Maksim: A Dark Mafia Romance (Akimov Bratva) by Nicole Fox (read aloud .TXT) 📕

father falls, headfirst, onto the table. Like a pin being pulled from a bomb, the reaction is instant. My father’s men yank out their guns while I see motion in my periphery as Maksim’s men rush to shoot first.

As the first bullets tear through the air, I feel a hand on my arm, tugging me down. In my hyperfocus, I think it’s my father, but as the person pulls me behind them, I know it’s not because I can see my father standing on my other side.

It’s Maksim.

He keeps his Glock raised. I flinch as he pulls the trigger at one of my father’s men who is aiming at him. He keeps his arm outstretched behind him, his hand gripping my arm as he steers me away from the center of the fight.

As we reach the dance floor, I notice the pandemonium down here. The other patrons are all trying to run out. They’re shoving each other, trampling each other, willing to do anything to get out of one of the two exits. Maksim shoves me in front of him, but he keeps his hand on my shoulder, keeping me close enough that people collide against him or both of us instead of just me. I reach back, gripping onto his suit jacket to keep my balance.

As we pass by the bar, I see people hiding behind it. One side of my brain is screaming to help them while the other side knows there’s nothing I can do. It’s a helplessness that feels pathetically familiar.

The stampede of people gets worse the closer we get to the doors. I’ve lost track of my father amongst the people. Maksim pushes me to the left to avoid a couple of people who have fallen to the floor. As I look back at him, he’s looking back at the gunfight. There’s a yearning in his face. I’ve become familiar enough with him and read enough about the Bratva’s reign to know that it isn’t in his nature to run from a fight.

We manage to get outside. I take in a deep breath, the air feeling bitterly cold yet soothing after the claustrophobic heat inside. Maksim continues pulling me away from the nightclub.

I follow his lead, and we run.

12

Cassandra

When Maksim drives us away from the nightclub, his grip tightens as we pass by several police cars, their sirens blaring. His eyes flit back and forth between the road in front of us and the rearview mirror.

He doesn’t know if any of his men have died. He doesn’t know if they’re going to get arrested.

I grip my seat belt, twisting it in my hand. I keep glancing at Maksim. His suit is spattered with blood. As we drive under a streetlamp, I can see smears and drops of blood along his neck and jaw, too.

“Your father will be fine,” Maksim says. “His men will protect him and my men know that I want him alive right now.”

“Oh,” I say. “Right. I know. I just—you set that up, didn’t you? We didn’t happen to be in that club at the same time as my father. You knew he was going to be there.”

“I knew he was going to be there,” he confirms. “I didn’t know that Gennady was going to go off the rails. We lost an important member of the Bratva. Gennady has a hard time controlling himself. He’ll be dealt with later—if he’s still alive.”

“Why did you want to be in the same club as my father if it wasn’t to kill him?” I ask. He checks his phone with his left hand before putting it back on the steering wheel. He doesn’t answer.

I don’t know why I felt compelled to ask—maybe an investigative journalist’s habit. But the answer has felt evident since he forced this fucked-up deal on me—he wanted to show my father that he has me in his web, that all my father’s power is meaningless as long as Maksim has control over me.

I should be more concerned about my father. Maksim could be lying. There could be another volatile Bratva member. There could be a stray bullet. My father could be arrested. He could be killed as he’s being taken to a police car.

A million scenarios could end with my father in a morgue, but as Maksim drives through the city, all I can think about is how Maksim abandoned his men, forfeited his bloodthirst, and left the fate of my father in the crossfire—a man he’d clearly been plotting revenge against for a long time and felt an immeasurable amount of hatred for.

And the only reason I can see for why he’d do that… is me.

When we step toward Maksim’s mansion, the motion lights outside flash on. Maksim moves toward me, his eyes focused on my dress. He reaches under the hem, peeling the material away from my skin.

As I look down in surprise, I see what he saw. Blood is spattered all over the dress. In the fog of my memory, I remember hearing the gunshots and grunts during the shooting, but for the most part, my mind erased people being shot around me. It must have happened before Maksim reached me.

“Do you feel pain anywhere?” he asks. “I thought I would have seen you get shot, but it’s possible I missed it and the adrenaline is numbing you.”

I run my hands over my body, checking for any pain.

“No. No, I don’t think so,” I say.

“Come in.” He moves toward the doors. “We need to burn our clothes before the police get here. We can check for injuries afterward.”

Inside the mansion, it feels like we’re escaped felons. Maksim strips off his clothes as soon as the door closes behind him. Shirtless, he goes into the lounge. I watch the muscles in his back ripple as he stacks logs in the fireplace. After he leans the pieces of kindling against each other to form a teepee, he strikes a match and lights the fire.

He steps back,