Hunted By The Bratva Beast: A Bratva Stalker/Captive Romance, Jagger Cole [good books to read for 12 year olds .txt] 📗

But the man’s grip on me drops. He makes a single grunting sound, staggering back into the shadows as his hands fly to the hole in his leather jacket. He sucks in a breath and looks down at his hands. Then, he looks up at me, his face twisting.

“You…”

Gunfire explodes behind me, and I scream as I throw myself to the ground in a hail of shattered glass and patio rock. I wince as a bullet embeds in the wall next to me. But then suddenly, the gunfire stops.

I pop up, gun in hand as I scan the carnage of the patio. When I see Viktor and Lev barge through the shattered doors outside, I almost scream with relief. My brother bolts across the garden to me, grabbing me tightly.

“Are you hurt?!”

“No,” I gasp. “You?”

He shakes his head grimly.

“Fiona?” I croak.

“We’re all okay, Nina.”

“Nikolai—”

Viktor turns to point at some of his men helping a wincing Nikolai to his feet. “He caught one in the arm, but he’ll live.”

“Casualties?”

My brother nods grimly. “Five men.”

“Who—”

“Nina—”

“Viktor, I’m fine—”

“Nina!”

I frown. I know I’m still in shock, but he’s not making sense. “Viktor, I’m fine—”

“Then who’s blood is that?”

I whirl, and my jaw drops. The enormous man with the piercing blue eyes is gone. I shot him in the chest, and he’s gone—as in literally no longer lying there on the ground at all. But there’s blood, and lots of it.

“Nina—”

“I don’t know.”

My heart skips when I lie to my brother. I don’t quite know why I don’t tell the truth. I don’t really understand why in this moment I’ve chosen to not mention shooting someone point blank in the chest, either. But I don’t have time to dwell on it. Bratva reinforcements flood onto the roof. Fiona and Zoey rush to me, holding me tightly as they both sob in fear.

I don’t cry, though. And the shock of the gunfire fades quickly. A psychiatrist would probably say “too quickly,” but it is what it is. That’s what a childhood of torment and trauma does to you, I guess.

I turn to look back at the blood on the ground. A second ago, I wasn’t sure why I lied. But now, I might. And it might be because somewhere, I know that there’s a memory deep inside my head of those haunting blue eyes. Somewhere inside, I know I’ve seen them and the animal ferocity behind them before.

And slowly, I start to wonder if I’ll see them, and the hulking beast of a man attached to them, again.

2 Nina

Three Months Later:

You’re mine now, little one.

I gasp, trembling as the dream evaporates around me. My pulse is racing, my breath coming in heaving pants. My sleep-shirt sticks to my skin—damp with sweat from the dream.

And my shirt isn’t the only piece of clothing that’s wet when I wake.

I feel my face burn, my skin tingling as I sit up in my bed. I’m still shaking, but I try and calm my breathing. I try to center myself, and I think about trying to go back to bed until morning. But when I glance at the alarm clock on the bedside table, I groan.

Yeah, not gonna happen. I’m an early riser, at five every morning. The clock reads 4:30, and my brain is wide fucking awake now. No way am I claiming that last half an hour of sleep now.

I tremble as I drop my face into my hands. My pulse is still thumping in my ears as I push my hands back into my hair. I close my eyes, and the dream fragments come flooding back to my conscious mind.

It’s been like this for months. For three months, since the night of the shooting at Lev and Zoey’s place, I’ve been having the same dreams—dark, pulse-pounding, breath-catching, dirty dreams. Sexual dreams.

In my dreams, nightly, he takes me, and binds me, and… well, they go on from there. I bite my lip, and my thighs squeeze together. I remember the way he groaned into my ear in the dream just now. I replay the way his huge, powerful hands gripped my legs and spread them wide, and how he…

I blush and shake my head. Okay, that’s enough of that, thank you very much. I swing my legs out of the bed and stand. I stretch, then open the blinds of my bedroom window. It’s not a palatial penthouse, but the view from my place is still spectacular. I breath in the sight of the sun rising over the Chicago skyline. Then, it’s time to face my day.

Twenty fast-paced, grueling minutes on the Peloton bike later, I stagger into my kitchen for a smoothie and some fruit. The ride has done its job of getting my blood pumping, and my thoughts off of the dreams. But now, it’s coming back again.

My face burns hotly as it floods back in. His snarls in my ear. His touch all over my skin. His mouth teasing lower and lower, until…

The blender whirs loudly, drowning out my thoughts again; drowning out the replays of my dark, dangerous dream lover giving me the best sex of my… well, I’d say “of my life,” and it would true. True because my dream sex with him is truly incredible. But also true because I have absolutely nothing to compare it to in the real world.

I’m twenty-three, and I’ve only had sex with one man; and that man exists exclusively in my head and in my dreams.

The night of the violence on the rooftop garden is still a mystery. It’s been chalked up to Bratva or just general gang violence. But I know I’m not the only one who still thinks it’s something more than that. I mean the Kashenko Bratva is a powerhouse. You’d have to be fucking insane to try and shoot up a party. Even if you’re using guns mounted on tripods with timers and remote controls.

Three months into the investigation, and that’s all they’ve found—both the legitimate cops, the cops