Blood And Betrayal
"She was mine first," Dimitri whispered, his voice deadly calm. "And you stole her in the dark."
Dimitri and Alexei Volkov are twin brothers, mafia kings, bound by blood and loyalty. When one bleeds, both bleed. When one kills, both kill. Nothing has ever come between them.
Until her.
Irina was Dimitri's maid, his peace in a world of violence. The only woman allowed close enough to touch him, to see the man beneath the monster. He fell for her quietly, deeply, and completely.
But one drunken night at a party, Alexei stumbled into his brother's darkened room. He wore Dimitri's robe. She thought he was Dimitri. And in the shadows, a line was crossed that could never be uncrossed.
Now Irina carries the child of her master's brother!
When Dimitri discovers her pregnancy, rage consumes him. When Alexei claims her as his own with a cruel smirk, something breaks between the brothers. The bond that made them invincible now threatens to destroy them both.
Two brothers. One woman. A baby that will crown one king and condemn the other.
In the world of the Volkov mafia, betrayal is paid in blood.
When this war is over, will any of them survive?
قراءة
Chapter: Chapter 165Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-FiveIrina's POVThe months after Alexei's death were the hardest of my life. This was grief, pure and unrelenting, a weight that sat on my chest and made it hard to breathe.I had not expected to love Alexei. When I learned the truth about that night, I had hated him. He had deceived me and violated me and taken something that was not his to take.But then I watched him change. Slowly and painfully, he tried. He really tried. He learned to hold Nikolai gently. He learned to speak softly. He learned to ask for forgiveness.And somewhere in those months, I fell. Not the way I loved Dimitri, with passion and fire. It was softer and quieter.
آخر تحديث: 2026-03-04
Chapter: Chapter 164Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-FourDimitriThe funeral was held in the old church where our parents were buried. The same stone walls that had witnessed their funeral fifteen years ago now bore witness to my brother's. The morning was gray and cold, snow falling in soft sheets that covered everything in white but nothing could hide the truth. My brother was dead. My twin. My other half. Gone.Mikhail spoke, his voice breaking on every word as he buried the second son he had raised. He stood at the front of the church, his cane in one hand and the other gripping the podium for support."Alexei Volkov was a complicated man," Mikhail said, his voice rough. "He made mistakes. Terrible mistakes. But at the end, he chose love. He chose sacrifice. He gave his life to protect the innocent. And that is how I will remember him."The entire Bratva attended. The church was packed with men in dark suits, their faces grim. Men who had killed without hesitation stood silent, paying respects to one o
آخر تحديث: 2026-03-03
Chapter: Chapter 163Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-ThreeIrinaI collapsed beside them, clutching Nikolai with one arm and reaching for Alexei with the other. Sobs tore through my body as I touched his face, still warm, already gone. My fingers trembled as they traced the line of his jaw, the curve of his cheek, memorizing the contours of his face one last time.The man who had saved me. The father of my child. The man who had held me captive, who had hurt me, who had tortured me. But also the man who had changed. Who had tried to be better. Who had thrown himself in front of a bullet to protect me.The man I had learned, against all reason and resistance, to love."Alexei," I whispered, my voi
آخر تحديث: 2026-03-01
Chapter: Chapter 162Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-TwoDimitriThe Romano struck at dawn. Armed men stormed the compound in coordinated waves, breaking through defenses that were spread thin across fractured territories. Most of my elite guards were stationed at my wing. Most of Alexei's men were protecting the western district. The compound itself was undermanned and exposed.Alarms screamed through the mansion. Gunfire erupted like thunder. The sound was deafening, a constant roar that shook the walls and rattled the windows. I grabbed my gun from the nightstand, checked the clip, and ran.The hallways were chaos. Men were shouting, running, dying. I saw bodies on the floor, some ours, some theirs. Blood was everywhere, splattered on the walls, pooling on the marble floors. The acrid smell of gunpowder filled the air, mixing with the metallic scent of blood."Irina!" I shouted. "Nikolai!" But my vo
آخر تحديث: 2026-02-28
Chapter: Chapter 161Chapter One Hundred and Sixty-OneIrinaI watched Dimitri sleep beside me. He looked peaceful for the first time in days. Nikolai was sleeping between us, safe and warm. This was all I wanted. Just peace. Just safety. Just my family together.Dimitri had explained everything to me. The call with Don Romano. The meeting planned for tomorrow. The promise of negotiation. I wanted to believe it was real. Wanted to believe that our nightmare was finally over. But something felt wrong. I could not explain it. Just a feeling in my gut that things were not as they seemed."What are you thinking about?" Dimitri whispered. I had not realized he was awake."Nothing," I lied."Liar," he said softly. "I can tell when something is bothering you."I sighed. "I am scared. Scared that this peace will not last. Scared that Don Romano is lying. Scared that tomorrow everything will fall apart.""I am scared too," Dimitri said. "But what choice did we have? It was either make a deal or keep running foreve
آخر تحديث: 2026-02-27
Chapter: Chapter 160Chapter One Hundred and SixtyDimitri"Why would they want to speak with you?" the voice on the phone asked."Because I have something they want," I said. "Information about their operations. Secrets that could destroy them. And I am willing to trade it for peace."There was a long pause on the other end."Hold," the voice said.We waited in tense silence. My heart was pounding so hard I could hear it in my ears. This could go very wrong very quickly.Finally, a new voice came on the line. Older. Deeper. More authoritative."Mr. Volkov," the voice said. "My name is Don Romano. I am the head of the Romano family. And I must say, I am surprised to hear from you.""I want to make a deal," I said."What kind of deal?" Don Romano asked."I have files," I explained. "Documents and videos left by my father. Information about your operations. Your enemies. Your secrets. I will give them to you. All of them. In exchange for a guarantee that you will leave my family alone."Don Romano laughed.
