My thoughts run amok. Will I have to stand here and watch while Aleks mutilates my brother? While he breaks an arm or severs a leg?
I mean, that’s what Bratvas do, don’t they? They torture. They deal out pain like Halloween candy.
I wriggle free of Aleks and try to sprint to my brother, but Demyan intercepts me. He wraps his arms around my waist and hauls me into the air. All I can do is kick and scream.
It only serves to exhaust me.
“No! No! No! Let her fucking go!” Rob yells. He tries to close the distance to us, but Aleks holds out his hand and my brother halts dead in his tracks.
“Not another move,” Aleks says firmly. Then he touches his earpiece and orders, “Bring out the priest.”
19
ALEKS
Three of my men surround Rob while Olivia rounds on me. Her eyes are wide, but there are no tears in sight.
Even now, she tries to be brave. It’s admirable.
Foolish, but admirable.
“What are you going to do to him?” she demands.
“I’m going to make sure he understands that I am not the man to fuck with.”
“He needs all his limbs, Aleks!”
“Not what I had in mind. But thanks for the inspiration.”
She grabs my arm. “You can’t do this.”
I use her hand to pull her towards me. She hits my body, and I can’t help glancing towards her brother to see what he thinks of our intimate proximity.
That snarl seems to suggest he isn’t such a fan.
“I can do whatever the hell I want, princess,” I growl into her face. “You know why? Because I’m the fucking don.”
“Tell me what I can do to save him,” she pleads. “I’ll do anything.”
“We’ve been down this road before, Olivia. Unless you want me to fuck you in front of him for the sheer sport of it, you’re not much use to me.”
She flushes with both embarrassment and anger. But then her jaw clenches and her eyes burn. “If that’s what it takes, so be it.”
I sigh as if I’m disappointed. “You’re the same thing you’ve been from the start, Olivia: a horny little girl in over her head. Just step back and do as you’re told.”
She jerks her face out of my grip, looking like she wants to take a shot at me. I almost wish she would. It would make this day so much more interesting.
But while her hand trembles, she doesn’t try to touch me again.
“Don’t do this,” she says instead.
“There’s no saving your brother from himself,” I tell her. “But at the end of it, you might wish that I’d just taken a limb instead.”
Her expression clouds over with confusion. “What do you mean?”
“You’ll see soon enough,” I say. Just then, a side door opens and a man in a priest’s collar shuffles in. He keeps his head down—the less he sees, the better, as per my instructions to him. Nice of someone to do as they’re told for a change.
“What is this?” Olivia asks in a rising panic. “Who is he?”
“The officiant."
"The officiant? Like…" She frowns. "Huh?”
“Who else would you have marry us?"
Over his sister’s shoulder, Rob is purpling with silent rage. How he’s holding it back is beyond me. He looks like he might pop a vein in his forehead if he doesn’t scream and kill something right now.
Poor bastard. I know the feeling.
But he should’ve known better than to fuck with the Bratva.
“I’m sorry,” Olivia splutters. “I think I heard you wrong.”
“No,” I retort, “you didn’t. We’re getting married today, Olivia. And your brother was thoughtful enough to be here to watch it happen.”
“You… you can’t be serious, Makarova,” Rob stammers.
I tap my chin thoughtfully. “Why would I joke about the holy bonds of matrimony?”
Another door opens and four of my men come hustling in with a table, which they set up in the middle of the space. A fifth sets a thin stack of paperwork on top of it.
“You can’t force me to do this,” Olivia finally blurts.
I laugh in her face. As if saying something so pitiful will stave off the inevitable.
“Force you?” I ask in mock surprise. “Of course not. You want to marry me, Olivia. You just don’t know it yet.”
“You son of a bitch!” Rob yells as he suddenly lunges forward.
My men are quick to grab hold of him. There’s no way he’s getting through that human wall. All he can do is strain, hurl insults at me, and keep growing redder and redder.
I round on him. “I warned you, Lawrence,” I snarl. “I gave you very specific instructions and you ignored them all. So now? Now, we’re about to become family.”
“Aleks,” Olivia says, grabbing my arm again feebly. “This… this isn’t happening…”
She sounds so helpless. So fragile. Poor little thing doesn’t know what to do.
But I know.
I always know.
"It's unfortunate that you’ve been caught in the middle of this, Olivia,” I sigh. “But I gave your brother multiple warnings.”
“He’ll listen this time,” she says, close to tears. “He will, I swear. Right, Rob? Right?”
“No, he won’t. Look at him.” She doesn’t move, so I grab her face and wrench it around until she’s staring her brother in the eye. “He won’t ever stop, Olivia. He’s a bulldog with the scent in his nose. Or at least, what he thinks is the scent, even if he’s wrong. He’s not that much different from me, come to think of it. Rob just chose his path and I was born to mine.”
“He will listen,” she protests again. Her voice is growing weaker and weaker. “I’ll… I’ll make him. I’ll convince him.”
I shake my head like a disappointed parent. “There are consequences to every action. And he’s going to meet his now.”
A sob escapes her lips with no words attached.
I turn from her towards the priest. “Are we ready?”
He nods without raising his eyes to meet mine. He’s really taking this “see no evil, hear no evil” thing to heart. “Yes, sir,” he mumbles. “Bring the bride forward.”
“Bride?” Olivia gasps, as if that one simple word is finally making this real to her. “I’m not a bride. No… no, you can’t make me marry him.”
“Olivia!” Rob tries to force himself between my men. All that does is earn him a punch to the gut.
Olivia screams as he falls to his knees and groans.
“You can make this easier on him,” I whisper in her ear as two of my men grab him and haul him back to his feet and a third rears back to punch him again.
Fearing the worst, Olivia throws her hand out and grazes the Bratva soldier’s elbow. “No, stop! I… I’ll do whatever you want.”
I hold up a hand and my soldiers freeze in place. “What was that?” I ask her mildly.
She wrenches her eyes to mine and blinks back her tears. “I’ll… I’ll marry you.”
I nod. “Smart choice.”
“Jesus Christ, Liv!” Rob explodes. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”