Unprotected with the Mob Boss: A Dark Mafia Romance (Alekseiev Bratva) by Fox, Nicole (classic books for 12 year olds .TXT) 📗

away for my mother to eavesdrop. He keeps his hands in his pockets. In our rush to leave, the last two buttons of his shirt were left undone.

“I need to ask you something and I need you to be completely honest,” I tell him.

“Okay.”

“I mean it,” I say. “Do not lie to me, Lev.”

“I get it, Ally.”

“You had no problem lying to my mother,” I snap. “Let’s not act like lying is a moral line you won’t cross.”

“You’ll notice that I lied to her, but I didn’t lie to you. If I don’t want you to know the truth, I just don’t tell you anything,” he says. “That’s how it was and that’s how it’s going to be.”

I take a deep breath. It doesn’t feel like I get enough air in, so I take another one. He reaches out toward me, but I take a step back from him. I look straight at him. Even in the dim lighting, he is intimidating and stunning.

“Do you—” I stop. “What do you know about the shooting tonight?”

He takes a step back, his head tilting. It’s the first time I’ve seen him seem confused.

“What do you mean?” he asks. “I know what you told me.”

“Come on, Lev,” I say. “I know about your business. I know who you are. You’re well-connected in the criminal world. Most criminals won’t move if they think it would upset the Bratva.”

“Ally, this could have been anyone,” he says, his hands swinging out in front of him like he’s presenting evidence but there’s nothing there. “You must know that the police piss off a lot of people. It’s part of their job. Criminals don’t go to people asking for permission to do things. Yes, many of them are careful to not piss off the Bratva, but they wouldn’t think I’d be upset about them shooting up a police station.”

“You should be,” I say. “That could have been my father who died. Those four policemen who were shot didn’t deserve to be attacked like that.”

“I didn’t say I wasn’t upset. I said they wouldn’t think I was.”

“Are you?” I retort. He stares at me for several seconds, his green eyes striking through me like the reverberations of a bass drum.

“The truth?” he asks.

“Yes.”

“I don’t care about those policemen,” he says. “The police have had it in for me for a long time and—”

“Because you’re a criminal who hasn’t served your time,” I interject.

He takes a deep breath, his fingers flexing. “But I care that you care,” he continues. “I care that you’re upset. I care that this hurt you. I’m sorry if that’s not enough for you, but I warned you about this. I told you I wasn’t crying over people’s deaths.”

I fold my hands over my chest. He looks away from me. His lip is slightly curled up in a partial snarl. I can feel the distrust breeding between us. It hurts, but it almost feels necessary. It feels safer to distrust him.

I can’t be certain if he’s involved or not. And that will always be my problem. It will be worse once I try to climb that ladder into becoming the district attorney. I’ll always wonder if the case I’m prosecuting is one he knew about beforehand. I’ll see the photographs of the victims and wonder if my husband ordered the murders. And if I saw something so heinous that I felt morally obligated to turn him in, my ties to a Bratva boss would cast such a long shadow over me that I’d never be free from it. I’d always be the Bratva boss’ fiancée, his wife, his woman.

“I want to go back to my apartment,” I tell him. He nods. When he looks at me, there’s nothing in his eyes. They’re cold like when we first met.

“That’s for the best.”

17

Lev

I’ve chosen a life of impassivity because rage is not an option. I’ve seen rage in my father’s fists like a bull trapped in a pen, and it only led to an FBI investigation and his death. I cut out those malignant emotions. It’s saved me from making the kind of reckless decisions that lead less capable men to end up on the wrong side of a gun barrel.

But as I’m driving Ally to her apartment, the anger comes after me like a rabid dog. I focus on the rational aspects.

It’s understandable that she’d see me as the source of all criminal activity in the city.

It’s understandable that she wouldn’t trust me completely.

It’s understandable that after her scare, she’d lash out.

But the anger screams in my ear, telling me that no matter what I do for her or how much of myself I give, she will never trust me. I was willing to give her my leverage and she still believes I’d endanger her father. It doesn’t even make rational sense for me to go through all of this effort to get her father on my side, only to attack the police station, but she still believes I would.

One hand on the wheel, I toss my phone into her lap. “Text Ilya. Tell him to send people to watch over your apartment.”

“I don’t need anyone—”

“It’s not up for negotiation,” I cut her off. “Either people are going to watch the apartment or you’re going back to my house.”

“I can’t believe …” She shakes her head. “Never mind. Fine.”

She texts out the message and tosses the phone into my back seat. She turns away from me, staring out the side window.

I park a couple of feet away from her apartment building. Ally opens her door and gets out. She turns like she’s going to say something to me, but a second passes, and she shuts the door.

I watch her step into the building before I stomp on the gas and drive away.

At a stoplight, I grab my cell phone. There’s no text to Ilya. I growl through clenched teeth and quickly text him before driving again.

The cars and buildings start to blur together as I pass