Bratva Prince (Bratva Series Book 2)

I knocked on Illayana’s bedroom door the following morning, a tight stiffness in my shoulders. Last night had not gone how I thought it would. After a good fuck, I usually woke up feeling relaxed and refreshed, ready for the coming day. This time, I woke up irritated and unfulfilled instead.

Part of it was the sex; it wasn’t as satisfying as it had been in the past. On top of that, Mila had thrown a fit when I told her she couldn’t stay the night. It wasn’t like that was new information. She never spent the night. She was here to fuck and that was it. But she seemed to forget that whenever it damn well suited her.

The whole ordeal had left me frustrated and annoyed when I should have been fucking relaxed.

I cracked my neck left to right, trying to relieve some of the tension building in my muscles. I knocked again when there was no answer, half debating leaving and coming back later when the door cracked open.

Illayana’s tired eyes locked on me, a frown forming on her face. “Aleksandr? What’s going on? Is everything okay?”

“Why are you whispering?”

Illayana stepped out of the room, shutting the door behind her. She tied the silk sash of her robe around her body as she said, “Arturo’s only just drifted off to sleep. I don’t want to wake him.”

I checked my watch, brows lowered in confusion. “It’s 8am.” By this time, I’d already had breakfast, done a two-hour workout, gone for a light jog and cleaned all my weapons. Gun maintenance was very important.

“He had a hard time lowering his guard enough to rest. He finally passed out from exhaustion about an hour ago.”

I nodded in understanding. In a way, I could sympathise with Arturo in that regard. If my woman had just been kidnapped, I wouldn’t be able to relax either.

“I just wanted to check on you. Make sure you are okay. See if you need anything.”

Illayana’s face softened. Her arms wrapped around me in a tight hug. “I’m fine, thank you starshiy brat.” Big brother.

I patted her back awkwardly with one hand. I wasn’t a big hugger, but I’d tolerate it for my baby sister.

“Good,” I grunted, stepping back. “Are you hungry? Do you want me to have some food sent up for you?”

“I want some food!” Lukyan’s muffled voice yelled from the bedroom behind me. Nosy bastard would have had to have his ear up to the door to overhear our conversation.

“Get it yourself!” Illayana yelled back, glaring at Lukyan’s door. Her eyes flicked back to me. “Flora already sent up a mountain of food for breakfast—”

The door behind her burst open in a rush, Arturo standing there with a gun pointed right at my head, a laser-type focus in his mismatched eyes as he locked onto Illayana. He was shirtless, his whole upper body covered in tattoos, and a pair of grey sweats hung low on his hips.

Illayana sighed, her head falling forward. “Goddamn it,” she hissed under her breath. She turned to face him. “Everything’s fine. Go back to sleep.”

The frantic, wild look on his face made it pretty clear he wouldn’t be going back to sleep any time soon. “I heard you yell,” he said, his voice laced in that thick Italian accent.

“She’s always yelling!” Lukyan boomed from his bedroom.

Illayana yanked off one of the slippers on her feet and hurled it at Lukyan’s door. “Shut up!”

“Make me!”

Arturo grabbed Illayana at the same time she lunged forward, his arm snaking around her waist. She kicked and thrashed, demanding to be let go and cursing Lukyan out in Russian.

I shook my head in mild amusement. They’d been doing shit like this since they were kids. If anything, this was tame compared to some of the shit they’d pulled on each other in the past. In my experience, it was easier to just let them go at each other. It never got too out of hand.

Okay, that was a lie. It actually got pretty violent sometimes.

When Lukyan started yelling crap back, riling Illayana up even more, I decided to step in. “Be quiet, Lukyan,” I yelled over my shoulder.

He shut up.

I looked back at my sister. Her chest rose and fell with quick, short breaths, a scowl etched on her face. Arturo wove a hand through her hair and began massaging her scalp in an effort to relax her.

It worked. The tension seemed to melt away from her with every passing second.

“You’ll let me know if you need anything?” I asked.

She nodded, taking a deep breath. “I will.”

“Alright. Get some rest. I’ll come back to check on you again in a few hours.”

“You don’t have to, Aleksandr. I told you, I’m fine.”

I gave her a hard stare that meant business. “I’ll be back in a few hours to check on you,” I repeated sternly.

She exhaled heavily. “Okay.”

As strong as Illayana was, she’d just been through something extremely traumatic. She’d try to deny it, but she’d need time to recover both mentally and physically. I wanted to make sure she knew I was there if she needed anything.

A look passed between Arturo and I. I still didn’t trust him, not completely. There was a lot I still didn’t know about him, but one thing I did know was that he cared for Illayana, and that was enough. For now.

