Only, he doesn’t tell me to get up. Instead, he takes the stencil and tosses it to the ground. “Not that one, this one.”
He doesn’t provide another drawing, he just gestures.
Inches away from him, his brothers stand side by side, each of them with a fist clenching the collar of their shirts, pulling the fabric down on the right side. It’s different from the design I’ve seen on the chests of Morozov soldiers and on the wrists of some Bratva daughters back at Empire Academy.
Most of the image is the same, but the color accents are blue rather than red, and the edges are sharper—almost like they’re meant to be made out of glass. No, not glass.Ice.
Morozov means frost, after all. They want me to have the same tattoo as them, the marking of their family that isn’t afforded to their typical soldiers. The Pakhan and his sons don’t need the tattoo, but the people closest to them have them. His brothers, and his most trusted men.
They’re making a statement by bringing me into their organization at all, and that statement just went fromhe’s one of ustohe’s family.
Fuck, I can’t wait to tell Anya.
Chapter Forty
Anya
“Oh my goodness, what happened to you?” I gasp, rushing over to Matteo as soon as I spot him.
He’s just come over for a late breakfast, but instead of waiting for me in the kitchen, he’s come to get me from my bedroom. And half of his lip ispurple. There are dark and puffy bags under his eyes like he hasn’t slept a wink too.
“It’s a bit of a long story,” he replies, almost sighing. “But I’m okay, baby. It doesn’t even hurt.”
That can’t be true. But I know men love to pretend like they’re not in pain for some ridiculous reason. Pride can’t be worth acting as though you feel fine when you’re hurting.
“It wasn’t my uncle, was it?” I ask, almost preemptively devastated. I don’t know what I would do if Uncle Lev hit him again, let alone hit him hard enough to bust his lip.
“No, no,” Matteo says immediately. “Trust me, it wasn’t any of your family. I got myself into this, and I don’t mean that I did so by pissing off your uncles. I actually think they might like me now more than they ever have.”
“I don’t understand.” My head shakes and I lift my hand up to examine his lip softly.
“Would this help explain it?” he asks, lifting his shirt from the bottom all the way up to his collar.
Wrapped in clear plastic, the sight of a familiar tattoo is unveiled and I blink rapidly, thinking I must be seeing things. But nothing changes with my vision, no matter how many times I close and reopen my eyes.
“What did you do?” I ask, my voice coming out as a ghost of a whisper.
“I wanted a way to stay here with you,meraviglia.” He drops his shirt and leans down, resting his chin on top of my head so that he can hug me. I hug him back, of course, but make sure not to rest my face where his fresh tattoo lies. “I know I want to spend the rest of my life with you, and I couldn’t bear doing that if it would mean taking you away from your home. So I took myself away from mine instead.”
I have to let him go, needing to see his face after hearing such a declaration. “You’ve joined the Bratva to be with me? How…your lip, I don’t?—”
“I fought my way in,” he admits, his blue eyes almost twinkling. He’s proud of himself. So proud that I can’t be upset that he’s come to me injured. “I called Dmitri to help me get where I needed to be, and he came through. I just had to beat up a bunch of men after that.”
My eyes sting and I blink back tears, realizing what he just said. “My brother helped you? He came here?”
“Just for last night,” Matteo clarifies. “He couldn’t leave Jade for long, but he came to tell me what to do, and to be by my side while I did it.”
“Oh, wow.”
Appreciation for my older brother sinks in and I realize with a sudden certainty that I need to call him soon. He cares enoughabout me and Matteo to fly out here at the drop of a hat, and he didn’t even attempt to see me so that he wouldn’t cross my boundaries.
It might just be time to push myself toward healing that relationship.
“I didn’t tell you in case it didn’t work out. I didn’t want to get your hopes up. But now I can stay here. I can be with you for as long as you’ll have me, and no one will ever be able to doubt my devotion to you.”
“I can’t believe…” I trail off, still trying to take in everything he’s saying. “What about your family?”
“They’ll always be my family,” Matteo says softly. “But they won’t be the most important thing in the world to me. Not anymore. That’s your place.”
