Kostya A Dark Bratva Hate Story

  Kostya: A Dark Bratva Hate Story

  Copyright 2019

  by Ginger Talbot

  This book is intended for readers 18 and older only, due to adult content. It is a work of fiction. All characters and locations in this book are products of the imagination of the author.

  License Statement

  This e-book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This e-book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each reader. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

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  Table of Contents

  Copyright Page

  Kostya A Dark Bratva Hate Story

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Epilogue

  Chapter One

  Anya Lebedev

  Three years ago...

  There’s nothing like a beautiful spring night in Moscow to whip the party crowd into a frenzy. They have emerged like butterflies from their winter cocoon, and they’re wild to unfurl their wings and dazzle the eye with their beautiful colors. Girls twirl across the dance floor in gossamer dresses. Men drip with expensive bling and strut in hand-tooled Italian loafers.

  Everybody who’s anybody is crammed into The Palace tonight – including the man who’s following me.

  Uneasiness churns in my belly as I scan the crowd for my friends. They scattered like the wind when we arrived, spinning into the crowd to flirt and dance, and of course I don’t see them anywhere now.

  Annoyed, I look for security guards...I can see some of them standing across the room, big grim-faced men standing on elevated platforms, but there’s about a hundred sweaty bodies in between them and me. And the weird guy is much closer to me than I am to the guards.

  A tiny voice in my head chastises me. I shouldn’t have come.

  Damn it, no. I’m so sick of living like a prisoner. Like a cloistered nun. I’m twenty years old, I’m single, I have every right to be here.

  I glance behind me and see the creep slithering through the crowd. Yep, it’s not my imagination, he’s headed my way.

  Is he Bratva, maybe from a family I’m not familiar with? I don’t think so – I’ve grown up around these men, and they advertise their status by draping themselves in designer everything. Clothes, jewelry, watches, shoes – each item has to cost more than the average Muscovite’s annual rent. This guy’s suit is off the rack, his shoes scuffed. He’s most likely some drunk perv who’s decided he wants to get to know me better.

  This annoys me. I am not seeking attention at all. I tried to dress low-key tonight, no cleavage on display, wearing a dress with lots of rucking and layers of lace to hide my curvy figure. I kept my makeup minimal, slicking clear gloss on my full lips, light brown mascara on my thick lashes, and the palest dusting of blue shadow on my lids. But I accidentally made eye contact with this creep once, and he immediately locked in on me like a heat seeking missile.

  I duck my head and pull out my phone, sending a text message to my friends.

  Where r u guys?

  There’s a brief pause, and then my phone vibrates in response.

  Nadia: At the upstairs bar!

  Zoya: Talking to a fine-ass hockey player! U ok?

  Valeria: Bathroom checking makeup.

  I glance up from my phone. I don’t see him anymore, I think I’ve lost him. I don’t want to hassle my friends, so I just send a text back. All good, stay safe. Remember don’t accept drinks from anyone! Hourly check-in!

  I get one response, from Valeria: Sure, mom.

  My phone beeps again, and this time it’s my best friend Raisa, who’s still in Chicago, taking summer classes.

  Raisa: Miss you so much! Are you having fun without me?

  Me: No, I’m home in bed, watching TV and eating ice cream. So bored.

  Raisa: Liar. That means you’re out at the clubs. Enjoy, you skank!

  Smiling, I send her an emoji of me flipping her off.

  I look up from my phone, and...damn it, there he is again. I lower my head and duck between sweaty bodies, heading towards the bar. There’s a security guard stationed there, I’ll stand next to him and hope the weirdo gets bored and goes away. I have to shove hard to make it through the packed crowd, using my elbows and spike heels, and I’m followed by expletives shouted in Russian. I may spend most of the year in Chicago, but I understand them all. We spend the school year in the U.S. at my mother’s insistence, but my father has made sure I’m fluent in my native tongue.

  Finally, I’m free from the crowd, and I stumble and run into a solid wall of a man. I let out a startled squeak, staggering back a step. When I look up, my heart does a little stuttering dance in my chest.

  It’s Kostya Mikhailov. Huge, imposing, and never far from my thoughts. People instinctively melt away from him, shrinking back into the crowd. Everything about him shouts “Bratva”. The hand-tailored suit, the burly build, the Patek Phillipe watch, the air of quiet menace beaming from his blue eyes.

  I’ve known him, and his stepbrother Pasha, since I was twelve. My father owns an import-export company, and he does a lot of business with the Bratva. I quickly look around and spot Pasha, flirting with a bottle girl behind the bar. Good, I’m glad the little weasel is distracted, because if he saw me, he’d be all over me.

  My father moves a lot of merchandise for Kostya’s stepfather, Yeger. Yeger is scary as hell, in a different way than Kostya. Kostya’s got a “don’t fuck with me” air about him. Yeger seems like the kind of man who’d drown kittens for fun.

  Kostya reaches his hand out to steady me, grabbing my arm, and a storm of butterflies takes flight in my stomach.