I said my goodbyes and left. I had a lot of shit to do, but I always made time for my baby sister.

Before making my way to the warehouse, I went down to the main floor, heading for the security room at the back of the house, just to the right of the kitchen. Nik was sitting at the kitchen table when I walked in, hunched over a bowl of cereal. His laptop sat open beside him, a picture of my uncle on the screen with other faces flashing sporadically beside it. Flora and a few of the other housemaids were fluttering around in the background, cooking and cleaning.

“You got a minute?” I asked, stepping up to the table.

Nik looked up at me, chewing softly. “What’s up?”

“I want to take a look at the footage of the prisoners.”

Nik frowned, flicking his eyes down to his bowl and back up at me. “Now?”

“Now,” I said curtly. Before I walked into that room, I wanted to be prepared. I wanted to see how they interacted with each other when they were alone. When they were free to talk amongst themselves, thinking we couldn’t understand them. I wanted to watch them, their faces, their bodies. See who was freaking out and who was holding strong. Find out who the weakest link was and poke at them, make them crack and tell me everything I wanted to know. I wanted to know exactly what I was walking into.

Shoving one last spoonful of food into his mouth with a groan, Nik got to his feet, grabbing his laptop. “Let’s go.”

He took the lead towards the security room. A wall of monitors greeted us when we walked in, screens flicking through the different camera angles in and around the house. Two men sat in front of them, only taking their eyes off the monitors long enough to greet us before turning back.

Nik placed his laptop down on a side table near the door and wedged himself between Dean and Oleg. “Go take a break, we’ll take it from here. Be back in thirty minutes.”

Both men nodded and left the room. Nik took a seat and started typing away. He logged into a program with his username and password, and the screen filled up with twelve individual camera feeds, each showing a different room in the pit.

The lower ranking members of the Bratva didn’t have access to the cameras in the pit. We trusted our men explicitly, but that didn’t stop us from being cautious.

Three of the rooms were occupied. One with the Zeta prisoners. One with Maxim, Father’s former Sovietnik, and the other with a local gangbanger who thought it was a good idea to jump one of our soldiers’ kids and beat the crap out of him.

We looked after our own. If someone fucked with one of our people, they suffered the consequences.

“How far back do you want to see?” Nik asked, clicking on the feed with the Zeta prisoners.

“From the moment they were locked down.”

Nik nodded, rewinding the footage. He pressed play and I watched as Erik and our men dragged them in, shackling them to chairs. Firecracker kicked and screamed the entire time, right up to the point that they tied her down. Just as Erik stood after strapping her legs to the chair, she smashed her face into his, catching him completely off guard. Erik fell back on his ass with a painful grunt, hand flying to his now-broken nose.

A chuckle rose up from my throat. I couldn’t deny how much I enjoyed that fighting spirit of hers.

“Shit,” Nik laughed. “That was a good shot.”

Erik got to his feet in a fluster. He wound his arm back and punched Firecracker right in the nose.

My hands clenched, a torrent of anger soaring through me. I frowned at the reaction. I shouldn’t care if she got hurt. She was the enemy. I planned to do much, much worse to her to get the answers I needed. And yet, all I wanted to do was choke the life out of Erik for laying a hand on her.

I banished that feeling away. I couldn’t afford to be sympathetic towards her. Not when Father was counting on me to get to the bottom of all this.

Once Erik and our men left, I listened intently to their conversation. They spoke in Spanish, which I wasn’t at all surprised by. They were trying to hide their words behind another language. But they had no idea it was a wasted effort.

“Do you think they’re telling the truth, or just bullshitting?” Nik asked after one of the Zeta men claimed they were never planning to rape Illayana.

“They’ve got no idea we can understand them, or that we’re even listening to them, for that matter.” Though I suspected Firecracker did. She was smart. She’d see the camera and assume we were listening to every word they said.

“So you believe them?”

“It’s too early to assume anything.” I continued to listen as they spoke, studying every expression they made, if their voices cracked in fear. It didn’t look like they were lying or putting on a show for our benefit.

The one they called Angel squirmed a lot. His eyes constantly darted around the room, as if looking for a way to escape. He was dripping with sweat, a permanent mask of unease and nervousness on his face.

He was the weak link. My way in.

Nik watched too, brows creased in concentration. “Their dynamic is strange. The woman seems to be in charge of them. And yet she knew nothing about what was going on, what the men were doing? How is that possible?”

