been on the man who had been killed in the video. That was, if he was actually her brother.
“Alexei,” Maya said. “He has a jagged scar—maybe two inches long?—right here. He was drunk one night when he came home from a party, and I was maybe fourteen. Got pissed at me for something stupid, and chased me out of the house after he punched me in the face. I threw a beer bottle at him and it cut him right here. Was there a scar?”
Kolya’s gaze darted to Konstantin, and the younger of the two brothers shook his head subtly. She could see it on Kolya’s face before he even confirmed what she already believed. No, she hadn’t been the only one—they’d seen it, too.
Or rather, a lack of it.
There was no scar.
“That wasn’t my brother,” Maya said, her voice fainter than ever.
That fear she’d been holding back started to wrap its way tighter around her spine with every passing second. It reached her chest and grabbed hold of her lungs there, too. Squeezing and draining the air right from her body with every little breath she dared to take.
Even as her panic started to swell, she heard Konstantin and Kolya’s voices drifting around her overworked senses.
What did it mean?
Why would they say it was Alexei if it wasn’t?
Her brother terrified her just about as much as Valbon Gashi did, honestly. The only difference between the two—as their cruelty to her was just about matched in all senses—was the fact that one shared her blood, and the other one simply enjoyed spilling it while he made her scream.
“He’s not a vor,” Konstantin said. “He wouldn’t have proper tattoos, if any at all. Nothing to identify him. Maybe he sent someone in pretending to be him—got lucky that the fucker who usually handled business with his father wasn’t there to say it wasn’t actually him, yeah?”
Kolya made a noise under his breath—dark and bitter. “But why? What is the angle there, Konstantin? Why fake his death, or want us to believe he’s dead?”
“Eyes are not on him. He can do … other things.”
“Other things—say it, asshole. You mean—”
“Maya,” Konstantin murmured. “I mean her, yeah. He did put out word on the street after you first took her; she’s his sister and he wanted her back. His way of repaying that debt, I guess, to the Albanians. What if he knew they were going to kill him? Maybe he got word ahead of us, and he’s smarter than we think he is. It wouldn’t be the first time someone outplayed someone else in this business in that kind of way.”
“Could he be the one, then?” Kolya asked.
“Which one?”
“The one that attacked you—the second attack, Konstantin. Would that be possible, do you think?”
“But what’s the angle?”
“I already asked that, no?”
“You had a point, then,” Konstantin countered. “We need to know the angle. At least, for right now, Vadim’s attention will be away from Maya for a bit. How long that is going to last will be anyone’s guess.”
“I did what he wanted—he asks, you tell him that.”
“You tell him.”
“I will, but I’m hoping he doesn’t bother.”
“We need to figure out that angle, and take care of it,” Konstantin murmured.
“You’re saying things I’m already aware of. I need you to talk about things I don’t know, brat.”
“You need an attitude adjustment.”
“Oh, is that what we’re going to call it now?” Kolya asked. “Vadim used to just say I needed the shit beat out of me, and usually did it himself, no? That black belt of his was a particular favorite. I still have scars from that. Those were the good days.”
“Sorry.”
Kolya grunted dismissively under his breath.
Maya was trying to listen to them, and keep up with their conversation, but her fear was saturating everything. She could feel it in her very marrow and taste it on her tongue. It rang in her ears like blood rushing through her veins. Somehow, she was trying to shrink in on herself so that the anxiety lessened even a little bit. A tight ball made it all better—or somewhat.
It was too much.
Too much.
Too fucking much.
“Maya,” Kolya snapped.
Her head jerked up at the same time Kolya darted away from his brother’s side. Sumerki was at her feet barking as loudly as his little snout could yap for a pup his size. He’d put his paws onto her shoes and kept making noise until someone heard.
She only glanced down at Sumerki briefly, and then by the time she looked back