Page 15 of Bratva Menace

Time snapped back along with a rush of sound that had me covering my ears. Adrian was crouched on one knee to my left, using the table for support as he fired at our attackers. Autumn dropped down at my right, facing behind us. She’d somehow acquired a machine gun. How or from whom, I had no idea.

She let loose a stream of bullets, guarding our six.

“Get off me,” Father grunted. Holes ripped into the table, shredding the wood like paper just as he went to get up.

I pushed him back down with a rough shove to his shoulder. “Stay down, you idiot. We’re in a vulnerable position. We need to stay behind cover.” I pulled out a gun, peeked over the table, took aim, and fired. One of our ex-soldiers went down like a house of cards. “Ten points, motherfucker,” I growled under my breath. “Sorry for calling you an idiot,” I threw to my father as I continued to fire. “You know, heat of the moment kinda thing. You understand⁠—”

A flash of red caught my attention. I pulled my hand away from the gun, staring at my blood-soaked palm in shock.

What the fuck?

I looked down at my father. His eyes were closed, a giant red patch spreading out across his shirt from his shoulder. I froze, staring at it. A cold tremor ran through my body, and I couldn’t move. Couldn’t think. Couldn’t do anything but stare in shock as blood seeped out of my father’s body.

Autumn gasped. “Put pressure on it!” she barked.

I snapped into action, dropping my gun and lurching forward. My hands slammed down on his shoulder. He groaned.

That was good. Groaning was good. Meant he was still alive.

“Is there an exit wound?” Autumn asked in between shots.

“How the fuck should I know?” I growled.

“Turn him over,” Adrian grunted, blocking a high kick to his own head with his forearm. He pulled a knife from the holster at his waist and jammed it into the dude’s eye.

“Right. Turn him over,” I said to myself. My hands shook as I rolled my father over to his side. “It’s through and through.” I breathed out with relief.

Any bullet wound was bad news, but what the projectile hit or passed through would determine the survival rate. If the bullet hit nothing of significance, my father’s chances of survival would increase dramatically.

Panic clutched me in its claws. It wasn’t very often that I felt panic. Not to toot my own horn, but I was pretty fucking resilient. Blood, violence, and death had been a part of my life for as long as I could remember. I’d grown accustomed to them. Numb to it all. Nothing really affected me anymore.

I really only had three triggers.

Sexual assault—anyone who had to force themselves onto another person was just fucking vile.

Hurting children—they were sweet, innocent, absolutely pure-hearted, and deserved to be protected at all costs. Anyone who harmed a child was a fucking coward.

And hurting my family—they might have been a bunch of idiots, and annoyed me most of the time, but they were my idiots. Only I was allowed to fuck with them.

Seeing my father like that, unconscious and bleeding out right in front of me, was something I never thought I’d see.

But I didn’t have the time to dwell on it. I needed to⁠—

Pull yourself together!

I slapped myself across the face. The slight sting of pain knocked me out of my panicked daze.

Autumn blinked. “The fuck was that?”

“Factory reset.” Keeping one hand on my father’s wound, I whipped out my phone with the other and opened the WhatsApp group chat, diving straight into it.

Aleksandr and Drea appeared, bloody and out of breath. Anger radiated from the king and queen of the Bratva, so palpable it stifled the fucking air. Their clothes were covered in blood, some even dripping down the sides of their faces.

I thought that anger was because we’d just been attacked by our own men, but my brother directed it right at me.

“Are you seriously on your phone right now?” he hissed.

Glaring, I showed him the screen. “I’m calling in all the docs on our payroll. Unless you’ve already done that?” I asked, arching a condescending eyebrow because I fucking knew he hadn’t.