Nikolai: The Complete Collection

30. Justine

30

JUSTINE

W ith my heart lodged in my throat, I swing my eyes in the direction of the voice. Standing at the side of my spare bedroom, wearing a thick black trench coat, is a man whose eyes are as dark as his poor choice of summer attire. His salt-and-pepper hair is slicked back on his thick skull, and his lips are curled into a snarl.

Even though I’ve never met the man glaring evilly at me, I know who he is. He is Vladimir Popov, the mob boss of Las Vegas and the monster who raised Nikolai.

After Vladimir’s sullied eyes rake over my body in spine-tingling detail, he returns them to my face. “Maybe we should have kept her on as counsel. It would have made the trial more entertaining for all involved.”

The three men surrounding him follow his lead when he laughs as if his comment is funny. My lungs begin accepting oxygen again when Vladimir signals for the men pointing guns at me to stand down. I’ve barely inhaled an entire breath when he heads my way.

I spot Nikolai rising from his bed in the corner of my eye. The fury on his face makes my skin slick with sweat even more than the fire in his eyes. His gaze is murderous and rapt on his father.

When he attempts to thwart Vladimir’s prowling approach, Roman splays his arm across his thrusting chest, halting his endeavor. They get into a tussle, but with every pair of eyes in the room glued to Vladimir, no one but me notices their exchange.

Clutching Nikolai’s shirt in a firm grip, Roman mutters something in his ear. His voice is so soft I can’t hear what he is saying, but whatever he is muttering must be unpleasant, as the agony in Nikolai’s gaze turns vicious.

My eyes drift away from Nikolai when Vladimir stops to stand in front of me. “As fine as a rose petal, but with the intensity of a huntress. You’d be a lot of fun,” he say, his eyes as desolate as his heavily accented words. “But no woman disrupts the rightful order. Not even one as pretty as you.”

After tracking his thumb down the pulse in my throat, Vladimir slings his eyes to Nikolai. “Is she yours, Niki? Is she the reason you tried to slit your cousin’s throat?” He sneersout Nikolai’s name as if it’s a derogatory word. “You’re letting a woman weaken you like Rico did. I thought I raised you better than that.” I don’t know who Rico is, but Vladimir hissed out his name as if it scorched his throat.

Panic engulfs every inch of me when Nikolai replies, “She isn’t mine.” His throat works hard to swallow before he adds, “She isn’t anybody’s. Sergei has been stepping out of line for years. I simply put him back in his place.”

Nikolai silently requests that Roman corroborate his statement.

My heart slowly creeps back down my windpipe when Roman says, “Sergei disrespected Nikolai. He was punished for his insolence, not a whore.”

Vladimir eyes his son with skepticism, his mistrust highly notable. “So you wouldn’t mind if I made her my whore?” His lips twitch as he struggles to contain his rueful grin.

When Nikolai deliberates for half a second, I beg, “Please.”

Who is this man? Only this morning he promised no one would ever hurt me, but now he stands in front of me, contemplating his father’s suggestion of making me his whore like it’s a perfectly acceptable thing to do. I’d spit at his feet if I wasn’t engulfed in fear.

Ignorant of my appeal, Nikolai drifts his eyes back to his father. “Would you like her? You can have her if you want. As a gift, perhaps?” he asks in Russian, his tone unlike any I’ve heard him use. It was shallow and weak, a stark contradiction to the man he is.

Moisture burns my eyes as my heart falls from my ribcage. I can’t believe I stupidly thought Nikolai wasn’t the man his file portrays. This proves what the pessimists always preach. A leopard can’t change its spots.

As he notices my distressed look, the haughty gleam in Vladimir’s dark gaze doubles. He feeds off my fear, loving every tremor shuddering through me. He takes his time appraising my ashen face before his dedication drops to my body.

I’ve never been more grateful for the bite marks on my arms when the lusty expression on his face switches to disgust. He glares at the red indentations maiming my skin, deepening them more with his wrathful gaze.