آخر تحديث: 2026-02-26
Chapter: Chapter 86CHAPTER 86: THE SESSIONThe council hall holds four hundred people.Every seat is taken by eight in the morning. The press take their positions along the side walls with the specific efficiency of people who have been to enough of these to know where to stand. Territorial representatives fill the gallery. Council members at the front table. The ordinary wolves of the territory — the ones who came not because they were required to but because they wanted to be present for whatever this is — filling everything else.I stand in the corridor outside the main doors and feel the room through the walls.Not the way I used to feel it. Not the full coronation weight of ten thousand heartbeats organized inside me. The quieter version. The outline of the room rather than the interior of every person in it. But enough. Enough to know the specific quality of a crowd that has come with genuine attention rather than obligation.They came to hear something true.Kael is beside me. He will not be on t
آخر تحديث: 2026-08-25
Chapter: Chapter 85Marcus finds us in the garden fifteen minutes later.He has the piece of paper with the garden requirements. He has added three items since the last time I saw it."Herbs," he says. "Eli says herbs are useful. We already have some." He looks at the north corner. "Are those the ones.""Yes," Kael says.Marcus crouches to look at them with the serious attention he gives everything he is cataloguing. "What kind."Kael tells him. The names in the old language and then the common names. Marcus writes both on his paper with the thoroughness of someone who does not trust himself to remember the distinction."Draven will want these," Marcus says. Not a question."Yes," I say.He stands. Looks at the garden around him. The wild growth. The old roses. The abandoned beds with their dormant roots."It is going to be good," he says. With the certainty of someone who has decided a thing and sees the evidence for it everywhere."Yes," Kael says. "It is."Marcus nods. Goes back inside. The piece of p
آخر تحديث: 2026-08-25
Chapter: Chapter 87"I am fourteen weeks pregnant," I say.No preamble. No buildup. The true thing first. The way she taught me — the way Queen Alara spoke in the video, the way the funeral words worked, the way honest things work when they are given plainly to people who are capable of receiving them.The room absorbs it.Not shock. Not what I feared in the garden when I was afraid of the wrong thing. Something closer to — settling. Like a room that has been slightly tilted finding its level."I wanted to tell you myself," I say. "In a room. Not through a document or a press release or a formal announcement that reaches you through three channels of institutional language before it becomes a sentence a person said." I look at the gallery. At the press. At the wolves in the ordinary seats who came on a Wednesday morning because they wanted to be present. "You chose me knowing I was a person with a life. That remains true."A council member in the front row — the northern territory abstention from the law
آخر تحديث: 2026-08-25
Chapter: Chapter 84CHAPTER 84: THE PREPARATIONFourteen weeks.Draven says this on Tuesday morning with the specific tone he uses when a number has implications beyond the number itself. Fourteen weeks means the pregnancy is visible now to anyone paying attention. Fourteen weeks means the governance question Maya warned me about — how to handle the public nature of it — has moved from eventually to now.I have been dressed carefully for six weeks. Deliberate cuts. Strategic layers. The specific armor of a woman who is not hiding something but is choosing when to present it.Kael has not commented on this. He notices everything and has said nothing which means he has decided the timing is mine to control and he is not going to take that from me.This morning I stand in the east-facing room in the good morning light and look at myself honestly.The armor is no longer working.---Hadwin notices at the council briefing.He does not say anything directly. He is too practiced for that. But his eyes move to m
آخر تحديث: 2026-08-25
Chapter: Chapter 83CHAPTER 83: THE ROOTSFelix finds the name in three days.He sends it through Hadwin in the morning — not a formal document, a single page in his handwriting, the specific handwriting that has been appearing throughout the archive for weeks. Precise. Dense. Every word earning its place.The woman who tended the garden was named Maren Voss.She was a territorial historian. Not a council historian — independent, working in the east territory for forty years before her death twelve years ago. She wrote three books, none of them widely read, all of them about the specific history of the guardian bond and the royal bloodline and the first queens. She was considered, by the established historical community, to be working in a fringe area of scholarship.She owned the house for thirty years.She planted the herbs in the north corner of the garden in the
آخر تحديث: 2026-08-16
Chapter: Chapter 82CHAPTER 82: THE CASEThe first morning in the new house Kael wakes before dawn.I feel him leave before I hear him. The bond registering the specific warmth of him moving away — down the hall, the stairs, somewhere in the new building learning its particular sounds the way he learns everything, thoroughly and in private.I lie in the dark and listen to the house.It sounds different from the safehouse. Older. The specific sounds of a building that has been standing long enough to have developed opinions about weather and season and the particular way stone settles when the temperature drops before dawn. Not uncomfortable sounds. The sounds of something that has history and is incorporating new inhabitants into it gradually.I get up.---He is in the garden.Not working — the garden is not ready for work y
آخر تحديث: 2026-08-15
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