Until the End (Volkov Bratva #2)(62)

“Set up a meeting with the Albanians, tell them what I know. I can’t risk protecting Naomi anymore.”

That was going to be harder than it sounded. His word was his bond, and now that he had neither the diamond nor Naomi to hand over to Jetmir, they would assume he was hiding her, no matter what he told them.

Digging out his phone, he called Lauren, wanting to tell her that she would need to get back to the safe house, but it went to voicemail.

He wasn’t looking forward to his next call.

“I wasn’t able to uphold my end of the deal,” Mishca said to Mikhail, tamping down his pride in asking his father for help. “What should I do?”

“Let’s not do business over the phone. I will meet you at your club.”

“See you then.”

Mishca had made it a habit never to involve his father in his business dealings, not just because he didn’t want his men to get the wrong impression of him, but because he sometimes felt like he lived in his father’s shadow and that was a place he didn’t want to be.





He tried her phone again, but when Mishca got no answer, he cursed, redialing before he could crush the electronic device.

It was just a feeling at first, something that was rubbing him the wrong way. From the moment he felt that budding anxiety in his chest, he’d called Lauren, just to hear her voice, but with each unanswered call, that anxiety grew.

When he reached her voicemail again, Mishca ended the call, looking around the room for his keys, at least until his phone rang.

Without looking at the caller id, he answered. “Lauren?”

“Mishca, this is Amber.”

The fear in her voice made him stand up straighter. “Amber? What’s wrong?”

“I need you to come to the apartment. Lauren’s gone.”





Amber was pacing the foyer when Mishca, Vlad, and Luka arrived. She barely gave his men a glance, focusing solely on Mishca.

“I didn’t know what to do,” she said quickly, her eyes red from crying. “I came back and the apartment looked like this.”

There was broken porcelain on the floor, paintings strewn around the room, and the further Mishca entered the apartment, he saw the door to Lauren’s room.

It was open, but the frame on it was splintered, a large footprint on the door itself.

“Did you call the police?” Mishca asked.

He didn’t have time to deal with local law enforcement if she did, knowing that he would be the first person they went to after the ordeal with them.

“No,” Amber answered shooting a glance at Vlad. “Lauren told me about you.”

Mishca arched a brow, not bothering to question that at the moment.

“See that?” Luka asked in Russian, going over to crouch in Lauren’s doorway, picking up the butt of a cigarette.

“What do you want to do about her?” Vlad asked inclining his head in Amber’s direction.

“Is there somewhere you can go?” Mishca turned to Amber, trying his hardest not to panic.

She nodded.

“Stay there and wait for my call.” To Vlad and Luka, Mishca said, “Let’s go.”

They were back out the door as fast as they entered, Mishca already pulling out his phone to call one of his contacts.

“Mishca?”

He looked back to where Amber was standing looking down on him, her demeanor going from worry to serious.

“I encouraged her to go back to you, don’t let her get hurt because of that.”





With one phone call, every member of the Bratva that answered to Mishca were waiting for him inside his club, and even some that worked for Mikhail. He wasn’t there yet, but his presence wasn’t necessary. From wherever he was, Mikhail had made calls as well, and he had men scouring the streets in search of Lauren.

“Someone saw something!” Mishca shouted at them. “Find them.”

Only one had the audacity to scoff. If Mishca hadn’t been so wired, he might not have heard it, but once he did, he spun around, finding the source of the noise.

Lyov.

His hand was still bandaged from Mishca’s last assault, but he still hadn’t seemed to learn his lesson.

“Strip him.”

That got everyone’s attention. There were only a select few in the Bratva that could order a person’s legacy to be removed from them.

Mishca was one of them.

Having Lyov ‘stripped’ was not as bad as it seemed, it was worse. Mishca watched as several of his men dragged Lyov away despite his protests.

In the next few hours, every tattoo he had dedicated to the Vory v Zakone would be sliced with an ‘X’, then torched, rendering the tattoos illegible.

“You are not sanctioned to do this!” Lyov growled at him, still being yanked away.

That much was true—Lyov wasn’t under Mishca’s command—but he would deal with the consequences of his actions later.

Twenty minutes passed and still nothing. After the first ten, Mishca had threatened to kill everyone in the room if they continued to just stand there—although he knew there were plenty more out checking around. Vlad had to force him into his office and block the door before he could threaten anyone else.

Through chaos, Vlad was the voice of reason. “Who do you think could have done this?”