Chapter 23: Thursday mid-morning: What the hell?

It had been days since I had reluctantly led Sonia back to the house after our wonderful morning together, and my nerves were on a knife edge from sexual frustration. We’d only managed to steal a few minutes together since, and the quick kiss we’d shared hadn’t been nearly enough to even take the edge off.

Plus, I had been kept so bloody busy that I hadn’t yet had a chance to call our uncle Maxim. However, I vowed that as soon as Friday was done and dusted, I would. Being separated from Sonia was killing me, and it was getting harder and harder not to let my feelings for her show.

I had managed to speak to my mum and brother and was surprised to hear that they had always suspected there was something special between us. Both of them were pleased, and it was good to know we had another few converts on our side. The more people we got to accept us, the more help we would have to convince the guys. It wasn’t going to be easy, but I’d begun to believe that it was going to be possible after all.

I nodded to myself. Yeah, I could convince Sonia’s brothers that I was the right guy for her. I just needed to make sure I did that before they killed me. I grimaced. Why the fuck did our relationship have to be such a bloody problem?

Rubbing at my forehead to loosen the tension, I sighed heavily. It really shouldn’t be; after all, our family loved us both, so surely they would eventually come around. My stomach churned. I hated waiting. I wanted to deal with things now. I had been reluctant to start a relationship with Sonia, but now I was all in, and I wanted my relationship with Sonia out in the open so we could finally be together properly.

Unfortunately, right now was not the time to tackle the subject with the guys. We couldn’t afford any upset or distractions with a war coming.

It wouldn’t be long now, I reminded myself. Just another couple of days or so, and I’d have another chance to be with Sonia again properly. Then, I would focus on dealing with the fallout the revelation about our relationship would cause.

For now, I just needed to see her. I couldn’t wait a second longer. My head was messed up, distracted by my longing. I was like an addict needing a fix, and the only cure was another moment or two alone with my Little Miss Trouble. So, I went in search of her intent on stealing another kiss from her luscious lips to tide me over and help me function until I could devour her thoroughly like my body and mind begged me to do.

Scrubbing the back of my neck, I headed up to her room. It was a risk, but at this point, I didn’t really care. I’d make up some excuse for being there if I had to.

It had been a bloody long week so far, and I was exhausted. I couldn’t wait for it all to be over—the sooner, the better.

As Miki and Glowacki had planned, we had begun our pretend attacks against each other on Monday night and put on such a good show for our enemies that it seemed that the Malia Boys and Broxys really did think that our alliance with Glowacki was breaking down.

It had started with me taking a few of our most loyal and trustworthy men over to one of Glowacki’s underground gambling dens. We had arranged it so his men would be wearing vests, and we shot them with blanks, seemingly killing a few. Glowacki’s clean-up crew then removed their “dead” bodies, which was normal practice to avoid police scrutiny, and the guys playing dead were then taken to hide out in some abandoned buildings near the farm.

Later that night, Dariusz had Glowacki’s men stage a pretend retaliation, and some of our own men were then able to be hidden away, so it continued throughout the week. We now had a good number of men from both sides hiding out, ready to surprise our enemies when they attacked us on Friday. Of course, these attacks had also allowed us to get rid of most of the traitors on both sides without our enemies becoming aware that the traitors had been discovered. So, basically, everything was going according to Miki and Glowacki’s plan, and so far, it had all gone smoothly. I just hoped that continued to be the case.

The remaining traitors would be dealt with during the attacks. That included Ivor. He was still strutting around our home, acting like a loyal soldier, smiling and flirting with my woman, making goo-goo eyes at her every chance he got when, in fact, he was working with our enemies to destroy us. I fisted my hands at the thought of the traitorous bastard. My palms itched to wring his bloody neck or shoot the fucker in the face for even daring to look at Sonia, never mind flirting with her.

Sucking in a deep breath, I let it out slowly as I approached Sonia’s door, not wanting my murderous thoughts to interfere with what little time we might have together. He’d get what was coming to him soon enough. They all would.

Just like Petrov had. It might have taken us years to end him, but he was gone now. I was happy to plunge my knife into the rapist bastard’s thigh and make him suffer after what he did to Krissa. We’d all taken our turn cutting him up, including Glowacki, Dariusz and Daniel, but we didn’t linger over the torture the way I’d always thought we would. Once we had got all of the information out of him we could get, we quickly slit his throat. We could have kept him alive and tortured him for days if we had wanted to, but with the current situation, we didn’t feel inclined to prolong our revenge. It just hadn’t seemed as important anymore.

It had been quite a shock when Miki agreed to let Glowacki and his sons come to the C to take part in Petrov’s death. He’d also divulged the location of our lab to them. It concerned me that Miki had yet to tell the rest of us why. Miki’s visits to Glowacki’s home recently, when he went in alone, were unusual, and it all had me worried. Miki was up to something, and I didn’t like not knowing what.

Frowning, I raised my hand to knock when the door opened. Little Miss Trouble’s face went from shocked surprise to elation as she grabbed my hand and hauled me inside.

