23. ANDREY

Chapter 23

ANDREY

“Again, he was eleven, barely a man,” I point out.

“You know, by the time you’re five in the Bratva, you’ve already started learning discipline, physical training, and loyalty,” Sasha reminds me. “Lev was man enough to rape a girl of eleven.”

“Why didn’t Sergei or my father kill Konstantin?”

“Seriously?” Sasha looks at me in disbelief. “Konstantin is not only Roman Zhukov’s heir, he’s a true Bratva prince with a pure bloodline.”

“Sasha!” Konstantin’s eyes flash with warning, and he shakes his head.

“If my father or your father killed Konstantin, they’d not only be crushed by Roman and the Andreevs but also the Morettis and another prominent Bratva family,” Urie tells me. “My father said that Ivan was just waiting patiently for the day that Andrey and Isabella produced an heir, and then he’d get his kingdom.”

“They also needed to find out where my mother sent that recording and her formulas,” Konstantin tells me. “Your father, Marco, and even Lev have searched for the messenger for eighteen years.”

“Because it incriminated my brother?”

“He said it showed him trashing Karina’s lab and searching for the formula, but it also had him speaking to his father and testing the drug as a truth serum,” Urie tells us. “He nearly killed Ivan that night. He’d pumped so much of that shit into him.”

“So my father was the secret patient?”

“It appears that way,” Konstantin tells me. “He’d been shot.”

“What did he confess to?”

“We don’t know. But we think it was something to do with his involvement in the murder of Matteo, Grigory, and Anatoli,” Konstantin informs me. “When Marco told Lev that your father would be ashamed of him if he could see what he’s doing to us, Lev replied, where do you think I got my idea about the containers from?”

“What was the point of the containers?”

“The containers caused destabilization in the ranks of the crime families that had been hit. While they were arguing in the ranks and scrambling to get the organization back on track, Lev had already swooped in and taken over their trade,” Urie replies. “Lev got the hacker’s parents indebted to him so the kids could get into the back door of the system using his old system code and exploiting that one weakness. While the hackers were routing and sending out containers, they were trying to find your mother’s master file to give him complete access to the Velvet company.”

“We have an idea, now that you and Isabella are married with an heir on the way, Roman has finally agreed to sell back the majority of Velvet Transport to Grace.”

“Fuck!” My eyes widen. “My mother told me they’d sold off that part of Velvet Transport.”

“I think it would be more accurate to say that Roman and Karla took that portion of the company from her,“ Urie tells me.

I give myself a mental shake at that alarming information. So Roman and Karla were holding my mother’s company hostage as well.

“So Lev gave the hackers access through his old systems account. Because we thought he was dead, it would appear that someone inside the company had accessed it. Like Marco or my father,” I guess. “What was the point of Lev going to Russia?”

“To find dirt that he would be able to use against Roman and the Andreevs to hand the organizations over to the law,” Konstantin tells me. “He was also trying to find two ancient plants that are the secret ingredient of the NeuroFamily my mother created.”

“Konstantin and you were set up that night Lev and Stacy were attacked,” Sasha tells me. “Not by Marco or Ivan but…”

“By Lev himself,” Urie says before Sasha can finish. His words floor me. “Lev stole your mother’s phone and contacted Konstantin pretending to be her and worried because she overheard Ivan setting something up to ensure Stacy never had the baby she was carrying.”

“I had told Lev that I was also getting engaged because Valentina was pregnant,” Konstantin adds. “Turns out that Lev had the sniper on the roof specifically for Valentina, to make it seem like Ivan and Marco were trying to finish what they started when I was eleven.”

“Only, I interrupted his plans. I overheard Lev say he was going to talk to you, Andrey, to tell you the good news about him and Stacy. I was going to ambush him when he came out and kill him for what he’d done to my sister.” Urie’s eyes flash angrily. “But before I could attack him, all these other men came out of nowhere and started to attack.”

My eyes narrow on Urie. I’m not quite sure how to feel about this right now. Urie has just admitted to trying to kill my brother—he’s a Pakhan’s brother. I can’t let Urie’s act against my family go unpunished. But my brother had hurt his sister. The iceman steps between Urie and me.

“Your brother shot the love of my life and raped the first love of my life,” Konstantin tells me. “I know, as Pakhan, you need to dish out punishment for crimes against your family, especially when it’s one of your soldiers.” His eyes hold mine. “But I will take Urie, Olga, and Hannah back to Russia with me, and they will be under my protection. Your brother killed your father and bragged to us about it. Rubbing it into my father’s face how he’d never know who’d killed his wife and blaming his son for something I didn’t do.”

“Konstantin is right!” Sasha agrees with him. “Your brother’s crimes are far greater than Urie’s.”

“I will decide when this is all over,” I tell them. “Right now, I need everyone to help me find Isabella and ensure my family is safe.”

“Yes, Andrey,” Urie and Sasha say in unison.

“I’m sorry about your father.” Urie says.

“Thank you, Urie,” I say, not quite sure how to treat my life-long best friend now. I push the problem aside and turn to Konstantin.

“Explain what Lev’s plans were.”

