Gilded Cage: A Russian Mafia Romance (Kovalyov Bratva Book 1) by Nicole Fox (best books for 20 year olds .txt) 📕

he pulls a knife out of nowhere and stabs me in the chest.

I scream, so long and loud that I nearly shred my own eardrums. Cesar lets his hand fall, but he leaves the knife buried in me.

Then he too turns and leaves.

It’s just Papa and me now. He’s staring down at me. His mask is off—there’s no hiding the bubbling malice in his brown eyes.

He despises me.

Or maybe something worse, actually.

Maybe he just doesn’t care about me at all.

“Papa, please, no—”

But he’s already doing it. Already plucking a knife from his hip and plunging it into my thigh.

I scream again. My throat is raw from it.

Papa is leaving. He doesn’t look back.

I don’t know how long I sit there with a waterfall of tears pouring down my cheeks. Seconds or centuries—I can’t be sure.

But some eternity later, one more man comes forth.

Artem.

He looms over me, eyes dark and stormy. I know deep in my bones that this is it. He’s going to finish what the others started.

“You lied to me, darling,” he whispers.

“No,” I gasp. “My baby… Our baby…”

Panic rises in my chest. My heartbeat is hammering against my ribs. I try to move away, to run, but I’m trapped in this chair. Strapped down. Can’t move.

And I realize suddenly that I can’t scream anymore, either. It’s like I’m underwater—I open my mouth but no sound comes out.

I’m drowning in this darkness, in these shadows, and Artem comes closer and closer, and that knife of his touches the soft curve of my throat and there’s nowhere to run, nowhere to hide, no one to help because my husband killed the only other man who ever tried to protect me and if I don’t have one or the other of them than I don’t have anyone and so all I can do is scream and scream and scream as Artem takes one final look in my eyes and then he tugs his jagged knife across my throat.

Blood spurts.

Artem laughs.

And everything turns to darkness.

42

Esme

I sense voices all around me. Some calm, others panicked.

I hear the shuffling of feet and the beeping of monitors.

I feel whispers at my ear and warm breath on my cheek.

I try to open my eyes, but my eyelids are impossibly heavy. It takes all my effort just to lift them a tiny crack.

I manage to catch quick, blurred glimpses of white walls. Bright fluorescent lighting. Snatches of rushed, whispered conversations.

“… she’s stable… so is the baby…”

“She’ll wake up when she’s ready…”

The echoes of Artem’s voice from my nightmare are still ringing in my head.

Wait, no.

That’s not the nightmare.

That’s the living, breathing man.

“I’ll be back,” he says.

He’s here, in this room with me—wherever this is.

I open my eyes a tiny bit again and catch sight of his shoes across the room.

A scream rises up at the back of my throat, but I swallow it down. My brother’s murderer is standing just a few feet away.

I want to curse him. Spit in his face. Cause him just a fraction of the pain he’s caused me.

I let my eyes fall closed before anyone notices I’m awake.

I hear more murmured voices. The shuffle of movement.

He’s leaving.

A door on the far side of the room opens. I risk a peek. It’s a little easier to open my eyes this time. Enough that I can make out some more vague details of where I am.

There are two armed guards stationed on opposite sides of the room, one near the window and the other near the door.

“Olezka. Sacha,” Artem says to them. His tone contains harsh, confident authority. “I need to step out for an hour. Two at the most. You both are to remain here with my wife. Do not let her out of your sight. If you so much as blink too long, I’ll have your heads on a platter. Is that understood?”

The way he talks about me makes my stomach churn.

My wife.

Just a possession. His property.

I’ve only ever been a pawn in a game to him.

“Yes, Don Kovalyov,” his sheep bleat without inflection.

I’m only a pawn in a game to them, too.

A pretty bird in a gilded cage.

But not for long.

As soon as Artem leaves, I’m getting out of this fucking room.

Out of this fucking city.

Out of this fucking life of crime and violence and murder and hatred.

I won’t be caged anymore.

How exactly I’m going to manage that is still up in the air.

Artem said he’d be gone for an hour or two. That means a clock has begun—because I intend to be gone by the time he gets back.

When I hear the door click shut, I risk peeking out through my half-closed eyes. There’s no one left but my two stone-faced guards.

Now what?

I spend the next few minutes peeking around. Subtly, though, so my guards don’t notice I’m awake and call Artem to come back.

I’m definitely in a hospital room of some kind, although it seems somehow cozier than any hospital room I’ve ever seen. Maybe it’s just some sort of private, rich people hospital that only men like Artem have access to.

The guards are both armed with massive automatic rifles, which also seems like it is some kind of healthcare faux pas. Not to mention total overkill for one pregnant girl in a hospital bed.

Beyond that, there’s not much to check out. The window in one wall just looks up at empty blue sky. Occasionally, a machine beeps.

A few minutes go by like that. Just scouting and brainstorming.

At the end of that window, my plan consists of… jack shit.

If I so much as twitch wrong, the guards will notice. And there’s no telling how my body will respond if I try to just sprint for freedom.

Not to mention the fact that there’s still an IV needle jammed into the back of my hand.

Think, Esme. Think.

A ringing phone interrupts before any good ideas strike.

The guard by the window pulls out a cell phone and starts talking in fast Russian. Something about his tone seems weird, almost conspiratorial, but I