As soon as the door closed, she leapt into my arms, kissing me like a woman possessed. The second our lips met, all the tension I’d been carrying around for the last few days melted away. This was what I needed. She was what I needed.

My body zinged with renewed energy as we kissed and touched, exploring each other with our hands, mouths, and tongues, but all too soon, I had to pull away. My cock was rock hard, and my heart thudded in my chest. I longed to finally sink deep inside her, but a kiss was all there was time for, so I broke our kiss and took a step back from her, forcing my hands to release their hold on her body.

“God, I missed you, babe. I couldn’t wait any longer to see you,” I told her as my eyes roamed her body, taking in every inch of her as if for the last time.

“I missed you too, Romi. So much. I can’t wait until we can be together properly,” she said, and my heart soared.

Unable to stop myself from having one last taste, I fisted her hair and dragged her mouth back to mine. By the time I broke the kiss again, we were breathless and grinning happily like a couple of lovestruck teenagers.

“I need to go, babe,” I told her.

She nodded and rushed forward to hug me tightly. I hugged her back and then reluctantly stepped out of her embrace again.

We slipped out of her bedroom and walked along the hall, stopping at the top of the stairs.

“Where are you off to?” I asked her, not yet willing to leave her side.

“I’m meeting Marta and Gracie in the library to talk about books and compare book boyfriends,” she said, grinning and wiggling her eyebrows mischievously.

I chuckled at her nonsense, but I must admit I also felt a bit jealous.

“Of course, none of them can compare to my very own Mr Sexy Abs,” she said, running her hands up and down my torso seductively.

Hot Damn! I so want to get naked with her right now.

Shaking my head, I quickly shut down that thought and pulled away again. I needed to get to Miki’s office, as he’d texted me to come see him just before I’d gone looking for my kiss, and I’d kept him waiting long enough.

“Well, Little Miss Trouble, please try to stay out of trouble, and I will see you later!” I said, and she giggled before turning and presenting her back to me. She winked over her shoulder and sauntered off with an exaggerated wiggle.

I stood rooted to the spot, unable to take my eyes off her retreating figure and that luscious backside that I was definitely going to have to spank sometime soon.

When she retreated into the library after blowing me a cheeky kiss, I smirked and finally forced my feet to move in the opposite direction, down the stairs, and towards Miki’s office.

“Come in,” Miki called at the sound of my knock.

“Romi, as discussed, you will be overseeing things here with Dariusz and Anton once you return from the pretend retaliation attack tomorrow night. Make sure you pick up Derrick and bring him back with you, too, in case we need a medic here. Dariusz will be part of the family soon, so I want you to watch his back and keep him safe,” he stated matter-of-factly as soon as I took a seat.

“What?” I asked quietly, shock making me unable to comprehend what he’d just said.

Narrowing his eyes, he looked at me intensely as if assessing me.

“Sonia and Dariusz are to be married. It has been agreed between Glowacki and myself so that our alliance can be strengthened,” he stated, watching me closely.

“What the hell? No! Absolutely not!” I shouted.

He froze, staring at me.

The room suddenly felt too small, as if the walls were closing in on me.

This couldn’t be happening. My breaths became shallow, and I shook with suppressed anger.

I felt sick as bile rose in my throat, and my stomach threatened to lose its breakfast.

Despite being forced to sneak about, unable to declare my feelings for Sonia, I’d been on a high all week now that high had come crashing down.

“I am aware of how close you and Sonia are,” Miki said, “but this is necessary, and I have made my decision. I will be telling her soon, and when I do, she will understand that this is required to ensure that the Bratva and Polish Mafia continue a strong relationship. We each have enemies, and we need to ensure the safety of both families. Our alliance helps us achieve that,” he told me as if it was all settled.

Shit!

“She won’t agree to this! You can’t just do this!” I cried.

What the hell was I going to do?

“It is done!” he said firmly, leaning back in his chair and narrowing his eyes at me again.

Shit, shit, shit! This was all my fault. I should have told Miki of my feelings for Sonia the minute I had accepted that our love was real and we belonged together and dealt with the consequences instead of procrastinating. I had wanted to make things easier on all of us and had been waiting for the right time, but while I was waiting, my woman was being signed over to another man like some sort of commodity. How the fuck could I have been so stupid? I should never have waited. I’d thought we’d had enough problems stacked up against us, but now we had a bloody arranged marriage to contend with.

“Surely Ash and Marko don’t agree?” I asked, unable to believe for a second that they would have condoned this.

“They will because their Pakhan has entered into an agreement, and it can’t be broken,” he stated in an obvious warning,

Fuck! I’d only just finally accepted my love for Sonia and her love for me. We were meant to be together. I couldn’t lose her now. My stomach churned and sweat broke out all over my body.

“Miki, this is not right. You can’t force Sonia to marry against her will,” I stated incredulously.

“You don’t want her to be unhappy, do you?” I asked, trying to appeal to his brotherly instincts instead of his Pakhan ones.

