Page 77 of Trapped By the Bratva
She had no right to get into my business and complicate this.
I knew of that name. I was well aware that Dmitri and his brothers were trying to locate the new leader, Erik. Dmitri wanted to kill him for torturing him. But he was too weak. He hadn’t regained enough range of motion to go through with any violent actions or enter a physical fight.
I can’t sit on this information, though.He was so determined to find closure on the man who’d hurt him and run to hide. If Melissa unwittingly got these Avilov men to come out of hiding, I was sure Dmitri and his brothers could benefit from this knowledge. I had to tell him, as soon as possible!
“Hannah—” The call ended abruptly. She’d said my name in that needling, whiny tone of hers that she used when she planned to con me into giving her something. But I didn’t know what she wanted. The call was dropped.
“Oh, shit.” I got off the bed and ran out of the room. Clutching my phone, I hurried the best I could until I reached the enormous dining room that the brothers liked to use for their meetings and discussions. My nausea returned. Bile rose up my throat. I did my best to shove both of those sensations down.
Peeking through the decorative frosted glass pane on the top half of the doors to the room, I spotted Dmitri focused on business.His face was an impassive show of serious concentration, but I broke it.
It seemed like Maxim was telling them something when I knocked on the door. Dmitri turned, frowning at me.
“I need to talk to you,” I said.
No one heard me. They’d remodeled this room to be extra secure after a shootout in there. The cracks around the panels were sealed because the men liked to have meetings in there so often.
Dmitri shook his head, stern in that silent dismissal.
“Dammit.” I wasn’t here to interfere. I was only here to tell them that… that…
What, exactly?I didn’t have a location on these enemies of theirs, but I had my sister’s word that they were near her.
I narrowed my eyes as I backed up from the doors. Could I trust Melissa and what she said? Was this all a prank or something?
I had no location to provide, only a shared report about the Avilov men being nearby.
What could I say? Nothing useful. And when I had to explain that my sister tried to find me and might have mentioned that I worked for the Valkovs, I would face and suffer the consequences of that secret being spilled. I’d been so careful at the meeting at the coffee place. I hadn’t told her a single clue because I was hoping that she would never have a means of reaching me again.
I didn’t want Dmitri to think I was associating with her or their enemies.
What do I do now?Those men weren’t going to let me in the meeting room and update them.
My phone rang again as I walked away and headed back to Dmitri’s wing. I figured it would be much easier to talk to him one-on-one, and he’d return to his private suite soon. Hopefully with just the two of us, he wouldn’t lash out with any assumptions that I wasn’t being loyal or anything like that.
I scowled at the number and answered. “What, Melissa?”
“The call was dropped before I could ask you for money.”
I growled, livid with this familiar refrain I never wanted to hear again. “Make your own money for once in your life.”
“I can’t,” she whined. “Not with these Avalon?—”
“Avilov,” I corrected.
“Whoever they are! I can’t work with these men actively stalking me because I said something about you working with the Bratva. I just need to bail and get the hell out of the city.”
I shook my head, so irritated that the burning sensation of acid churning my knotted stomach barely registered.
“I need money to leave town,” Melissa begged. “Please. I just need enough money to take off.”
It was always the same. Something that prevented her from finding work and forcing her to demand my income. I didn’t bother asking herwhyshe couldn’t make her own money and leave with her own funds.
I just wanted her gone, now more than ever since she tried to follow me and act like a spy.
“You’ll never see me again. I swear it. I need to get out of the city and away from these freaks.”
I bit my lip, torn between the temptation of never having to see her again and being an idiot to give her a single penny for being involved in these complications.
