Page 41 of Saving Helena

"Scared, are we?" Sergei’s voice dripped with malice, his lips curling into a cruel smirk. It was pretty obvious he enjoyed the idea of me being scared. “You should be. The boss thinks I betrayed him — that I betrayed the Bratva.”

Wait a second. Tilting my head, I considered him. “I could help you,” I tried, but his face turned a more dangerous shade of puce. I added, “Makarovich wasn’t acting on the Bratva’s orders.”

The attack was vicious, the open-handed slap so hard that it whipped my head to the side and sent me to my knees.

“You lying bitch!” he shouted.

I raised the back of my hand to my lip and wiped away the blood. For fuck’s sake, if it hurt so much to get hit in the face, why did people box? Pushing off the floor, I struggled to get back to my feet.

“I don’t lie.” The words were heavy in my throat, but I wouldn’t back down at this juncture. This might be the opening I needed. “He wasn’t working with the Volkov pakhan.” Sergei’s eyes opened wider. This name was the right one to use. I was thanking my lucky stars for paying attention when Maddox was talking. Sergei’s hand reached out and closed around my throat, squeezing.

“You are not Bratva. Why do you know that name?” he demanded.

Gasping, clutching at my throat, it seemed as if he’d squeeze me until my eyes popped like one of those squeezy toys. His face was right against mine, his breath hot against my cheek. Sergei was a big man, much larger than I was certainly. Well — everyone was bigger than I was. It wasn’t my fault I never seemed to get very big. The giant oaf was angrier than I’d ever seen him, which wasn’t good for me. This was the only option, though, that I could think of to try and reason with him.

Choking a little, I grappled with his fingers, indicating that he needed to loosen his grip if he wanted any information while I tried to figure out what to give. Did Sergei know that I’d been with the Iron Brotherhood? Surely, he did. That wouldn’t be providing information that he didn’t have.

“What do you know of the Bratva? Suka,” he spit at me. Literal spit drops hit my face, I realized with disgust. What a pig. He threw me from him hard enough that I hit the opposite wall with so much force that I slid stunned to the floor. My entire skeleton was rattled.

“I wasn’t on vacation. You’re right.” Setting my palms against the grimy carpet, I focused on my fingertips, the cute nails I’d painted before leaving for work at the duck. I’d redone my nails with a bright yellow to match the lettering on the T-shirts. Initially, I’d thought of doing a little duck on one, but that was beyond my skill. Then my brain had come up with the idea of maybe actually spelling out ‘duck’ or even ‘odd’ on the one hand and ‘duck’ on the other, like in black. If I could manage it upside down in little block letters, it could be super cute, right? Maybe Jills could help me. Suddenly depressed, I came rushing back into my body, my hands pressed against the dirty carpet and Sergei yelling.

He was screaming at me in Russian, standing in front of me while I was slumped down like a broken doll. “Tell me, tell me!” He demanded.

“I can tell you that Makarovich wasn’t working under the pakhan’s orders. You can check if I’m lying. He’s lied to you if you think you were following Bratva orders. The pakhan won’t be happy if something happens to me.” This part was a huge gamble. I had no idea if the Volkov pakhan would know who I was or give two shits about me or even connect me to the Iron Brotherhood if Sergei called.

Suddenly, Sergei unleashed a volley of kicks to my abdomen, vicious and swift with his booted feet. Curling into a ball, I tried vainly to protect myself as he went wild, lashing out with his feet as I scooted as far away as possible and tried to endure.

Finally, after what seemed like forever, but was more than likely only a minute, he was exhausted and leaned his hands on his knees, sweat dripping from his temple. “You better not have lied. I will call the pakhan, and he better back your story up.”

Whimpering, I pulled even tighter into the corner and prayed with all my might that this unknown man might someone save me.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Maddox

Church was a somber affair. It was typically a serious meeting, but today, our topics of embezzlement and Helena’s kidnapping weren’t precisely small matters.

“This is so fucked,” one of the brothers said under his breath as I went over the embezzlement particulars.

“Yeah, it is fucked,” I agreed. “Look, there isn’t any getting around the issue that Jake stole from us. From the MC and all of us by doing what he did.” We were low-tech around the Brotherhood, but not so low-tech that I didn’t throw up a small PowerPoint to show the particulars so I could highlight the exact quantities and the runs that he stole from. “We’re looking at these runs here. You all know that we keep track of every dime. Not only because the club is earning, spending, and paying, but because every brother here earns their cut.” I let that sink in. The MC was a brotherhood in name and deed, but every person here earned their way. They were paid accordingly. What the MC did wasn’t easy or safe.

“That means Jake stole from each of you.” Dimitri made the point for me, pointing his fingers around the room at individual brothers.

“He was my pick. I backed him, and that makes me feel like shit.” I shoved my hands into my pockets. “If he’d asked me, I would have helped him with his issues with the money. I’d have lent it to him. He didn’t need to go behind our backs for over a year to steal from all of us. This is a betrayal. The Brotherhood is about loyalty.” I was crushed, and I couldn’t help but show it. “Hands up if you think that exile is enough.”

Looking around the room, I could see the people grumbling to each other, their faces angry. One or two hands went up, and one went up and came back down again.

“Okay, I get that. I do, I wish it were enough for what happened, but that isn’t how we work. Jake knew the consequences of his actions. Hands up if you agree that the brother in question should die for stealing from us.” I swallowed as I spoke, bowing my head and raising my hand. Then I lifted my head and met their eyes.

There are only two hands down. The vote was nearly unanimous, and there were more than enough votes to advance. There was no mercy to be found today, which was fine by me. That business would typically have occupied the agenda for more time, but I was on a tight schedule and couldn’t wait.

“Alright then. Let’s move on to the next item on the agenda,” I said. “Helena Marsh has been back with us. She is staying with the Brotherhood while she gets back on her feet. Most of you know she was abducted from her job at the Duck this morning.”

This knowledge had spread like wildfire through the club, so it wasn’t news. I needed a unanimous vote for this next part of our work.

“She’s been taken by a rogue member of the Bratva by a man who is wanted for human trafficking. Helena had found information about auction sites.” At this, there were several veiled looks in Dimitri’s direction. “I want to get her back – she’s mine. It’ll mean war. Do I have the support of the Brotherhood?”

“Fuck yeah!” Dimitri’s voice was loud above the others as fists rose, a sea of them. There were no dissenters as all the brothers pumped their arms up and shouted in the smoky room. It meant a lot to me that the MC was behind me. Dimitri and I needed the backup, even with the extra manpower from the Volkovs.