Hidden Monsters (Volkov Bratva #4)(29)

His frown grew more apparent, his grip tightening slightly. “What are you on?”

Alex couldn’t help it. She laughed a little. It wasn’t that the question was particularly funny, but because she didn’t actually know what she was on, or at least some of it. She could have listed what she drank when she was still here, but when she was in the compound with Snow, it was all a mystery.

Despite the growing anger in his face, she decided to answer honestly. “A little bit of everything.” The look on his face had her shaking her head. “But don’t worry, even if I hadn’t’ve been high last night, I still would have done it. Maybe not now, but eventually. It feels like that’s where we’re going to end up at some point, don’t you think?”

Ignoring that, he asked, “Tell me…what are you taking?”

“I think I answered that. Now, are you going to be long about this? I have somewhere to go.”

“This is where you’ve been going, why you’re not at home? Who’s giving this shit to you anyway?”

She smiled a secretive smile, wagging her finger. “A friend.”

“Don’t f*ck with me, Alex.”

No longer finding him amusing, she pulled free of him, frowning. “Back off, Luka. I don’t owe you anything, and the last time I checked, we’re not family, nor are you f*cking me. That means you don’t get to tell me what to do.”

“That doesn’t mean I don’t care about you and the fact that you’re drowning in whatever the f*ck this is.”

“I appreciate it, and if I weren’t late, I would stick around to discuss this more, but I’m in a rush, so…Seriously,” she said when he didn’t move. “I’m fine. I know I said I’d never call you again, but if something’s up, you’ll be the first person I call, okay?”

When his phone rang, she took this as her opportunity to get away from him. It was obvious that he wanted to stop her, but he couldn’t ignore the call, not when it was his boss.

“You can let yourself out, Luka.”

She was glad that she was able to escape without further hassle, but she didn’t realize just how hard it had been for him to watch her go.

_____

Three pills, a fifth of vodka, and a number of other things that Alex really didn’t want to think about later, she felt like shit. Not just physically, though that too since it felt like she could hardly keep her eyes open, but emotionally as well, especially since that scene with Luka earlier.

She didn’t want to admit that things were spiraling out of control any more than she wanted to admit that now she was officially trading her body for drugs.

Just another thing to add to her list of f*ck-ups.

A part of her felt like crying because she was doing this to herself, that she had a choice in the matter, but the other part enjoyed the pain she was putting herself through because she deserved it. She had been given so many choices, so many opportunities to go a different route, but every time, she chose wrong.

Her phone was in her hand, pills in the other, and all the others who were partying around her seemed oblivious to her inner turmoil. Here again, she was presented with two options.

She could call Luka, admit that she wasn’t dealing well and she knew, no matter how she felt about his relationship with Natasha, that he would be there and help in his own way. But her other option was easier. She could take the pills, sink into oblivion, and confront the problem another day.

Dropping the phone on the bed, she frowned even as she lifted her hand, taking them all instead of rationing. Had there ever really been a choice?





15

____





Death is Knocking





Mishca arched a brow, staring Luka down. “Do I have to tell you how to do your job?”

Though his hand twitched with urges of a time long past, Luka merely nodded, conceding to what Mishca was saying to him. There was something going on with the Bratva boss that Luka wasn’t understanding at the moment. Ever since he’d gotten back from Italy, he’d become a bit of a dictator, and while their relationship had always been rather easy before, now it was as if he was deliberately trying to push Luka’s buttons to get a rise out of him.

There was only once when Luka’s careful control had slipped, the night when Vlad was killed. More than the others who stained his conscience, Luka wouldn’t be forgetting the former enforcer’s death anytime soon, especially since it had come by his own hand. Clear as day, he could still remember lifting the gun, firing off the rounds that killed him almost instantaneously as if it was second nature. At the time, it hadn’t mattered that he had known Vlad for a couple of years and might have considered the older man someone he was close to. Ultimately, he’d had to make a choice between adding another haunting memory or saving a friend from the same thing, only Luka knew that it wouldn’t have been the same. Mishca had cared for Vlad in a way that would have broken him if he’d been the one to take his life.

Not many understood the sacrifice of what it meant to take a life. Sure, some could forget the names and faces of people they ended, but Luka wasn’t one of them, and more importantly, he didn’t want to be. He liked having the reminder, knowing that during his every waking moment, he wasn’t a good person. He needed to remember who he was.