Until Forever Ends: A Dark Mafia Romance by Adelaide Forrest (black books to read .txt) 📗

"You see, I'm not a fan of men talking about my wife," I said, setting the block on the floor behind me. With a steak knife in my hand, I cut through the fabric of his shirt to reveal pale white skin beneath. Covered in the tattoos of the Bratva, his torso heaved with exertion as he moved to strike me.

I grabbed his hand as he lifted it, pulling until I twisted him to lie flat against the floor. Pulling his arm out to the side and pinning it beneath him, I stabbed through the flesh with the steak knife until it held steady in the floorboards. He yelled his pain, raising his other arm to hit me and fight me off as I grabbed another steak knife and repeated the process on the other hand.

He whimpered as he tried to lift the knives out of the wood floor, his flesh sliding along the knife until he dropped back down in agony. Ripping the shirt off his torso, I grabbed the filet knife from the butcher block and pressed the tip to his chest while he tried to sink into the floor to get away. The tattoo over his heart was the unique mark that the Kuznetsovs wore to signify their impeccable genetics. To show that they alone were the heirs to the specific line of the Bratva that Pavel ran in Siberia.

I sank the point of the knife into his skin, gliding it through his flesh as I carved around the edges of his tattoo. "Fucking stop!" he screamed as the blade sank deeper beneath his ink and flayed the skin off his chest. I peeled it back, the skin tearing off the muscle and blood red flesh until the patch hung limply in my hand with the black ink of the Tundra Wolf and stars glimmering underneath the red stain. I tossed it to the side, listening to the wet sound as it stuck to the floor. "You're insane," he mumbled, his breathing harsh as I touched his face with blood-soaked fingers and laughed.

"You have no idea," I chuckled, dragging the tip of the knife down his sternum and leaving a trail of blood in my wake. The devil inside me craved the blood and the scent of fear and pain in the air.

I couldn't wait until I could share that part of myself with Isa. For the little demon inside her to admit that she craved the bloodshed and death just as much as I did.

"I used to think I'd get bored eventually," I sighed. "After a lifetime of violence, how could I not?" I asked, pressing the knife through the skin of his chest carefully. I pushed it deeper, making slow and careful glides with the knife to get through the chest wall until I felt the familiar press of bone against the tip, sliding straight down along the sternum. I set the knife on his stomach to slip eight fingers in the cut I'd made on his chest, pulling the flesh apart to reveal the breastbone. He stared up at me in horror, his eyes fluttering closed as the unimaginable pain of having his chest cavity opened while he looked on settled over him. “But that day has never come.”

I used the tip of the chef's knife to crack open his breast bone, pleased he still breathed as I reached inside his chest cavity and wrapped my fingers around his beating heart. Isa was the love of my life, my heart, and Pavel had nearly cost me that. With his life in my hands, I pulled his free until he blinked up at his own heart in the moments before his death. Opening his mouth, I shoved the bloody organ between his teeth and trapped the last breath in his body.

It protruded from his face, a mouth full of his own heart as it pumped the remaining blood within it all over his face and neck. I dragged my fingers through it, drawing on the floor beside his body.

One down.

Four to go. I stood, washing my hands in the sink in the kitchen. Making my way back toward the door to the apartment, I pulled it open and strode into the hallway after closing it behind me. Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I dialed Pavel's number and chuckled when it went to voicemail as expected. "Are all your sons morons like their father? Or was that only Leonid?" I asked, ending the call and turning to wander down the streets of Rome.

I smiled at the old woman I passed sitting on her steps, making my way back to my gracious host's house.

Massimo Farrante was one of the few men I trusted to keep me safe until I could return to Isa, but he and I had business to discuss before I could leave Rome.

Tomorrow would be soon enough.

By the time I’d finished my business and made my way to the room set aside for me for the night, exhaustion made my limbs heavy. I wanted to go home to Isa, but getting some sleep first would do me wonders. My conversation with Massimo would continue into the next day, working to help him find a solution to his own woman problems without crossing the line. Men like us walked a careful line, and if we didn't take the time to evaluate our actions, we may cross into the forbidden zone of those we condemned.

I flipped open the screen on my laptop despite my fatigue, wanting to watch mi reina sleep for a few moments to settle the violence rattling in my bones. Not having her to fuck the remaining adrenaline out of my system was torture, and I resolved to taking her with me whenever I could do it safely.

As I brought up the camera feed and my eyes settled on her face, there was no denying the restlessness of her body. Despite the late hour, she was wide awake in