Twilight Sins (Kulikov Bratva Book 1)

My fist cracks across the man’s battered face. He drops to his knees in the blood of the dead Gustev soldier next to him, spraying blood onto my shoe.

I spit on the floor in disgust. “You’re not giving me what I want and you ruined my shoes.” I kick him in the chest and he sprawls backwards on the dusty cement floor. “I was annoyed before—but now, I’m pissed.”

That’s not entirely true. I was fucking livid from the moment I looked in my rearview mirror and saw two of Akim’s men tailing me. They weren’t even being discreet. They weren’t trained well enough to know how.

It’s the third time I’ve been followed in a week and these soldiers are the fifth and sixth I’ve had to kill.

It’s becoming tedious.

“Tell me what Akim is planning,” I demand again. “Tell me and you live.”

The soldier barks out a laugh, sending blood dripping down his chin. “You’ll kill me either way.”

“I won’t. Not if you pledge your loyalty to me.”

“I was born with my loyalty running through my veins,” he hisses between his red-stained teeth. “I work for the Gustev Bratva. Not you.”

I roll my eyes. “Your commitment would be admirable if it wasn’t so fucking sad. What are you, a fourth cousin twice removed? A Gustev by marriage? Akim probably doesn’t even know your name. It’s why he sent you to tail me. Because you’re dispensable.”

“Akim chose me for this mission because he trusts me.”

I almost feel bad for the bastard. Almost. The fact that he’d happily run straight into Akim’s arms and tell him exactly what I’ve been up to all day is where my sympathy dies.

For that, he has to die, too.

I grab the man by the front of his shirt. His feet barely touch the floor.

“Haven’t you wondered where all of your friends have disappeared to? You are the sixth man I’ve killed this week.”

His bloodshot eyes widen.

“Sorry to break the news to you this way,” I continue. “But your boss sent you into the fucking lion’s den. You’re a distraction. Do you understand that? He knew I’d see you tailing me. And he knew that, after seeing you, I wouldn’t risk driving to the meeting I have set up today with one of your supposedly ‘loyal’ brothers.”

The man narrows his eyes. “No one would betray the Bratva.”

“Someone already has. You could be next,” I say. “Just tell me what Akim is planning.”

“Never,” he spits. “I’ll die before I double cross my family and⁠—”

I release him and put a bullet between his eyes before he can even finish. He said he wanted to die, so he can die. At heart, I’m in the wish fulfillment business.

I pull my phone out and text Boris. Just took care of two more of your brothers. I was followed again. No meeting today.

Boris has been my contact within the Gustev Bratva for the past year. He played a major role in getting us the intel we needed to take out Akim’s father, the previous pakhan. Now, he’s going to help me take down Akim.

That is, if I can ever make it to a fucking meeting without being followed.

I’m about to call a cleanup crew to come take care of these bodies when I get a call from Oleg. “What’s my sister doing now?” I growl into the phone. I don’t have time for more of Mariya’s shit.

This is the third time Oleg has called me today. The other two were to warn me that she demanded she be allowed to leave the house and then again to let me know she was clearing out the mall of lingerie and swimsuits.

She knew she was being followed and watched, which is the only reason she did it. She’s treading on thin ice as it is, showing up here unannounced, but she’s still trying to piss me off.

“Nothing. She’s safe back at the house,” Oleg says. “I’m calling about Akim.”

“Tell me what you know.”

He sighs. “It isn’t much, but I didn’t want to sit on it. The word going around is that he’s planning something. Big.”

I suspected as much already. There’s no other reason he’d be sacrificing his low-level soldiers so he can tail me. Plus, going after a woman I had one dinner date with is a bit desperate, even for him. But hearing it confirmed means he’s making moves. Word is spreading. He won’t be able to stay hidden for much longer.

“Tell Nikandr and have him lead this. I want to know what Akim is planning,” I say. “And get someone out to the warehouse for a cleanup.”

Oleg chuckles. “Again?”

“Two of them.” I sigh. “Akim keeps setting them up, so I keep knocking them down.”

“I’ll take care of it,” Oleg says.

We hang up and I turn back to the dead men behind me.

They’re fucking kids. No older than Nikandr. Akim had them both convinced that he was going to take care of them, yet he rolled them straight into my path.

I despise that I didn’t have a choice here.

I hate even more that I had to kill these men when I’d rather rip Akim himself limb from limb. I’d kill him for no other reason than that he is happy to sacrifice these men who would die for him. He isn’t a leader; he’s a coward.

So, soon, he’ll be a corpse.

The drive back to the mansion does nothing to ease the tension between my shoulders.

It has been day after day of knocking down Akim’s pawns without getting any closer to him. Now, I have to worry about him going after my sister while she’s running around town buying underwear.

Inside, I fill a glass of water at the sink and knock it back. I’m about to go find my sister and force her to return at least seventy-five percent of what she bought today. I can more than afford it, but ground rules have to start somewhere. Ground rule number one: never buy lingerie with your brother’s money.

Then I look out the window and freeze.

Luna is lying in one of the loungers by the pool. If she isn’t in the library or the garden, she’s usually by the pool. This is normal.

What isn’t normal is the microscopic scraps of fabric covering her tits.

It can’t be a bathing suit. It looks like that thing would dissolve the moment it touches water. I’m wondering if it isn’t painted on.

The frustration I’ve been shoving down all day boils to the surface. My skin is buzzing and my cock is rock-solid.

It’s been a bad day. A release would be nice.

I need her.

No. Not her. Anyone would do.

This has nothing to do with Luna and her full lips and her confession of love. This desire has everything to do with the floss she dressed herself in and called a bathing suit.

I storm through the double doors and across the patio. Luna’s eyes are closed, one arm thrown over her head. The triangles of the bikini barely cover her nipples and there is the thinnest strip of blue disappearing between her thighs.

I stop next to her lounger. I’m so hard it almost hurts.

Her eyelashes flutter as my shadow falls over her face, but she doesn’t open her eyes. Doesn’t realize I’m standing over her with the vilest intentions.

I reach down and snap the thin tie that wraps around her neck. “What the fuck are you wearing?”