Kostya: A Dark Mafia Romance (Zinon Bratva) by Nicole Fox (open ebook .TXT) 📗

on my laptop the day before I had to turn in my term paper on business economics, or when you opened that credit card in my name and went on a spree at Nordstrom. I just paid the bill because you’re my mom, but I’m telling you right now that if you don’t stay away from Kostya, if you even call him on the phone, I will do a disappearing act that’ll make what Lila did seem like nothing.”

“Are you threatening me?” She advances as if she’s going to slap me.

But I can’t back down. I can’t retreat. Not this time. Not anymore.

“No, Mom. I mean it.”

I reach around her to snatch the letter out of her hand. She doesn’t try to stop me this time. Doesn’t even move as I shuffle around her to the drawer to make sure she doesn’t have any others hidden there.

When I confirm that it’s empty, I stomp toward the door, Lila behind me.

“Don’t go, girls. Please.”

I can’t look at her. For once, I don’t care if she’s upset, don’t flinch at the anguish in her voice, don’t look back at the tears in her eyes. She did this. She deserves this.

I know that tomorrow might be different. Tomorrow, I might care that she’s hurting, but right now, I care about me. I care that I need to get away from her. I can’t excuse her this time. Or maybe I just won’t.

I’m done being everyone’s second choice.

I wait until we’ve driven a few miles before I look at Lila. “Thanks for coming along.”

She chuckles. “You have my suitcase in here.” But in a toss-up between leaving with me and staying with Mom, I know I’ll always be the less dramatic choice. She lays her hand over mine on the steering wheel. “Where are we going, anyway?”

I haven’t thought that far ahead. My plan was to stay at Mom’s until I could figure out what to do. Without that option in play … “I don’t know.”

“Do you want to come with me up to Stanford? You can stay with us.”

It’s a lovely offer. One I should probably take her up on, but one question remains: “What about Mom?”

The guilt is big with this one. Ingrained. No matter what she’s done, she’s still Mom and someday, assuming Kostya doesn’t kill one of us first, I’ll have to work it out with her.

Lila is not so afflicted with the familial devotion gene. She just sighs. “Let’s get a hotel room for tonight, and we can figure out what to do. Okay?”

God love her. She’s trying her best. “Yeah. That sounds good.”

It takes about ten minutes to book a hotel by the airport and another ten to find a store where Lila can get some snacks. I’m strolling the aisles of the chain drugstore while Lila hits up the food section when I run into an aisle with pregnancy tests.

I swallow hard and grab a few.

I walk to the counter at the same time as Lila, and while she doesn’t comment on my purchase, her eyebrow cocks, but as quickly as it happens, she looks away and just asks, “You okay?”

I haven’t really had time to consider, to process this part of everything that’s happened. But I also don’t have the luxury of wallowing right now. Or ever. Especially if I’m pregnant.

“Yeah.”

Lila adds her stuff to mine then hands over her credit card. “You know, I left here because I couldn’t take things like what just happened with Mom. But also because Dave was there and I wanted to be where he was. It made sense to go.” Oh. So, we’re back to making everything about her, I see. At least that part of my life has stayed consistent. “But your situation’s different. I don’t know how you feel about this guy, but when he briefly mentioned you, his face changed. He had that look, you know, the ‘man in love who doesn’t want to admit he’s in love’ look. He had that one. Clear as day.”

I shake my head. “He fired me, Lila. Kicked me out. Said I was replaceable.” Of all the things, that one hurt worst.

“Because of Mom. If you go to him and explain, give him back the last letter, maybe tell him how you feel …” She shrugs and takes her card back from the pimply teenager who is getting an earful of our conversation. “I know I wouldn’t let Mom come between me and Dave.”

I’m happy she found that kind of courage, but my situation is a little more complicated than falling for a guy she met in a bar and running off to Happily Ever After Land with him. I don’t even know if a happily ever after with a Bratva don is possible.

That’s probably something I should’ve thought about before I fell into Kostya’s bed or fell in … anything else with him.

18

Kostya

Fucking Whelans.

I’m holding a report that says their presence is threatening one of my more lucrative businesses but all I can see, the only thought in my head, is of Charlotte. All day, all night since she left, I’ve done nothing productive, only thinking of Charlotte—the devastation, the sadness in her eyes when I told her to leave.

I miss her.

“Kostya?”

“What?” I snap because I haven’t heard a word of this meeting but I also won’t allow anyone to point out my distractedness. Yelisey nods to Vlad who taps Dmitri who stands and motions for Nicholai to follow them all out the door.

Yelisey shuts the door behind them. “Want to talk about it?”

“No, I don’t want to talk about it.” This isn’t a fucking teenager slumber party. I’m a grown man who can damn well work out my own issues. “I want to get my people in line so I can go home and check on my daughter before I have to be back later to do the jobs I pay you to see to.”

If Yelisey doesn’t wipe that grin off his face, I’ll