“Your brother had a few backup plans when he realized that my mother had made Roman choose you for Isabella and Pakhan,” Konstantin replied. “According to your great-grandfather’s law, the first Belov sibling to be married and have an heir became Pakhan.”

“Jesus, I thought my father did away with that shit,” I assure him.

“No, your grandfather wouldn’t let him and then Roman and Karla enforced it,” Konstantin corrects me. “Lev chose Stacy because, apparently, she’s as big a psycho as your brother, and the two of them have been fucking since she was a teenager.”

“No way!” My brow furrows. “I’m sure Isabella told you Stacy’s life story, and the two of them have been friends since they were kids—Isabella would’ve known if Stacy was crazy.”

“Stacy has done nothing but use and manipulate Isabella since they were kids.” Konstantin’s voice is laced with anger. “None of the shit that she told us about being abused as a kid by her brother, et cetera, was entirely true.”

“She played everyone,” Urie clarified. “Your brother took great pleasure in telling us everything in detail, then gave us a demonstration of how life was going to treat Isabella after her brats were born. He uh…“ His eyes darken.

“He raped Hannah in front of us and forced Urie and me to watch before beating her unconscious as punishment for what Urie did to him a year ago,” Konstantin tells me. His eyes darken with warning once again as he steps closer to Urie. “So! I won’t let you harm a hair on Urie’s or Hannah’s head.”

Urie’s eyes meet mine, and I can see how haunted they are. What do you say to someone when your brother has just done something as heinous as that to one of their family members?

“Urie, I have no words,” I tell him. “But, I agree with Konstantin. There’s no way I can punish you for that. Especially after what Lev has done to you and my father. It’s my brother that owes your sister.”

“Thank you, Andrey,” Urie says. “I’m going to check on Marco and Hannah.”

“I’ll come with you,” Sasha says, leaving Konstantin and me alone.

“So all this shit was orchestrated by my brother so he can be the Belov Pakhan?”

“No, your brother’s thinking a lot bigger than that. Lev wants the kingdom that your father was envisioning,“ Konstantin answers. “But we’re all in his way. He wants Isabella as she is the bridge to opening up alliances between the most powerful Bratva families in Europe, Canada, and America.” His jaw clenches for a second. “He wants to be the king that would make the Belov organization one of the largest in the world. Lev can then expand operations in Europe, Central, South, and North America.”

“I know you have every right to want to be the one to take my brother’s life…” I have no idea why I’m even trying to plead my brother’s case—Isabella must be rubbing off on me. My heart lurches and anger bubbles thinking about my missing wife. “But is there any way you’d think of some other punishment?”

“No!” Konstantin shakes his head. “My father will take his revenge on your brother and will also pay for helping Ivan kidnap me.”

“Jesus!” I run my hand through my hair and guess my brother’s intentions, “Now Lev is going to try to pin the containers on me so I’ll meet the same fate as our uncle Grigory. Then Lev will swoop in and save Isabella, then trap her until the twins are born.”

“That’s his plan,” Konstantin confirms. “Then he’ll raise your twins he refers to as the brats as his own, keeping them alive purely to secure his throne.”

“Which means I’m next on his hit list,” I guess. “As I’m a contender to his throne and he knows that I’ll never let him take my kids or Isabella.”

“Yes.” Konstantin nods. “Your brother feels loyalty to no one.”

“That’s fucking cold, even for us,” I say and frown. “The only thing I don’t understand is… why did my brother kill his own baby?”

“He didn’t, but there is no time to get into that now,” Konstantin tells me. “What’s important is that your brother had hired men to attack him and make it look like it was Marco and Ivan. He messaged me pretending to be your mother worried about his safety, so I’d save him. He knew that if I thought my father or yours were trying to kill us, I’d take him to Russia to hide him.”

“While he was away he started expanding his territory to make it look like it was us,” I add. “I just don’t understand why he’d kill Valentina?”

Konstantin’s eyes harden with hatred. “Because he knew something I only found out after giving a few pints of my blood to save Lev’s life that night.”

My brow furrows at his words and alarm bells echo through my brain. “That was…”

“Lev and I share a rare blood group.” Konstantin watches me with raised brows as words sink in. “No one in my family has that blood group. I was also supposedly born two months premature.”

My eyes widen as the penny starts to drop for me. “You’re Grigory Belov’s son!” I splutter.

“Your older cousin and the rightful Belov heir,” Konstantin says, his eyes darkening with pain. “Or at least I would’ve been if Valentina had lived.”

“Is that why you hated Marco?” My brows knit together. “Because he didn’t tell you, you were a Belov?”

“No. I started hating Marco when he believed Ivan’s story about me breaking into my mother’s lab and raping Hannah,” Konstantin explained. “Then, when Sergei put me in that container, he made it seem like my father and Ivan had sold me.”

“So your threat you pinned to Marco’s wall that you came to get back what your father stole? What was the Belov legacy?”

“No. It was mine and my sister’s freedom,” Konstantin says bitterly.

“The I live you carved into my father’s arm?”

“A message from someone from your father’s past.” Konstantin’s eyes become hooded. “Now, are we going to stand here gasbagging the whole day or go find my sister and your fucking psycho brother?”