcase as he waited for the light to change; a harried-looking single mother of two children, toddler propped on her hip, dragging the other along as he throws a rather impressive tantrum; the homeless man taking special consideration to fix the blanket his mut companion is curled up under.
Just inside the cafe, behind me, is the faint sound of the manager berating a barista for messing up a customer’s order. A hundred tiny details that paint Boston’s bustling scene, and I absorb them all, keeping my senses alert, my attention keen.
I feel my brother’s eyes on me before I catch his blond head of hair out of my periphery. A second later, Sascha slinks into the chair beside me, a to-go cup of coffee clasped casually in his hand, though we both know he’s never touched the stuff. It’s strictly a prop he uses to blend in with the crowd—because we’ve been trained to avoid unnecessary attention, regardless of what we’re doing—and it might catch someone’s notice if he sat without a drink.
“It’s been a long time,” he observes, dropping casually into Russian as he settles in his chair so he can scan the street as well.
“Too long,” I agree, joining him in our native tongue—or at least, the language we grew up speaking.
Flashing a grin, I catch Sascha’s golden-eyed gaze, and he returns the gesture.
“What happened in Chicago? When you left Boston, I thought the plan was to join Kostya and the Shulaya.”
“Yeah, it was.”
Kostya, Sascha, and I are the only three brothers who possessed the drive to look beyond my father’s training, to see what the world had to offer, and want to be better—the only ones who wanted out of his twisted business our old man made of turning his progenies into profitable commodities. So, when I left Boston, I followed my older brother to Chicago.
“Was our cousin not all Kostya cracked him up to be, then?” Sascha presses.
“Nah, Ilya’s cool. He and his sister, Bianka, have a great setup there. Some crazy alliance with the Italians that somehow seems to be working.”
I snort, thinking about the birth family of Pyotr’s wife. Our cousin Bianka married into it, and that seemed to solidify the relationship between my cousin’s Bratva, the Shulaya, and the Marchetti family. From what I’ve heard, Kostya is living a pretty cushy life in Chicago because no one’s stupid enough to infringe upon either territory at this point.
“But you didn’t stick around to check it out,” Sascha observes.
I shrug. “I guess I was still restless. Freedom’s no small thing to wrap your mind around. And when I met Pyotr Veles, he just struck a chord with me, you know? He and his wife, Silvia, are people worth following. They have a bigger vision—a war worth fighting, I guess. So when he offered me a job, I thought a change of scenery sounded nice. New York’s more my pace, anyway. Kostya’s probably in Chicago getting fat and complacent because he’s got no enemies to challenge him.”
Sascha nods, his golden-brown eyes scanning the street once again. “But you do? Have a challenge?”
“Hell yeah. A good one, too. I fucking love my job. Pyotr gets me. He lets me put my skills to use, and he doesn’t treat me like a dog that needs to be kenneled at the end of the day. But what about you? I thought you were leaving Boston the first chance you got. You change your mind about ditching the old man?”
Last I heard, Sascha was tired of being one of our father’s soldiers for hire and had no intention of taking a job with the Kellys. So, I was more than a little surprised to find him still in Boston.
“Definitely done with that piece of shit. And good riddance. I look forward to the day I learn he’s dropped dead. But he’s still going strong. You hear we have two more baby brothers arriving this year?”
