Page 108 of The Bratva Betrayal

“He’s fine.” His voice is flat and final. “He’s out of the city, he’s alive, and that’s all I’m going to say about it.”

He reaches past me for the zipper again, and I catch his wrist with both hands this time.

His eyes drop to where my hands are wrapped around his wrist and then come back up to my face with a dark, steady heat.

“I’m not letting you take this dress off me,” I tell him. “Let it go.”

“You’re not stopping me.”

“I’m literally holding your wrist.”

“With both hands,” he agrees, and the corner of his mouth moves in a way that does something deeply inconvenient to my ability to maintain this argument. “And I have an extra.”

Smartass.

“More words,” I command. “Less touching.”

He looks at me with annoyance. “What else is there to possibly know?”

“I want to know about my father. And how you got the wedding called off. And why haven’t I been summoned to his home so he can berate me for all of this?”

Artem looks at me for a moment, deciding how much to give me, and then he lets out a slow breath and steps back.

“I went to his office.”

I stare at him. He’s smarter than that, and he knows damn well those five words aren’t going to do it for me.

He sighs. “I told him that Misha was gone and that the arrangement was over. He wasn’t happy.”

“I’d imagine not. No one tells my father what to do.”

“I’m not saying he didn’t bitch about it. But he badly wants an alliance with the Volkovs. He told me that since I’d decided to take matters into my own hands, I could marry you instead⁠—”

“No.”

Artem glowers at me. “I’m not finished.”

“I’m not going to marry you.”

“But you’d marry my brother?”

“Did I look like I wanted to marry Misha? I thought I made myself perfectly clear⁠—”

“You’re in a fucking wedding dress right now⁠—”

A muscle in his jaw ticks as he stretches his neck a little and continues. “I told him that a ring and a license aren’t what makes someone safe. That my name sitting behind yours is enough. That anyone who needs to know will know, and anyone who knows anything about what that means won’t come near you.

I also told him that if he arranges you with anyone else or puts your name on any deal you didn’t choose, I’ll dismantle everything he has, starting with his men and working my way up.”

“You threatened him?”

“Yes.”

“Because… you’re buying Misha time?”

“No.”

I look at him with his arms crossed and his eyes steady on mine. I think about my father behind his desk and his men hovering around him in protection. And Artem Makarov walked in there anyway and came out having changed the terms of what my father had planned.