  “You need to be more careful,” his voice rumbles from his broad chest.

  “I’m sorry, I wasn’t watching where I was going.” I have to shout to be heard above the music. “There’s a guy following me around and it was distracting me.”

  He leans down, his lips brushing my ear. “Yes, I know. My men are taking care of him.” A shiver ices my spine. I know what that means.

  “Was he Bratva?” Past tense is appropriate.

  “No, just some drunk piece of shit.” So my instincts were correct. “Where is your bodyguard? I will take care of him too, for leaving you alone like this.”

  There’s vodka on his breath, and a slight blur to his voice. He drinks a lot, to hide some secret pain. Everyone else looks in those dark brown eyes and sees pure violence. That’s why people shrink away from him as he moves through a room. I can look past the simmering fury, and see a secret sorrow lurking deep inside.

  “I don’t have a bodyguard. There are hund
reds of people here, what could happen to me?”

  Kostya narrows his eyes at me. With a look of impatience, he moves me through the room. I don’t have to elbow my way through the crowd anymore; people are practically tripping themselves to escape from us. He leads me into a hallway, where we’re cut off from the din.

  “Did you just tell me you came without a bodyguard?” He’s leaning so close to me. I love the way he smells, the notes of bergamot in his cologne accentuating his pure, masculine musk. “Do your parents know? What about Masha?”

  Masha is my nursemaid. She basically raised me single-handed; my mother was never the nurturing type. Fortunately, Masha’s old and falls asleep at eight o’ clock these days, and she doesn’t know I sneak out sometimes. I’m always home before she wakes up.

  My mother is in her room sulking because she hates being in Moscow and wants to be back in the U.S., and also because my father is away for a couple of days on a “business trip” which probably involves his latest mistress.

  “I came here with friends.” I throw my hand out in a vague gesture. “They’re out there. I can text them if I need them.”

  “Your friends are a bunch of spoiled little girls. And your father is a weakling and a fool to allow you such liberties. Our women do not go out to nightclubs unescorted.” His thick brows draw together in a fierce scowl.

  Our women. Please. Just because my father does business with the Bratva doesn’t make him one of them. However, Kostya doesn’t seem to believe that.

  "Then I'm glad that I live in America," I say.

  His blue eyes bore into me, intense and serious. "It won't help you. Your duty follows you everywhere."

  "What duty is that?" I ask.

  "You know."

  I roll my eyes. "You mean my duty to remain a virgin until marriage, my duty to marry whoever my father selects?”

  "Yes. That." He looks at me questioningly.

  A hot blush rises to my cheeks. "Yes, I'm still a virgin.”

  And it's true. Sleeping around would be incredibly risky, both for me and for whoever I fooled around with. Not worth risking whatever my father would do to me, to punish me for a moment’s pleasure. And we may not be Bratva, but my father has plenty of them on his speed dial. If he caught me having pre-marital sex, my unfortunate lover would end up in pieces, which would then be slowly melted in a vat of acid.

  “My mother didn’t have an arranged marriage,” I point out. “I don’t see why I should have to.”

  My mother was an actress with a minor part on a Russian tv series when my wealthy father courted her and swept her off her feet. She’s the reason we live in America; she hates it here. My father’s compromise is that we spend six weeks every summer in Moscow. The rest of the time, I’m at college in Chicago, he’s travelling on business, and she’s shopping her unhappiness away.

  And, much as I tire of her unending complaints about my cheating, boring father, her back-stabbing friends, and life in general, I am eternally grateful that I didn’t have to grow up in Russia. I feel like I’d be wearing a freaking chastity belt and a GPS tracker if I lived here.

  “That was before your father got in bed with certain types of people. He associates with us, which places certain expectations on him, and his family.”

  "But when I’m in America, I have freedom," I insist. "If everyone's going to be spying on me here and trying to make me live by their rules, then maybe I should just go back home." Say no. You like barking orders; order me to stay.

  "Suit yourself." Kostya’s indifferent tone cuts me to the core. He used to flirt with me. Then his stepbrother Pasha apparently decided he wanted me, and suddenly, Kostya started treating me like last week’s leftovers.

  "Well, if you don't even care, then I'll be on the first plane back, tomorrow," I say. I'm surprised by the depths of my hurt.

  His expression doesn’t change. "Go then."

  I was bluffing. I wanted him to beg me to stay. "Bastard." I spit the word out, tears glimmering in my eyes.

  I started to walk away. Kostya grabs me by the arm.

  "Let go of me!" I jerk my arm, uselessly. If it were anyone else, I'd trip him, flip him over and plant my stiletto heel on his jugular. My mother loves Krav Maga, and she signed me up for it too, since I was a little girl.

  Kostya isn’t an ordinary man, though. He’s more solid than a building.

  "I mean it, Anya. You can't be seen walking around this club by yourself. It will come back on your father. And since he does business with my family, that reflects on us as well." For half a second there, I thought maybe Kostya didn’t want me flirting with other men because he as jealous. But of course not; it’s all about Bratva pride.