“Dariusz is a good man. I’m sure he will do everything he can to make her happy,” Miki said firmly, annoyance and anger lacing his voice.

No fucking way! I surged to my feet. No other man would make her happy but me!

Seething with rage, my body was poised for a fight, my fists clenched tightly at my sides; I desperately held myself back from leaping over the desk and punching the hell out of Miki.

Calm down! I pleaded with myself, running my hands through my hair in frustration. Attacking Miki wouldn’t help my case. I needed to think things through.

“You have work to do; I suggest you go do it!” Miki said with barely contained anger, dismissing me.

Fuck him! I stormed out of his office, slamming the door behind me. The crashing sound of something falling off the wall gave me a tiny bit of satisfaction as I rushed straight for the front door. I needed to put some distance between us, or I might end up returning to beat the crap out of my pakhan, and that would definitely land me in even more trouble than I was in and certainly wouldn’t do anything to change his mind.

Climbing into my car, I drove along the driveway and out of the gates like a bat out of hell. I sped along the country roads like a man with a death wish, only coming to my senses when I stupidly overtook another vehicle and just barely missed an oncoming truck. Swerving out of the way just in time, I gulped at the close call.

What the hell was I doing? Acting like an idiot and getting myself killed was hardly the way to deal with this situation.

Slowing down, I pulled into a layby, turned the engine off and jumped out. I dragged big heaving breaths of country air into my lungs, determined to calm the fuck down and make some plans.

My instincts were like those of a caveman. I wanted to go back home, throw Sonia over my shoulder, and run off with her right now, but I knew I couldn’t do that—not yet, anyway.

I needed to be rational right now. We were about to have a huge battle on our hands. If I ran with Sonia now, it would jeopardise all of our plans, which could be disastrous. I didn’t want any of our family or men to be killed because I was selfish. I might be spitting mad at him right now, but Miki needed me, and I couldn’t let him, the rest of our family, or Brotherhood down.

Still, I had to do something.

Huffing heavily, I sat on the bonnet of the car with my head in my hands. Sonia was going to have a fit when she found out, and I needed to figure things out before then. It was going to be hard to change Miki’s mind, but I had to try to stop this situation before it got to the point of no return—if it hadn’t already. But how?

Uncle Maxim! If anyone could help us, it was him. I just hoped he could.

As I placed the call, I tapped my leg anxiously, too pent up and worried to sit still.

“Romi, my boy, how are you?” Uncle Maxim asked.

“Not so good!” I told him truthfully.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, and the genuine concern in his voice was all it took.

Confessing everything, I told him that I was in love with Sonia, and she was in love with me, but now Miki had entered into an arranged marriage contract with Glowacki for her to marry his son, screwing things up for us.

When I had finally finished, I was breathing heavily again, pacing in front of the car, and clenching and unclenching my fists in anger.

“Can you help?” I asked him, holding my breath.

“Son, I wish you had called me sooner,” he sighed heavily.

“I would have given you my blessing and spoken to the boys and Miki for you, but I can’t really interfere now.”

Shit.

“Miki told me about his plans to safeguard the Estate and lab on Friday. He also told me about the arrangement Glowacki instigated regarding his son marrying Sonia, and I agreed. I didn’t know about your feelings for each other at that time, or I wouldn’t have,” he continued.

I felt like a bloody fool. This was my fault. I should have contacted our dyadya days ago. If I had, this might not be happening now.

I scrubbed the back of my neck and listened as he talked.

“An agreement of this kind will have been shaken upon, and that is something that cannot be easily broken; if Miki tries to break it, there could be a great deal of trouble.”

He was quiet for a minute.

“Miki has exposed some of our biggest secrets to Glowacki due to this deal, and if Glowacki gets mad, he could cause us all a lot of difficulty, and the alliance would indeed be broken. If you go up against him, you risk losing everything and becoming an outcast. You could end up being hunted down and killed because you have gone against your Pakhan. Miki would have to punish you regardless of how he felt about that. Also, if you were to take Sonia with you, she would have to spend her life on the run, too.”

He tutted and huffed out a breath, obviously mulling things over.

“This is a bad situation, Romi; let me think on it and see if I can come up with an alternative arrangement we can make Glowacki instead of this marriage,” he said, but he didn’t sound too hopeful.

“Get through the battles ahead first, and then we will talk again. Don’t do anything stupid in the meantime, okay?”

He sounded weary as if the weight of the world was on his shoulders, and I knew exactly how he felt.

“Fine. I’ll wait until this bloody war is over. I’d planned on doing that anyway, but I won’t be able to wait forever,” I warned.

“I’ll see what I can do, Romi,” he promised before hanging up.

A couple of hours passed while I sat there wracking my brain for ideas on how to get Miki to change his mind, but I couldn’t come up with any viable alternatives. It was bloody frustrating.

Checking my watch, I saw how late it was getting. I had stuff to do.

I headed back to the Estate feeling dejected but determined to get through the next couple of days and then talk with Uncle Maxim again. I had to believe he would have some good news for me by then. There had to be a way out of this agreement. We just had to find it.