Champagne Venom (Orlov Bratva, #1)(21)

I wave my hand dismissively. “We already know it’s Petyr.”

“He won’t accept responsibility for it without proof.”

“I don’t give a fuck if he admits responsibility,” I growl. “I don’t need proof to come at him. He killed my—”

I stop short to gather myself. I nearly lost it when we walked into that boardroom and I saw Petyr standing there. The simple fact of him breathing… It’s incomprehensible. Petyr Ivanov gets to live, while Maksim Orlov rots beneath the cold earth.

It demands justice.

“We’re playing the long game, brother,” Konstantin says, putting his hand on my shoulder. “But I promise you that that bastard will be made to answer for Maksim’s death.”

“And who are you to promise me that?”

Konstantin drops his arm. His expression falters. “You’re my cousin, Misha, but you’ve always felt like my brother. We grew up together. I’ve always looked up to you. I love you, man. But sometimes

—”

“Let me guess?” I ask bitterly. “Sometimes, you don’t like me very much.”

Konstantin shakes his head. “It’s not that. It’s that, sometimes, you act like Maksim’s death only happened to you.” He steps back, retreating to the corner once again. “We all lost Maksim that day.

We all carry his death around with us. Every fucking day. The difference is that the rest of us have learned how to cope. We’ve learned how to live without him. Whereas you… you wear your pain on your sleeve and then hate the rest of us for not doing the same. How is that fair?”

“I don’t hate any of you,” I mumble, but the words sound false even to my own ears.

“No?” Konstantin challenges. “Then come to dinner, Misha. I dare you. I fucking dare you to just come to Friday dinner.”

I grip the armrests so hard it’s a miracle they don’t snap off. “I’m the don now, Konstantin. I have shit

to do. Businesses to run.”

“Revenge to plot?”

My jaw hardens. “You make that sound like a bad thing.”

“Of course it’s not,” he says. “Or at least, it wouldn’t be—if it wasn’t all you cared about. Maksim would have wanted you to have a life, Misha.”

I jump to my feet and wall him in. “How the hell do you know what Maksim would want?” I snarl in my cousin’s face. “He’s dead. None of us know what Maksim wants anymore.”

We’re dangerously close at this point. Another inch and we’ll be pounding chests and pressing our foreheads together like we used to as boys.

The only thing that stops a full-on fight from breaking out is the appearance of the nurse pushing Paige’s gurney through the door. She’s still unconscious, but there’s some color in her face now.

“She’ll be fine, Mr. Orlov,” the nurse informs me as I whip around. “She just might be a little disoriented when she comes to, which should be any minute now. Be gentle with her.”

"Is there anything else I need to know?" I ask. "Will she need surgery? Is anything broken? Tell me everything.”

The nurse hesitates, and I see it in her eyes: she's hiding something.

"Tell me," I demand.

"Details can only be shared with immediate family members. I'm sorry, but I---"

"I'm her husband." I say it without hesitation or pause. I can feel Konstantin watching me, but I don’t so much as glance his way. The problem with working with family is that they assume they know you.

They assume they have a right to your thoughts.

They assume they have the right to save you.

But I’m the only one who can save me now.

The nurse looks at me questioningly, but I meet her eyes without blinking. After an unbearably long second, she nods. "Okay. Then… yes, there is some news. You might want to take a seat."





15

PAIGE

“I think she’s waking up.”

The voices around me are a haze of noise, and I can’t sort through it. I can’t even open my eyes.

“Can someone grab her husband from the hall?”

Husband? That’s a dirty word now. I don’t have one anymore. Never did, actually, if you wanna get technical about it.

Did I hit my head? Is that why I’m hearing nonsense?

“Don’t worry, darling,” an unfamiliar female voice says, presumably to me. “You’re okay.”

Of course I’m okay. Why wouldn’t I be okay?

I peel my eyes open, one micro-blink at a time. Bright lights shine above me, blinding and relentless.

But I can start to make out a human shape next to the uncomfortable bed I’m lying in.

“Where am I?” I croak. I don’t recognize my own voice.

“You’re at Saint Mary’s Hospital,” the woman explains. “You’re okay. Just hold on a moment. I’ll get your husband.”

There’s that word again. I want to tell the woman that I don’t have a husband. I had a sort-of-not-husband, but he left and took my money with him. But before I can launch into that spiel, she’s already gone.

I rub the blurriness out of my eyes and sit up.