1
ALEXSEI
Aloudpopcracked through the air.
Confetti and glitter blossomed out in a fluff only to float then fall to the floor of the lounge at my uncle’s mansion.
As if on cue, Helene and Carina, the two youngest members of the Dubinin family, woke up and wailed. Alarmed and likely unhappy that they were pulled from their sleep at eleven fifteen on New Year’s Eve, they cried their heads off.
“Andre!” Lev, my cousin’s nine-year-old, turned and scolded the naughty two-year-old toddler who’d pulled the strings on the party popper. As the second-born son to my uncle, Luka Dubinin, thePakhanand boss of the Dubinin Dynasty, he might have been able to get away with any kind of mischief he wanted. Perhaps having Luka as his father could lend him some exceptions throughout life, but with Gabriella for his mother, the little naughty boy was in for one of those looks.
Sure enough, there she was, holding baby Carina as she cried and protested being woken like that. She slanted her brows and gave him a look that prompted him to mildly lose that self-satisfied smile. No matter how much she rocked her daughter, Carina competed with Helene for who could cry the loudest. Sadie held Helene, but once she put her arms out for her father, my cousin Emil, she quieted down. If I hadn’t witnessed it myself, I never would’ve believed that the Dubinin’s deadliest and sneakiest assassin could be such a hands-on father. But it was crystal clear that Helene was quickly becoming a daddy’s girl. He cradled her against his chest and gave Andre a look.
“You’re supposed to wait until midnight,” he told his half-brother.
Andre only grinned like the menace he was.
“Luka,” Gabriella said tiredly at the same time Emil said, “Father?”
Luka got up, nodding and already knowing it’d be on him to scold his son.
Every toddler was prone to having attention issues when a new baby brother or sister came along. That was a simple fact of life. Andre, however, was born with the demand that he be the center of attention—always. It was only getting worse, not better, with his baby sister Helene here, as well as his cousin Carina, who was just four months old, born on the same day as Helene was. Andre did love them. Of course he did, just like he loved his cousin Lev and my son, Misha. But damn, was he getting out of hand with his antics.
“Andre, you scared Carina and Helene,” Misha told the toddler before Luka could get to his son.
Andre blew a raspberry, and that summed up his opinion.
I rolled my eyes and sighed. What a devil.
“You have to wait until midnight,” Misha said. “Cuz Gabriella and Sadie will take the babies upstairs before it’s a new year. That way, they won’t be scared by the noise and celebration.”
I smiled, proud of my only son for being such a guiding presence for Andre. At the rate of his naughtiness and with all the ways he tried to get attention, it really was becoming a case of it taking a village to raise a child. Or in our case, an entire Mafia Family.
Misha chased after Andre as he saw Luka approaching. The toddler grinned and giggled, thinking this would be a game of chase, like any other playtime with his father. Misha intervened, though, catching the toddler and carrying him to Luka, who so clearly intended to discipline his son—if not that, he’d deter him and distract him aside from the rest of us sitting around, waiting for the ball to drop.
As I watched, almost laughing when Andre slipped away and Lev joined in on teaming up to corral the wild one, I knew I had more to be proud of than my son being a helping hand.
He didn’t flinch.
He hadn’t jumped.
Most of us in the room for this party were used to loud pops, bangs, cracks, and rapports of gunfire. All of us men had spent years in combat, in the streets, and doing whatever it took to keep our family safe and prosperous. Even Sadie was used to the sounds of surprises, a former FBI agent who’d married Emil this past year. Raisa, too. She used to be a Mafia princess and was used to the chances of sudden, loud noises like a gun going off.
For the longest time, Misha had startled easily. He was only eight, and that was far too young for any child to ever be exposed to danger and violence. This was how it was in our world,though, always having to anticipate some kind of peril lurking too close for comfort.
Since my wife, Elena, passed away, I raised Misha on my own. I had a “village” as well. Luka, Emil, and Ivan all helped me raise the boy. Once Luka married Gabriella, then Ivan married Raisa, and lastly, when Emil married Sadie, I had so much more help to make sure Misha wasn’t lacking for anything in a family sense.
Well, besides the obvious.A wife was the missing piece in my life. Misha needed a mother, too, but I was hoping his aunts and cousins could fill that gap. I wasn’t ready to go looking for another wife after how I’d lost my first one.
Until Andre was born—and Lev showed up with Raisa—Misha was the only child to visit this mansion or stay as a guest here. He was the only boy who had to teeter on the fine line between being aware that the Dubinin name represented power and threats and also being appropriately sheltered.
Noticing himnotflinch at Andre prematurely pulling the strings on that festive popper was my cue that Misha was coming around. He was naïve, yet not ignorant.
Still, the fact that he could roll with the punches meant that he’d already lost some of that youthful ignorance.
Hell, they all grow up too damn fast.
“I told them it was a bad idea to bring the babies down here,” Raisa said as she approached me. She, too, watched over as Lev and Misha told Andre not to use any more of the toys and novelty noise makers before midnight.