  This is ridiculous. I’m dressed modestly, I’m not making out with random men, I am doing nothing that would bring shame on my family.

  "It will not. Let me go. I’m going to go get a cab and go home." I’m feeling that familiar ache again, the same pain I feel in my heart every time Kostya pushes me away. My evening’s ruined, I just want to go home.

  "No, you will not take a cab. I will have you driven home.”

  "Fine. If you have one drink with me."

  It’s silly to bargain with Kostya, when I have zero leverage over him. He could throw me over his shoulder and carry me out of the club, and nobody would even glance his way. People at this club know who he is, or rather, what he is. You can spot a high-ranking Bratva from a mile away by the way they dress and the way they carry themselves, and also by their brutal size and build.

  But he rolls his eyes, slings his massive arm around my shoulder, and starts moving me through the crowd again, into the VIP area, which is much quieter. He takes me over to the bar and orders a double shot of vodka for himself, and a mojito for me. A warm glow spreads through me; he remembered what I like to drink.

  I settle onto the barstool, feeling a little guilty. He never says no to alcohol, and I shouldn't take advantage of that. But I want so badly to spend time with him, and this was the only way.

  “How is your summer going so far?” I ask, leaning closer to him. “Doing anything fun, or is it all business with you?”

  “Killed a few people,” he shrugs.

  “Kostya!” I gasp, glancing around. Nobody seems to have noticed. “You can’t say things like that in public.”

  He smirks at me. “I think I just did. See all the people rushing to call the cops? Nope, neither do I.”

  I roll my eyes at him. He could kill someone right here in this crowded room, and nobody would see anything. “Fine. You didn’t actually answer my question, though. Did you kill them for fun, or was it business?”

  I’m flirting with a murderer. I’m crazy to be attracted to a man like him. I’ve always been such a good girl; daddy’s little sterling silver trophy. All my life, I’ve been surrounded by thugs and murderers, and I’ve never had the slightest interest in them. Why do I yearn for Kostya to tarnish me?

  I know some women are turned on by the scary reputation of the Bratva men, but I don’t think that’s the reason that I’m drawn to Kostya. There’s just something about him that pulls me in; I’m attracted despite all of the bad things, not because of them.

  He’s not all bad, anyway. He’s tender and protective of his mother and little sister. When we were in his father’s garden this summer, I saw him rescue a little bird from a cat, and gently set it on a tree branch. I want to get to know the real man underneath the hard, angry shell that he armors himself in.

  Kostya laughs. “Maybe a little bit of both. I’m not a good man, Anya. You shouldn’t like me so much.” Then he slams down his glass. “Another!”

  I sip my drink as slowly as possible, trying to drag out our time together.

  All too soon, we’ve both finished. He shoves back his stool, and my warm feeling fizzles a little bit. Does he want to get rid of me so soon?

  “Dance with me,” I say quickly, before he can dismiss me.

  "You’re so American, Anya. You can't ask a
man to dance with you.” But there's a smile tugging at his mouth. It’s a real smile, and it softens the harsh planes of his face and makes him look so much more human.

  And maybe that’s part of it – my attraction to him. I love that I can reach a place in him that no-one else can touch.

  "Then ask me to dance with you."

  “I can’t dance with you. My stepbrother is here.”

  Ugh. This again. "I don't like him that way, and you know it.”

  "What don't you like about him? He's handsome, so the girls say. He has money and nice cars."

  I make a sour face. When he rattles off the list the list of things that I should like about his stepbrother, it somehow makes Pasha even less appealing. And not to be stuck up, but I know plenty of very good-looking men with money and nice cars who would be delighted to let my father arrange a marriage with them. I don't want any of them.

  "I'd rather hang out with you." I say it lightly, afraid of being rejected again.

  "Give him a chance." But Kostya doesn't look at me when he says it, and he makes a face as if the words taste bitter in his mouth. Seriously. What is his deal? He can’t be afraid of Pasha. Pasha’s a skinny, pretty little wimp; Kostya could floss his teeth with him.

  "If you dance with me, just once, I promise you that I will dance with him tonight."

  "Fine," Kostya says, surprising me. There is a small dance floor in the VIP room, and he folds his hand around mine and leads me to the floor.

  As we swirl, his arm circles my waist. For a large man, he moves with surprising grace. I see girls glancing his way admiringly, and I want to stab their eyes out with the heel of my stiletto. Mine. Back off, bitches.

  He pulls me closer to him. “I’m with you, Anya, not them.”

  “I don’t even know what you’re talking about.” But my lips curl up in a smile. Just for these few minutes, at least, he’s mine.

  Another song starts, and we keep moving, in perfect rhythm. His pelvis brushes up against me, and I feel his thick erection through the fabric of his slacks. A shiver of arousal rushes through me.

  The music throbs through my body, and the rest of the room vanishes. Kostya stares into my eyes, and I see that sadness there, and longing, too. What does he long for? Dare I hope that it’s me?