Fractured Ties by Bethany-Kris Page 0,21
had that once before he’d died of lung cancer, and he’d laughed when she asked what it meant. Don’t ever try to run, girl, and you won’t have to learn. Her brother clarified later: it was designated to a man who was hard to get away from.
On his pointer finger, a dot inside a circle.
That one didn’t make sense to her.
“You’re not an orphan,” Maya said quietly. “You have a brother.”
She didn’t miss how Kolya’s fingers twitched—a sure sign he understood what she was referring to, and maybe that her forwardness had taken him off guard.
“And a sister,” Kolya muttered, “as fucking annoying as she is.”
“Why the orphan ring, then?”
“I’m not an orphan, but I do rely only on myself,” Kolya replied, “and it works both ways.”
“You’re missing some rings, aren’t you?”
“Or I haven’t earned them yet,” he countered easily. “Or maybe there’s some I don’t want at all.”
“You didn’t seem to have a problem with the ones you have.”
Kolya chuckled dryly. “They fit me.”
How would she know?
“Which ones don’t you want, then?”
She could tell just by the way Kolya’s brow dipped and his smirk melted away, that he wasn’t comfortable with that question. Still, he surprised her by answering.
“Ones my father would like for me to wear … eventually,” he said.
“I don’t understand.”
Kolya’s gaze drifted to her, but just as fast, moved back to the road in front of them. “You don’t even realize who you’re sitting beside, do you?”
Sure, she did.
A vor.
A criminal.
Killer.
A man.
Kolya.
“You,” Maya said.
Kolya nodded. “I am a Boykov man—like your father was, too.”
“The tattoos are a good indication.”
“The difference between the two of us is the fact I actually own the Boykov surname, and he only had the privilege of working under it, Maya.”
It took her a second.
And then two.
“Boykov.”
Kolya tipped his head subtly. “Keep going.”
“You’re a Boykov son.”
“The oldest, Maya. Favored. Context is important.”
How had she not realized that?
All of this suddenly made a lot more sense to her—why he had taken her like he could under his demand, and not to someone else; why his authority climbed higher than the others around him; why he had been there to do the job he had in the first damn place.
Funnily enough …
She still didn’t know what to do about it.
Or him, for that matter.
Kolya made the sign of a large cross on his chest, murmuring, “Besides, my father already put one mark on me that effectively placed me where he felt I should go—that’s enough without having to add more for him, yes?”
She had no idea what he was talking about.
None at all.
• • •
Maya only got a peek at the front of the brown Wicker Park townhouse before Kolya’s Hummer made a sharp right turn, and disappeared into the opening garage leading into a below-ground port. He said nothing as he parked the vehicle and turned the engine off. He scooped up Sumerki, and the sleepy dog blinked its big yellow eyes and took in his new surroundings while Kolya exited the truck.
“Do you need me to lift you down?” he asked.
Maya shook her head, amused. “I think I have it.”
“Your broken ankle.”
And there he went again. Like a fucking light switch flicking on or off, his moods and words were just as quick to be kind … or not.
Asshole.
“Don’t be rude,” Maya mumbled, climbing out of the Hummer. Jumping was more like it, really, but she wasn’t going to give Kolya that satisfaction. “You did take me tonight, and won’t even tell me what you’re going to do with me because, apparently, I don’t get the right to know. If you’re going to do those kinds of things, and not be an asshole all of the time, the least you could do is not give me whiplash, you know?”
Kolya rounded the back of the vehicle with a furrowed brow and a slightly more alert Sumerki hanging over his thick arm. “Was it?”
Maya brushed her hands on her blouse. “What?”
“Rude?”
She stood straighter and eyed Kolya. He seemed genuinely confused, and she didn’t know whether to laugh, or feel bad for him. “You’re not very kind to people, are you?”
“Should I be?”
“I would think so.”
Or rather, when the time called for it. It would probably do him wonders.
Kolya arched one dark brow. “Being this way gets me better results, yes?”
“Not with me,” Maya mumbled.
Kolya was quiet for a moment.
She didn’t even meet his gaze.
“Noted,” he finally said. “I’m sure you’re tired.”
To say the least.
“Today was a lot to take in,” she admitted.
“There’s two bedrooms