I tolerate my brothers because I have no choice. Anton, my older brother, is quiet—silent as a city at 1 a.m., and silence I can live with. Maksim, the younger one, I gave up trying to shut him up years ago; he’s chaos in human form. My cousin Viktor, my closest friend, is a strange mix of the two, tolerable enough. But the rest of the world? I’d rather it didn’t exist.
The alleyway that night was mine. Silent, except for the sound of my fists breaking flesh, the grunt of a man who deserved far worse than what I was giving him. His blood spattered, his groans weak, it’s music to anyone who knows justice isn’t always clean. He made my blood burn, and I don’t regret what I did to him.
Most people who know me call me a psychopath. They’re wrong. I don’t kill for pleasure or for the thrill. I kill only when it’s necessary — when someone needs to be silenced, when a line has been crossed, or when protection demands it.
But I won’t lie: there’s a sharp satisfaction in watching life drain from someone’s eyes. There’s a jarring kind of thrill indeciding whether a man breathes or not. Control—that’s what I crave.
Still, I hate the smell of blood. You’d think I’d be used to it, after years in the bratva, surrounded by death and killings, but I’m not. I never will be. Blood stinks of mess, and I don’t like mess.
Do I feel things? Yes. Not like others, not loud and messy, but sharp, concentrated things. Rage. Satisfaction. That sweet burn of control when my fist lands just right, when I know someone’s body is mine to break. And above all, I hate distractions. When I’m tearing someone apart, the world should disappear. No interruptions. No noise.
That was true… until I saw him.
A flash of blonde hair caught in the flickering streetlight. Loose curls, thick and full, the kind you want to drag your fingers through. Then his face—androgynous, delicate but with an edge sharp enough to keep it from being too soft. Beautiful in a way that unsettled me. Beautiful in a way that made me pause.
He froze when he saw me, knuckles whitening around the handlebars of his bike. Shoulders locked tight. Wide brown eyes fixed on me. The fear was there in his eyes, but then it wasn’t. It vanished as quickly as it came, replaced with something I couldn’t name. Hesitation, yes. Quiet, wary defiance, maybe. Like a stray animal aware of danger, but still stepping forward anyway.
I expected him to turn around, run away, or scream. But he didn’t. Instead, he tightened his grip and pedaled forward—straight past me, eyes ahead, refusing to look back.
For the first time in years, something inside me stirred.
Not rage.
Not boredom.
Something else entirely that I still do not know the word for.
I could have stopped him. That would have been the right choice—the safe one. We don’t let witnesses walk away because witnesses mean risk. Yet, I let him pass. I let him go.
Not because I was careless. Because I couldn’t help it.
Every instinct I’ve sharpened into habit told me to drag him off that bike, silence him before his wide brown eyes became a problem. But another instinct, one far deeper and far more dangerous and obsessive, screamed louder. To follow. To hunt. Not to kill. But to see him again.
Because there was something in that look of his that unsettled me more than blood ever has. Something that made me want to tear him apart and pull him closer in the same breath.
And that terrifies me more than leaving a witness alive ever could.
“Why did I let him go?” I murmur under my breath, dragging my palm down Apollo’s strong neck, feeling the steady warmth beneath his sleek coat.
The barn smells like hay and earth, leather faint in the background. Grounding. Honest. The only place on my father’s estate where I can breathe without pretending.
Apollo huffs softly as my fingers trace along his mane. He’s been mine for fifteen years, one of the few things in my life that hasn’t changed. When everything else feels like a problem to fix or a distraction to kill, he’s just here. Uncomplicated. Loyal.
“Wanna go for a ride?” I switch to Russian, rubbing his muzzle.
He nudges my chest with a snort, and the corner of my mouth almost tilts into a smile. Almost.
Of course, peace never lasts.
“Well, well, well.” Maksim’s voice cuts through the barn, boots crunching over hay. “If it isn’t the dark and brooding sociopath prince in his natural habitat.”
I exhale, resting my forehead briefly against Apollo’s before straightening. “Go away, Maksim.”
“But I just got here.” His amusement is thick, footsteps drawing closer. “I’m surprised you’re home. We barely see you around.”
He already knows why. I prefer my own apartment, away from the suffocating family estate. I only come back for Apollo, the occasional family gathering, or when Mother drags us all to dinner.
“Robert Grey was found dead,” Maksim says casually, leaning against the stall. “On a train track. Five hours from where he lived.”
