Avgust didn’t even flinch, but I screamed.
“Fyodor! What the fuck do you think you are doing? That man just saved your life.”
Right behind me, Avgust lifted his other hand, already holding a second gun, which was pointed directly at Fyodor’s head.
“And I can very well take it again and make sure you are dead, Fyodor.” Avgust’s voice was cold.
The air between them crackled with tension, neither of them agreeing to back down from their positions. My head was spinning at the scene. I still could not believe Fyodor would do such a thing after Avgust helped him come back from a deadly situation. He would have died if it were not for Avgust.
“Drop it,” Fyodor said hoarsely, clearly still in pain.
“Not a chance,” Avgust replied. “You drop it.”
It was quickly becoming too much to handle. I stepped between them before either of them could pull the trigger, becoming a wall between their guns, which were still aimed at one another. I was not going to stand here and watch the two of them kill each other for no good reason.
“Both of you need to stop this bullshit right now!”
“Ilana—” Avgust began speaking.
“Get out of the way, Ilana—” Fyodor said at the same time.
“No,” I said sharply. “This has gone on long enough. If I let this go on for one more second, I am sure you will end up shooting one another, and I cannot let that happen. You two are forgetting that your hatred for each other is not our biggest problem right now.”
“I have to kill him, Ilana,” Fyodor said. “He married you and then abandoned you, and on top of that, he is a Chernykh.”
“He saved my life and only asked me to leave because he thought I had betrayed him,” I said, my voice hard. “And you have no right to decide what happens in my relationships and what doesn’t.”
“Ilana,” Avgust began speaking, but I raised my hand to silence him as well.
My heart hammered so hard it hurt. The Ilana who had just come to Miami a few months ago could have never imagined standing in a situation like this, between two men who were pointing their guns at one another. “You two want to kill each other? Fine. But you can do it later. Right now, we have a bigger problem. The men who shot Fyodor are the very same men who kidnapped me and took me to that auction. And they are still out there. We have to deal with that and not this.”
Neither of them lowered their guns, but I knew I had gotten their attention.
Fyodor’s eyes flicked to mine. “You recognize those men?”
“Yes.”
Avgust’s jaw tightened. “How many of them were after you?”
“At least four or five of them. Some of them were the kidnappers, and some of them were men I saw at the auction. One of them was even the accountant you paid money to,” I told Avgust, and he finally lowered his gun.
“They must have found out you were living alone. And now that you are attached to both the Chernykh and the Romanov name, it only increases your price. Now you aresomeone of consequence,” Avgust reasoned, finally lowering his gun.
Fyodor followed suit. The stand-off finally dissolved, leaving behind raw tension and something far worse. An essence of understanding had settled between the two of them. I knew it was fickle and might not last long, but right now I needed the two of them to cooperate.
“I think they always knew Ilana was a Romanov. That is why they kidnapped her in the first place,” Fyodor added, leaning against the table as he winced in pain.
I stilled and turned to look at him. “They did tell me it was for revenge. What did you guys do to prompt such a reaction from them?”
“It was stupid,” Fyodor sighed, regret flashing on his face.
Avgust’s gaze sharpened. “Define stupid.”
Fyodor exhaled. “It was Roman. Our brother. He made a bad deal with someone who led to wrong intel, and our partners lost their minds. He went ahead and cut them out of the profit after a botched delivery, and they got angry. It happened right after we came to Miami, and we couldn’t do much about it because we didn’t have the right contacts or connections here. They swore revenge in order to make up lost money, and I believe kidnapping you and selling you off in an auction was their way of doing that.”
“So it was all revenge, and you had nothing to do with the auction?” Avgust asked, stepping closer.
Fyodor’s lip curled. “No, that is disgusting. We don’t touch that shit. Never have, never will.”
