Until the End (Volkov Bratva #2)(12)

Born and raised in a lifestyle full of secrets and death, he had hardly lived for anything else in his twenty-five years…not until a year ago when he met a girl that would disrupt the delicate balance between his personal life and his obligations to the Bratva.

He had tried for months to get her out of his head, doing just about anything to get a reprieve. A few girls, but after the third attempt at trying to take one home—and feeling absolutely nothing—he turned to the one thing that took away the memories.

In his office, Mishca drank freely until the wee hours of the morning, but only on the days when he was not needed by the Vory v Zakone. Their mandate demanded that they not drink to the point of excess, but Mishca often teetered on the brink.

He didn’t know how to handle it, the emotions she sparked inside of him. Nothing he did would turn them off. The only time he had a modicum of peace was when he drank.

A hard knock drew Mishca from his thoughts. Sighing, he dropped the picture into the drawer, slamming it shut with his foot. Barking an ‘enter,’ he watched the door swing open, Jonathan standing in the doorway.

His partner was one of the few people outside of the family that knew what Mishca really was, but he was also someone Mishca trusted with his life.

Currently, he looked apprehensive, rubbing his hands together as his eyes shifted from Mishca’s face to the half empty bottle of Vodka that was doing nothing to lift Mishca’s ever darkening mood.

“Hey, Boss.” Though Jonathan had a stake in the club, and wasn’t one of the brigadiers, he insisted on calling Mishca by the same title as his men. “I know you’re busy,”—another pointed look at the bottle, then to the drawer where the picture was hidden.

Frowning, Mishca turned in his chair, blocking the view. “Get on with it.”

“Right.” Jonathan snapped his fingers, shifting on his feet. “There’s a saying I’m rather fond of. ‘Don’t shoot the messenger.’ Have you ever heard that before?”

Mishca was slowing losing his already short patience. “Spit it out!”

“Your sister is downstairs dancing on the bar.” Jonathan cringed as he said it, waiting for Mishca’s careful composure to come unhinged. It wouldn’t be the first time he had snapped since he and Lauren had ended things—a subject he knew never to bring up.

In the blink of an eye, Mishca had the bottle of Vodka in hand, hurling it across the room to shatter against the wall. In the midst of the bottle flying, Jonathan made his exit.

As soon as Mishca got his hands on her, he would strangle her scrawny little neck.

Since Lauren’s revelation that day, things had slowly spiraled downhill for the Volkov family, at least for the Volkov children. Mikhail had returned his full attention to the Vory v Zakone, putting his men to work to expand their businesses. With Viktor dead they had to take over his obligations.

Mishca wasn’t hypocritical enough to judge her for the drinks—there were many a night when he found himself at the bottom of a bottle—but he could limit her intake when he was around. He didn’t let her in his club, not just because she was only seventeen, but because of the men that used this place as their hunting ground.

Though a bar brawl sounded a bit appealing at the moment, he had all he could take of law enforcement lately. Even in death, Victor still managed to bring a cluster f*ck of a problem down on them.

Mishca understood Mikhail’s decision to make Viktor’s death public, though a few members of the Bratva voiced their disapproval. It was a calculated risk, one meant to resolve the problem with the NYPD as well as the Michigan police department. Anatoly’s recorded testimony had been destroyed, there was no physical evidence, and Mishca knew—and made sure to speak up at the last meeting—that Lauren wouldn’t speak a word of it.

That problem had been fixed.

Now, if he could just fix the hundred and twenty pound problem he had downstairs…





Commotion near the other end of the bar had Lauren turning around, nearly spilling her drink when she saw who was at the other end.

Several college-aged boys were throwing back shots, shouting at each other though they were only inches apart, but the petite girl in the center of their group was who grabbed Lauren’s attention.

She was dressed in a rose gold sequin dress, her feet bare though silvery anklets adorned both of her ankles. Her blonde hair gleamed in the glowing lights of the club, wayward strands sticking to her damp skin. She looked far older than her seventeen years, wearing enough makeup that she almost didn’t look like herself.

The girl was Aleksandria Volkov, Mishca’s little sister.

At one point, Lauren might have thought them friends, but she doubted Alex wanted anything to do with her now, not after that day she revealed the truth about Viktor—Alex’s biological father. Technically, that made Alex Mishca’s cousin, but Lauren doubted either of them wanted a reminder of that.

She was the splitting image of her mother, Anya, more so in this moment than any other.

Two of the guys grabbed Alex’s extended hands, hoisting her up and onto the bar top. Cheers rang out as Alex threw back another shot, swaying her hips as she danced to only a beat she could hear. At that point, Lauren knew she had to step in, no matter how much more Alex would hate her after.

“I’ll be right back,” she told Amber who gave her a drunken thumbs up.