Claire Braden had spent the majority of her life trying to stay away from the violent lifestyle of the mob and the men within it. Or rather, one particular man, her step-uncle. Liam Dolan didn’t—or couldn’t—comprehend the word empathy. In all things, he was unfeeling and cruel.
Family was another word her step-uncle didn’t have in his vocabulary, unless they could be of use for him in some way. Claire supposed she should count her lucky stars in that regard because he mostly left her alone. But she still knew what his influence on those around her could do and had done.
After all, just because Claire’s mother had married into the Irish mob after her first husband’s death didn’t automatically mean her daughter was married to it, too, right?
Wrong.
The mafia left no one untouched, especially those closest to it through affiliation. Usually those touches came in the form of cuts that left scars behind. The worst kind of scars that were a brutal red, puckered skin, sore to the touch even when healed, and would never fade.
No matter how much time passed, those scars didn’t leave.
So, it was surreal to sit across the room from Anton Avdonin, a man in a position of power and dangerous like her uncle, while they talked about Liam as if they were having tea. Dreamlike, even bizarre, because all of her work and effort to stay away from a man like her uncle led her to one who simply shared a different last name.
“You don’t sound very …”
“Irish?” Claire offered.
Anton smiled, flashing white teeth. “Yes.”
“You don’t sound very Russian.”
“Point taken, although it’s taken me years to lose the accent.”
“It still comes out,” Viviana Avdonin said from her spot on the couch. “When he’s angry, or in the midst of se—”
“Vine.”
“Well, it does.”
Claire was amused at the two, but she hid it. “My biological father is Irish and my mother is half. My step-father is full, but he didn’t think to teach me much and I tried to stay away from a lot of things, if you know what I mean.”
“I suppose, yes,” Anton said quietly.
“So, no quirks or accent from me. Sorry to disappoint.”
“No disappointment here. I am curious as to why you’ve done all this, though. Come to us, I mean.”
“I want to know,” Claire said.
“It isn’t a pretty story,” Anton replied.
“I didn’t come here for a fairytale.”
“I should hope not,” Viviana said. “Because our life sure as hell isn’t one.”
A ghost of a tender smile shadowed Anton’s features as he regarded his wife from the side in silence. Claire decided in that moment, with that one gesture, this Russian man was nothing like her uncle and she had obviously been mistaken in thinking so.
Liam would never smile, and if he did, something awful was sure to follow.
“You’ve been in the city for how long?” Anton asked.
“A couple of months,” Claire said.
“How did you learn of my family?”
Claire glanced away, uncomfortable under the man’s scrutiny. “I asked enough of the right questions, I suppose.”
“About Cavan.”
“Yes.”
“Your half-brother,” Anton added pointedly.
Claire hated that she had to admit her relation to the dead man at all. “Yes.”
“What do you know about what happened?” Anton asked.
“I know you killed him.”
“No, my son did.”
“Oh,” Claire whispered. “I only knew the Russians had their hand in it and I assumed—”
“That the boss does all the work?” Viviana interrupted with a soft laugh.
Claire shrugged. “I guess.”
“And you want to know why,” Anton said, drawing out the last word slowly.
“I do.”
“Do you miss him?” the man asked instead.
That was an easy question to answer. “No.”
“Why not?”
“Because he was a monster,” Claire said honestly.
Anton hummed under his breath, his fingers pattering to the table in a fast beat. “He raped my daughter, and my son retaliated on him for what he did. Count your blessings that it was a closed coffin, my dear.”
Claire shivered. The information she had been trying to find for years was tossed out so fast that she almost missed it. Except she couldn’t miss it at all.
And she knew …
Knew before he even said the words why Cavan had died. Not because someone else had told her first, but it wasn’t the first time Claire had experienced the backlash of her half-brother’s brutal nature.
A learned behavior, her mother said once.
Claire agreed. Cavan, spoiled and indulged by Liam, had grown up to be the man his uncle created. Yes, a monster.
“It didn’t end with that, of course,” Viviana added when her husband stayed silent.
“Oh?”
“Unfortunately, no,” Anton said, resting back in his chair. “Demyan, my son, was expecting his first child—a little girl—with his fiancée.”
No.
The word banged around inside Claire’s head but miraculously, didn’t make its way out.
“Your uncle—”
“Step,” Claire corrected quickly. “I share no blood with that man, not even a last name.”
“Lucky,” Anton murmured. “I would have killed you, otherwise.”
Claire didn’t even blink. “Really?”
