Kostya: A Dark Mafia Romance (Zinon Bratva) by Nicole Fox (my reading book .TXT) 📕

you ask me a question?” I hate that I sound petulant and I hate that she can make me that way, but I wash my hands and pop open the door. I want to ask her why she’s the only one who gets to lament her bad day, who is allowed to spread her bad mood around, because I’ve had a day worthy of bursting into some melancholy country song about my sad lot in life, but I smile instead as Lila walks in and Mom turns.

“Hey, Mom.”

I expect a cry of happiness or a squeal of joy since bringing Lila home was important enough to risk blackmailing a Russian mobster. This has been the culmination of a years-long quest to see the prodigal daughter darken her doorstep once more. At the very least, I thought she’d look happy.

But she just scoffs. “Kostya Zinon comes through again.”

I don’t remind her that she didn’t leave him a choice.

Mom stares at Lila. She is still barely inside the house. Close enough to the door for a fast break should the situation call for it. Not that we aren’t already careening toward a Mom-meltdown—the quivering lip and shifty eyes are a dead giveaway. If I don’t do something to stop her, Lila is going to leap from the frying pan directly into a Mom-sized inferno.

The tension thickens the air so much that I’m conscious of the effort behind every breath. Lila moves toward the door and Mom’s teary eyes dry up.

There’s nothing surprising in what’s happening. She’s flipped her switch—the one I’ve learned to tiptoe around, but Lila’s been gone so long she’s forgotten the dance. The stress of this is churning in my stomach along with a gallon or so of bile. Part of me wants to stick around and hear Lila deal with Mom, but the churning is now full-on, gut-wrenching turbulence.

Lila’s on her own. I slam the bathroom door shut and lunge for the toilet.

I haven’t eaten, but hours of building acid violently erupt before I can breathe normally and rinse my mouth. This sustained nausea has been weird. I’m not usually a stress puker, and if I didn’t know better …

Oh shit.

I pull out my phone and check my app because I don’t trust the accuracy of my memory.

Oh shit. Oh shit. Oh shit.

Nine days late. Unemployed and nine days late. Unemployed, nine days late, and possibly … pregnant—oh shit—with a Russian Mafia boss’ child. Oh shit.

I fold my hands in front of my face and offer up a prayer that the app has gone wonky and needs a software update. I turn my phone off and back on.

Nope. Works like a charm.

I can’t deny the truth, staring at me from my phone in a charming pink font.

It takes ten deep breaths and a few “oh God” mantras before I can pull it together enough to walk out and face them in the kitchen.

Neither of them looks at me, and it’s a good thing, too, because while I was quite content to stand in front of the mirror and pray, I didn’t pay much attention to how disheveled I probably look. But they’re too busy glaring at each other to notice me.

“I had to leave, Mom. You were suffocating me.”

“That’s funny. Your sister never complains about how much I love her. How much I do for her. How I made sure her boss never fired her.”

My head jerks up. “He fired me today, Mom, because you blackmailed him into finding Lila.”

She smiles broadly as if she’s just solved global warming, goes to the drawer where she keeps the kitchen towels, yanks it open, then pulls an envelope from underneath the pile of cloths. She shakes it at me. “Then I’ll just remind him who he’s dealing with. The Lowe women aren’t about to be taken advantage of, even by a mighty Bratva boss.”

I glance at Lila whose eyes widen as her mouth drops open. Oh shit.

Mom’s logic has cost me enough already, but more than that … how did I miss another letter? “Are you out of your mind? Haven’t you done enough?” I reach for the envelope, but she jerks it away and moves around the table.

“We need that money, Charlotte. I won’t let him fire you.” Her eyes brighten as she stares at me. “Or better, he can pay for us to move closer to Lila.” She nods again and licks her lips feverishly.

I want to cry. To stamp my feet and make her listen to reason, but while these are tricks she employs with moderate regularity, her own medicine won’t work on her. “Mom, I swear to God, I will walk out of here and you will never see me again if you don’t give me that letter right now.”

Her voice is thin, mean. “But then where will you live?”

She has a valid point. I gave up my apartment to move in with Kostya and Tiana, but no way in hell am I going to live with Mom. Especially if she plans to continue blackmailing Kostya. Not because I’m afraid of what he’ll do, but because a little part of me loves him and doesn’t want her to force his hand, to make him banish me from his life forever.

Even if he hasn’t already.

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll figure it out; I’m a grown woman. What is wrong with you?” Her eyes narrow as I shake my head. “All my life, I’ve tried to be a good daughter, to stand by you and excuse you when you acted erratic or unreasonable, when you showed up at school in your pajamas when I got hurt—”

“I wanted to get there quickly.”

“In a teddy and a silk robe?” Not the proudest day of my fifth-grade career. “I let it go when you asked my high school prom date”—Jack Rosado, proud owner of a 1993 Mustang GT and quite possibly the world’s worst goatee—“if he’d ever considered dating older women. I didn’t hate you when you poured a glass of wine