Pieces clicked together in my mind like a jigsaw puzzle. “When I found her, she was chained. She claimed she was an escort and Nero had bought her for the night, but I don’t think she was there by choice. Nero was holding her captive.”

“Okay?” Nik could see the wheels turning in my head. “You think she’s someone important to the cartel? That Nero was holding her hostage as leverage or something?”

“Considering his history, it makes sense. Do you remember what Miguel said when Father interrogated him after the first time they tried to kidnap Illayana? That they did it to keep Father in line? To keep him from interfering between the Outfit and The Cosa Nostra? What if Nero did the same shit to the cartel? Kidnapped someone important to the boss so he’d do whatever the fuck Nero wanted to keep them safe?”

Nik nodded. “It definitely fits with Nero’s tactics.”

“So, we just need to figure out who she is.” That was easier said than done, though. So far, she’d been more than unwilling to share that information, and I had a feeling she’d take it to her grave.

An idea formed in my head. I pulled out my phone and called Thomas. He was one of our contacts at the LVPD (Las Vegas Police Department). We paid him five grand a month to be our eyes and ears within the department. To provide us with information about anyone we asked—names, addresses, social security numbers, you name it—and to cover for us when needed. Like when our house got blown to shit at Illayana’s wedding.

Even though our closest neighbours were miles away, the massive explosion and all the gunfire that followed had people calling the police. Thomas, as well as a few others, had covered for us, reporting no disturbance.

It was always smart to have people in the police department who were on your side. Not only did they help out with situations like that, but they also got rid of any incriminating evidence that could bury us. They let us know any time the police were getting a little too close to home, helping us steer them in a different direction.

“Yeah?” Thomas answered, his voice laced with a deep Boston accent.

“I need you to come to the house.”

He sighed. “When?”

“Now.”

“I can’t. I’m on shift.”

“You’ve got thirty minutes. Bring your fingerprint scanner.” I hung up, not giving him a chance to protest.

At five grand a month, I didn’t give a shit if he was busy. If I called and demanded his presence, he bloody well better show up.

“What’s your plan?” Nik asked, logging out of the camera feed system. He spun in his chair to face me.

“I’m going to scan her prints and find out who she is.” I was confident a feisty, hardass woman like her had to have some kind of record, and it would tell me everything I needed to know about her.

That curious expression I saw last night crossed Nik’s face again. It aggravated me.

“What?” I snapped.

“Why bother with the scanner? I’m sure you could make her talk without it. You’ve made grown men fucking piss their pants and tell you anything you wanted to hear.”

True. And I enjoyed every second of it. But I had a feeling those tactics wouldn’t work on Firecracker. She was tough as shit. Absolutely fearless. I didn’t think there was any amount of pain I could put her through that would make her talk.

But that wasn’t the main reason.

“If our theory is right and it turns out the Zetas were only doing Nero’s dirty work because they didn’t have a choice, because of her, we need to tread carefully. Us torturing and killing her could cause more problems than it solves, and with Grandfather coming, the last thing we need is more trouble.”

Nik had been tapping his finger idly on the table as I spoke, his gaze watching the movement, but at the mention of Grandfather his head snapped up, a deep frown on his face. “What? Grandfather, coming here? When?”

“Two weeks. And we need to get everything ready for his arrival. The sooner we sort out not only this shit with the Zetas, but also the crap with Dominik and Rayna, the better. Before he gets here would be ideal.”

Nik nodded. “What do you need me to do?”

“What you’re already doing. Find Dominik and Rayna. As soon as you have a location, let me know.”

Firm lines of determination set on his face. “Will do.”

“And keep an eye on that idiot brother of ours. Make sure he does as Father has asked. Father is stressed, and he doesn’t need the added hassle of double-checking Lukyan’s work.”

It’s not like Lukyan was bad at his job. It was actually the complete opposite. When he put his mind to it, he was capable of doing great things. But that was the problem. He rarely put his mind to anything unless absolutely necessary, and he had a tendency to be lax with his responsibilities. Not that he had many to start with.

“Got it.” Nik got to his feet. “I’ll also see what I can dig up on the Los Zetas. I know the last time we tried to get information on them we couldn’t find anything on their boss, but who knows, maybe we’ll get lucky.”

I doubted it. The identity of the boss of the Los Zetas was some kind of well-kept secret within their organisation. The man we knew who used to be in charge before he died of cancer four years ago was Andres (or El Diablo, as he liked to be called). But the identity of the man who had taken his place had been a mystery to us ever since.

We knew of their second—Juan—as confirmed by Miguel before we killed him. But that was it.

“Alright, keep me informed.” I clapped him on the shoulder. “Thanks, brother.”