Chapter 3

Vera

I sat in the corner of the coffee shop Katya and I used to come to when we liked to imagine what it would mean to not be a member of the bratva. To have normal teenage problems and live in a normal world. To be free to have boyfriends,so it doesn’t come as a surprise when I drift to my imaginations as soon as I settle into our spot to wait for Katya.

What surprises me is who the sudden object of my imagination is.

I could have left my dream world alone with thoughts of a faceless man, granted the new man is still faceless, but now he has height, an eye colour, a hand texture. I remember the feel of his arms on my waist and feel a small thrill travel up my spine. I wish he wasn’t so secretive to have had his face covered. I’d have really loved to see his face.

My thoughts drift to my upcoming marriage, while I would love to say that I was unaffected by the fact that it was drawing nearer and I still didn’t know anything about my soon to be husband, I was five seconds from running away from the Russian mafia. Maybe I still could, living with the fear that I could be caught at a time certainly couldn’t be worse than marrying a Bardini. But nobody ever left the bratva and lived to tell the story, except my mother apparently.

I had gone on a little hunting mission trying to find out anything about the man I’m marrying but I hear nothing but terrible things that he has done in his time as Capo. Granted, it’s always because of something foolish that was done by people who needed to be taught a lesson, it was a little extreme. I heard that he once plucked out both of a man’s eyes and had him castrated, sent the parts to his wife with a note that she should keep her husband away from his mother because he hadn’t liked how he looked at his mum. What was worse was that he made sure the man lived and word spread round that he no longer could procreate or see, not that anyone needed to be told the second half. He committed suicide the week after.

I am pulled out of my thoughts when I hear Katya call out my name. I notice something is wrong when I smile at her and she just turns up her lips. She looks around fidgeting and I notice a bruise on her hand as she reaches out for the coffee I had ordered for her a while ago.

“What happened to you?” I say reaching for her hand. Setting the cup down back she flinches when I touch her.

“Can we leave this place?” It is clear that she is no longer comfortable here and I wonder why our best moments were here.

“Did something happen? Is someone chasing you?” I ask worry clouding my thoughts. If anyone thought they could hurt Katya I was going to find a way to kill them.

“Not now Vera. We need to leave.” I rise to my feet and lead her towards my car. My instincts shifted to protect my cousin.

“Are you being followed?” I ask as we get into the car. She nods, tears gathering in her eyes. “Fuck. I need to lose them, get your seatbelt on.”

As soon as I see that she is strapped in, I notice a man in a suit approaching us. “Go, he’s one of them.” She says and I step on the gas.

My mind races with thoughts of what could have happened that would make anyone decide that Katya did something so wrong that she needed to be chased. I drive faster knowing that once I am in the comfort of the walls of my house we will both be safe.

The entire drive home I don’t speak, wanting Katya to gather herself however she could before she tells me what on earth was going on. As I enter the gate of the house at full speed my guards still on my tail everyone rises to high alert. The security detail of the house intensifies as my head guard, Arturo, approaches me.

Stepping down from the car I faced him “We were being followed.”

“Yes, we spotted the men, Bogdan is on their tail. We will find out who they were soon.”

“That won’t be necessary.” Katya interrupts. “They were Boris’s men.” Boris was not someone I could hurt. I flinched when I finally processed her words. That didn’t answer any questions, it just made me start wondering why on earth were we running from her husband’s men.

I get my answers when we walk into my room. I turn to face her, as she slides to the floor with her back against the door.

“He hurts me Katya.” She pauses, her voice breaking. “I can’t do it anymore.” She cries the pain in the sound she makes wringing my heart till I almost feel her pain as though it’s my own, only I know I did not know half of what she has gone through. Her tears keep falling and I only realise that I joined her too when a single drop of mine lands on the cold hard floor.

I sit with her and hold her because I know there’s not much else I can actually do.

“It started two weeks into our marriage. I think he was holding out hoping that I’d want to be intimate with him soon. Those were the most peaceful weeks of my marriage.”

I am stunned. Boris had always come off like he was head over heels for her and he’d never let anything hurt her. “It's been three years, Katya.”

“Three very long years. I’m so glad I don’t have to see his face again.” I don’t say anything to that, we both knew marriages in the bratva didn’t end that easily, especially ones that were ordered by the Pakan.

She starts crying again and I wish there was a way for me to erase everything that had ever hurt her. “I’m sorry I am laying this all on you, I didn’t want anyone to worry about me. I should have just kept enduring it.” Her eyes fall to the ground. But I raise her head back to look at me. When I see her eyes I wonder what she had gone through. A mixture of the shame and disappointment that she feels in herself brimming from her eyes.

“Don’t you dare say that, whenever you need me I want you to come to me. I will always be here for you.” I wrap my arms around her and we stay there for a long time.

A shower, a lengthy explanation to my dad and a crying Aunt Sofia later, night settled, we sat on my bed together under the covers reminiscing on old times.

“You know maybe I should have married Marcus when he asked.”

I laugh at that “You said, and I quote, he doesn’t look like a man.” imitating her voice as best as I can.

“That was because his hands were always sweaty and he didn’t seem confident in anything he did.”

“Yeah, at least I’d get to live vicariously through you.” She laughs lightly. “Whatever you do, don't have an arranged marriage.”

I'm still at that, how was I meant to tell her that since this entire ordeal started I had been hoping that the man I had to marry is not anything like Boris? That I was shaking with fear and a part of me was desperately hoping she’d stop talking about what she went through so that the fear I am feeling does not make me explode?

“You are already betrothed aren’t you?” Katya had always been able to see through me, she had watched me grow, I don’t know how I thought I could have hidden it from her.

I nod because I did not know how else to let her know that I was so scared for myself.

“Who is it?”

“Nikolai Bardini.” Katya’s eyes widened in shock before muttering a series of curse words under her breath.

“Boris has reasons why he’s the way he is. I always thought he treated me the way he did because he loved me, and in his own way, he did.” Katya begins. “Russian men are very protective of their women, he’d not hurt you or let anything happen to you.” But there’s uncertainty in her voice. She’s not sure and neither am I.

I remember the rumour I heard about what Nikolai did to a man that looked at his mother the wrong way, and I wonder if he’d be like that to me too. Protect me even from himself. I also hope that he’d be powerful enough to completely annul Katya’s marriage because the bubble we were both living in was going to burst.

Soon.