“She’s marked! That makes her worthless!” he spits out in disgust, the words fired off his tongue like venom. “I could have looked past her lack of innocence to witness her face in ecstasy, but I’ve tasted the richest wine, and I refuse to settle for anything less than perfection.”

My breathing spikes when Vladimir runs the back of his hand down my cheek, wiping away a tear. I fought with all my might to hold in my tears, but when his words echoed what I’ve been waiting to hear the past four years, they spilled over before I could stop them.

Vladimir releases a throaty moan when he sucks the salty droplet off his finger. “It’s a pity you’re marked. If your cunt tastes as sweet as your tears, we could have had a lot of fun.”

Even though I’m not looking at Nikolai, I know he balks at his father’s crude statement. His movement was so rigid the air rippled.

I secure my first breath in what feels like ten minutes when Vladimir steps away from me. “Thank you for the offer, Niki, but I must decline your invitation.”

Not bothering to issue a farewell, Vladimir hightails it to my front door. The three heavily armed men follow closely on his coattails.

The instant my apartment door slams shut, Nikolai’s hand curls around my quaking jaw. His body is hot and brooding, nearly as tumultuous as mine. I yank away from his embrace, sickened he failed to defend me as promised.

“I’ll slit the throat of any man who dares look at you sideways. Family or not,” I quote with devastation dangling off my vocal cords. “You’re such a liar.”

Nikolai growls, angered by my insult. Normally, the fury in his tone would have me cowering away, but not this time. Call me stupid, but I know he won’t hurt me, so it gives me free rein to unleash my vicious tongue.

“Why did you do that? Why did you offer me to him as a gift?” My anger is so intense it chops up my words, making them weaker than I had hoped.

He stares at me, shocked I understood what he said to his father.

“I can speak thirteen languages, Nikolai—including Russian. Perhaps you would have discovered that if you hadn’t thrown me away like trash.”

“I offered you to him to save you from him,” he whispers, his words barely audible.

I laugh. It’s a torturous chuckle that exposes that my heart is still sitting at my feet.

“Don’t treat me like an idiot! I know what your father is like. I know exactly what he would have done to me if he had accepted your offer.”

Fury lines his face as his fists clench into balls. “He wouldn’t have touched you. I wouldn’t let him touch you like that. I’d kill him before I would let him touch you.” His voice grows louder with every sentence he speaks.

“You offered me to him!” I shout, my words croaky from the absolute despair clutching my throat. “You gifted me to a man who sells his daughters to the highest bidders and tortures his sons as if they’re animals!”

When a fresh batch of tears trickle down my cheeks, Nikolai wraps me up in a tight hug. “I offered you to him to save you,” he mutters into my hairline. “If I thought there was any chance he would have accepted my offer, I would have never said it.”

I pound on his chest, sickened by his continued denial.

If he can’t see how wrong this is, he’s beyond saving.

“Don’t touch me,” I sneer, pulling out of his embrace and hightailing it to the door. “You lost the right to touch me the instant you offered me to that monster.”

“Justine…” Nikolai growls in warning.

The vicious snarl of his tone sends horrid memories rushing to the forefront of my mind, but I continue with my trek, more determined than ever. This exchange is different from my last tussle with a mafia prince. No vicious animals are forced to follow their owner’s command or die.

My shaky steps falter mid-stride when he says, “If Vladimir knew how much I want you, he would have taken you away from me. If not for himself, for someone else. He has been that way my entire life. Anything I love, he takes. I only offered you to him because I knew he wouldn’t take you. Vladimir craves perfection, so I used anything to save you from him.”

The swishing of my stomach amplifies when it dawns on me what he’s saying. I feel sick—horribly ill. Although grateful the marks mottling my skin saved me from a man as horrid as Vladimir, hearing Nikolai say I’m not perfect hurts more than I can explain. I stupidly thought he was the first man not bothered by my scars.

Clearly I was wrong.

I can’t stay here and let him watch me cry, so I continue marching to my bedroom.

“Justine,” Nikolai shouts, following after me.

When he snags my wrist in a vise-like grip, my free hand flies wildly through the air, only stopping when it brutally connects with his face.