Heart of My Monster (Monster Trilogy, #3)(23)

“Why ask something you already know the answer to?”

I get it. Kirill and his family are Maksim’s benefactors. They gave him purpose and a privileged upbringing he wouldn’t have dreamt of having anywhere else.

Not to mention that he genuinely respects Kirill and even Viktor. The latter personally trained him from a young age and was the reason he developed superior combat skills.

It was foolishly hopeful of me to wish he’d be on the side of two people who lied to him. One of them tortured him for damn weeks and killed his real friend.

“If you go back to Kirill…” My voice catches, as is the case every time I speak or think of him. “We’ll meet again as enemies.”

“Aren’t we already?”

“I don’t want to hurt you, Maks. You’re the first friend I made after losing my family. You helped me integrate into the military and mafia life seamlessly. You always had my back and cheered me up whenever I was down without asking for anything in return. You easily became my best friend without even trying. I’ll never forget those moments.”

He gives Anton the side-eye. “That makes one of you.”

“The fuck did you just say?” my brother snaps in a frightening tone.

“I said, one of you isn’t an ungrateful motherfucker. Want to hear that again, dick?”

“You must be tired of living.” Anton starts to grab him, but I push his hand away.

“Stop it, damn it. What’s with all the testosterone between you two? It’s exhausting to watch.”

Maksim snarls, and Anton glares at him as if he wants to snap his neck. If I hadn’t been here, I’m sure that’s exactly what he would’ve done.

“But we can’t be friends anymore,” I say in a choked voice. “You’re the guard of the man whose demise I’m planning. The man to whom I was loyal to, but he chose to betray me. We’re on opposite sides of the board, Maks. If we meet as enemies, we might kill each other.”

“We could’ve easily bypassed this if you’d been truthful about who you were from the beginning.”

“If I had been, I wouldn’t have been able to exact revenge.”

“Both of you keep saying that. Look at your fucking faces! You’re grown-up adults living in the past. So what if you get revenge? You think you’ll be happier? Freer? Better? Well, here’s a news flash for you—you’ll just feel empty as fuck.”

“We’ll at least get closure,” I say, deadpan.

“By killing the people who were once your comrades and protected you back? This isn’t only about Boss. It’s about all the other men’s lives. Were they responsible for your family’s death? No. But you’ll kill them anyway because they’ll be defending Boss with their lives. How are you any different from terrorists?”

“I swear to fuck, Maksim. If you don’t shut your fucking mouth, I’m going to send you to your dear boss in a casket.”

“Do it, damn it!” Maksim staggers to his feet using the wall for balance and clutches Anton by the collar of his shirt. “Kill me. Death is better than seeing your true fucking face.”

My chest aches at the reminder of the feelings that ripped my chest open when I discovered Kirill’s betrayal. Maksim must be experiencing feelings similar to that.

He genuinely liked Yuri, but he found out that it was Anton all along.

And while Yuri and Anton share the same silent personality, they’re entirely different in everything else.

My brother was always the heir to the Ivanov empire, and that turned him into an emotionless person at a young age.

The massacre made his negative traits worse.

Even now, he looks at Maksim with cold eyes, as if he can’t feel any of the rage that’s targeted toward him. But he grabs Maksim by the hair, his fingers pulling back until it looks painful.

I stand up and carefully but firmly break them apart. Maksim sags against the wall, and my brother briefly closes his eyes and breathes deeply before opening them again.

“I think we could all use a break,” I say softly.

“Are you going to let me go?” Maksim asks in a nonnegotiable tone.

“I told you, I don’t want to fight you, Maks.” I pat his shoulder. “I think it’s better you stay here. At least for now.”

“So the sadistic asshole can torture me some more?”

“I’m going to knock your fucking teeth out,” Anton growls, slowly but surely losing his patience.

“There will be no torture,” I announce.

“And how will you make sure of that? The moment you turn your back, your dear fucking brother will go back to his favorite hobby of marking my skin.”

“I will stay here.”

“You’ll do no such thing,” Anton says.

“Maks is right. I also can’t trust you not to torture him just because you can.”

“You’re not staying alone with him,” Anton enunciates each word.

Maksim grins with an edge. “What? Afraid Sasha likes me more than she likes you?”

“You fucking—”

“You can stay, too, Anton. But if we leave, we do it together. That way, neither of us is with him on our own at any given time.”

I can tell Anton doesn’t like this plan; however, he has no choice but to accept it. One, I’m not leaving. Two, he’s also not leaving.