“Yes.” Anton waved the statement off, dismissing it altogether. “It’s not important. You came here for information, so I will give it to you. Liam had his men kill Gia, my son’s fiancée and my former best friend’s daughter.”
A quiet man in the corner lifted his hand but kept his face down and his attention on the glass of vodka in his hand.
“Ivan, I mean,” Anton said, gesturing at the silent man.
“Former friend?” Claire asked.
“Best,” Anton corrected.
Ivan chuckled but the sound was hollow. “What a bullet can do to an over thirty year friendship is … amazing.”
“Something like that,” Anton replied coolly.
“Are we going to start shouting at one another in Russian again?” Viviana asked as she pulled out a yellow buffing file to work on her already manicured nails. “Because if so, I would like to leave before you two get started.”
“No, we’ll be good,” Ivan muttered.
“Something like that,” Anton repeated, his gaze leveling on Claire once more. “An apology is right on the tip of your tongue, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” Claire admitted.
“Don’t. I have no interest in hearing it from you, neither does my wife, and I’m sure Ivan would say the same. Neither your apology, nor your blood, will pay for ours that spilled.”
Claire shifted in the seat, her fists clenching tightly in her lap. “How did you know I wanted to apologize at all?”
“You have honest eyes,” Anton said simply. “They’re the kind of eyes that are an opening to your soul. An old soul, which I can understand. My son had eyes like those once, too.”
Did that mean he didn’t now? Was it possible for everything you were to be shattered and taken away by one man?
“Because of Liam,” Claire said.
“Because of Liam,” Anton echoed. “And now when we see Demyan, there’s nothing staring back. It’s hard to watch a man slowly suffocate to death in his own private hell, especially when he doesn’t even realize he’s dying.”
Viviana sighed. “Harder when that man is your son.”
Anton nodded, agreeing with his wife. “You also have a look of guilt, Claire. Like maybe you feel you have something to answer for.”
She did. She had so much to answer for.
“What it is you have to answer for, Claire?” Anton asked.
“I didn’t protect someone once,” she said softly.
“Does your family know you’ve sought us out?” Anton asked.
“No. And my aunt and uncle believe I’m in the city to work, mostly. Since they’re the only family I have here and I’m twenty-seven-years-old, they treat me like an adult who doesn’t need to be babysat.”
“Apparently you should be if you’ve found your way to my den,” Anton replied.
“Maybe.”
“You said work. Doing what, exactly?”
“I’m a nurse.”
Again, a small smile curved the man’s lips upwards at the corners. “So was my mother. ER, mostly.”
“I prefer pediatrics,” Claire explained.
“Children,” Viviana said, giving her husband a look. “Imagine that.”
“Vine …” Anton’s voice barely contained a hidden warning.
“I didn’t say anything, Anton.”
“I can hear your wheels turning, baby. Don’t start.”
“Fine,” Viviana replied, huffing before going back to buffing her nails.
Claire was lost, but she didn’t bother to ask what she missed between the two. She figured they wouldn’t tell her anyway. “I do feel guilty about what happened to your daughter and …” Claire nodded at Ivan in the corner. “His daughter, too.”
Anton lifted a single shoulder in response. “We all are. Apologies have gotten us nowhere but cold.”
She supposed she couldn’t possibly understand these people’s pain because hers was not the same and theirs was much worse.
Leaning forward in his chair to rest his arms over his desk, Anton said, “I’m going to kill your uncle.” Claire wished she could be surprised, but she wasn’t. “And strangely, I have the distinct feeling you don’t even care if I do.”
“I really don’t. I know how he is and the things he’s done. His death wouldn’t be a loss to this world after everything, but a gift.”
“Good, because you’re going to help me do it.”
Her back straightened like someone had shoved a metal rod up her spine. This was not what she had come here for, but Claire knew by the way Anton Avdonin was staring at her, he wasn’t going to give her a choice.
It was yet another thing she wasn’t surprised about.
She also didn’t care.
“How?” Claire asked, unsettled.
“We’ll figure something out. I always do.”
Claire fidgeted with the hem of her shirt. “I don’t know if I can do that. Help you, I mean.”
“Sure you can,” Viviana said sweetly, smiling a brilliant sight that looked warm but felt cold.
“Won’t that make me just as bad as them? A monster, too?”
“Haven’t you realized it, yet?” Anton asked her quietly.
She shook her head. “No.”
Viviana smiled from her seat on the couch, still buffing her nails as though the conversation happening wasn’t really going on at all. “We’re all monsters, sweetheart. Some of us just hide it better than others.”
That was the key, wasn’t it?
