His Captive Bratva Princess: A Bratva Captive Romance

by Cole, Jagger

  The prick takes my arm, and we smile and saunter down the red carpet. Daniel reeks of liquor and pussy, but I have to stand there smiling as nine hundred different magazines and bloggers take our fucking picture.

  But this is my new role; my forever-part.

  For the last few pictures, Daniel’s hand keeps sliding down to my ass. I keep smiling and brushing it away with a laugh. But by the twentieth time, I’m ready to gouge his fucking eyes out with my stilettos.

  When we step inside, I whirl on him.

  “If you fucking touch me again,” I hiss. “I will cut your fucking hand—”

  He slaps me. At first, I don’t even realize it’s happened. It’s just so sudden and so shocking that I can’t process it. Then I stare at him in horror.

  “You motherfucker—”

  I gasp as Daniel lurches at me. He pushes me around a corner and into a darkened alcove and slams me into the wall. Fear jolts through me. Daniel is a little pussy, but he’s not weak.

  “Here’s how this is gonna work from now on,” he snaps furiously. “You’re my girlfriend.”

  I sneer at him. “You’re delusional.”

  “Well, Belle,” he hisses. “To the cameras, and the public, I am. So I’ve decided to start playing the part more for real.”

  “That the hell does that—”

  “It means,” he growls. “That from now on, if I want to touch you? I fucking will.”

  “That’s not part of our deal in the slightest fucking bit,” I hiss.

  Daniel chuckles. “I’m changing the deal.” He leers at me. “So, dear, if I want your mouth, I’ll fucking take it. If I want to bend you over and fuck you like a slut, I goddamn will.”

  I stare at him in horror. “You’re a fucking monster.”

  “I’m Daniel fuckin’ Crew, baby,” he slurs. “I’m the hottest shit on planet Earth. You’d be lucky to get fucked by me.”

  I level my eyes at him. “Let me be clear. If you touch me, I will cut off whatever you touch me with.”

  He grins. Then he glances at his watch. “Shit. We’re going to be late.” He looks up and glares at me. “Go to the bathroom and clean yourself up. Be at your seat in—”

  “Go fuck yourself,” I seethe.

  His lips purse. “I said be at your seat in five minutes, or so help me, your tits are going on the internet.”

  He holds his phone up and grins. “And before you think about getting your little pal River to go to my house or some shit and fuck up my computers, they’re all here. No cloud, no hard drives. My leverage on you doesn’t leave my side. Ever.”

  Daniel stumbles back and leers at me. “Go clean yourself up. Be sitting next to me smiling in five fucking minutes, or else.” He turns his head. “Hey! Little help!”

  Two huge, hulking Russian men—Daniel’s new bodyguards—step around the corner. He nods at me.

  “Watch her. In five minutes, drag her ass if you have to into that auditorium and into the seat next to me.”

  He turns and lurches off. I stifle the sob in my hands. I turn, trembling as I slam open the door to the bathroom. I suck in air, trying to slow my racing heart. I feel the terror and revulsion curdling inside of me as I lean over the sink.

  This can’t go on like this. There has to be a breaking point. I have to get out. But first, I have to do this. I have to keep playing this part, until I can find a way to escape.

  I close my eyes. Six months ago when it felt like the world was caving in around me, I had an escape. I had a stranger, a bike, and the great unknown. I found Trouble, and he ended up being the escape I needed.

  But Trouble is gone. There’s no escape this time.

  Someone bangs on the bathroom door. I wince and look down. “I’m coming, okay!?”

  I take one last slow breath of air. A second bang thumps against the door.

  “Fuck off!” I scream.

  I turn and walk for the door. I grab the handle and yank. “I’m here, okay? We can—”

  The bodyguards are in slumped heaps on the ground. I’m staring at a pair of boots and dark jeans. My heart skips, and I slowly drag my eyes up—up over his torso, his chest, and finally, the face I’ve been dreaming about every night for six straight months.

  Our eyes lock. And then suddenly, he crashes into me.

  I moan as he slams me back against the wall. His hands grip me tightly, and he growls as his lips crush to mine like they belong to him.

  “Niko,” I whimper into his lips, kissing him back. “I—”

  “I warned you,” he groans thickly. “Six months ago, in that motel room, I fucking warned you that tempting me was dangerous.”

  I sob as I crush my mouth back to his. My hands slide around his neck. And for the first time since the last time his lips were on mine, I feel free.

  “Come on, princess,” he groans.

  “Where are we going?”

  “Anywhere,” Niko growls. “I’ll go anywhere with you.”

  14

  Nikolai

  Helmand Province, Afghanistan, Six Years Ago:

  The man swings like a fucking beast, but I dodge it easily. I anticipate the next hit and duck away from that one too. But then, my trap is sprung. With him off-balance with the follow-through, I strike. And I strike hard.

  Mr. P’s machine-gun rolls in action.

  Left-right-left. Left-left-right-left-hard right. The man grunts and goes down hard, hitting the floor with a groan. I dance back, moving my weight, keeping loose. But he glances up and shakes his head.

  There are cheers around the hanger as someone clangs a bell. I grin as I yank my helmet off and spit out the mouth guard. I trudge over to the guy on the ground and help him to his feet.

  “Hey, good fight, man.”

  He winces and spits out his guard before he chuckles. “Nyet,” he grunts in Russian. “That was no fight. That was a massacre.”

  “Ty bol’shoy. Ya ochen’ staralsya,” I say with a grin. You are big. I went hard.

  The Russian Special Forces soldier—part of the joint Russian-British-Pakistani-American team sweeping this region—grins.

  “Ty russkiy?” He says in a surprised tone.

  “Nyet. My mother.”

  He smiles and yanks his glove off to put his hand out. I take mine off and shake his.

  “Pyetor.”

  “Nikolai.”

  “You drink vodka, Nikolai?”

  I grin. “I’ve been on rotation for five months. At this point, I’d drink camel piss if you told me it was a beer.”

  He chuckles. “Come, drink with us.”

  A few soldiers of a couple different countries slap me on the back as I step out of the ring. I yank a shirt on and follow Pyetor over to the Russian corner of the big hanger. He introduces me, and once they figure out I speak Russian, it’s like we’re old high school buddies.

  “You fight like a bear, man,” one grins, passing me a plastic cup of what smells like antifreeze. When I taste it, I’m convinced it might be. “Pyetor’s a professional back home and you just kicked his ass.”

  I chuckle. “So am I. Well, sort of.”

  “Hey, to ‘sort of’,” Pyetor chuckles, knocking his cup to mine.

  As we drink, we’re joined by a few more guys who saw the fight. Turns out, a couple of them are from the same neighborhood back in Moscow. One of them elbows the other and nods at me.

  “Der'mo, muzhik. Znayesh', komu by ponravilsya etot paren’?”

  Shit, man. You know who would love this guy?

  Two others from that same neighborhood group whistle.

  “Shit, definitely,” one laughs. “That fucking psycho would eat this motherfucker up.”

  I frown. “Who?”

  “This gangster guy from our old neighborhood,” one says with a shrug. “A real piece of shit. But he was all over the boxing circuit. He used to train up these kids into fucking monsters and fight them for money. Crazy shit.”

  He turns to holler at another guy who’s turned awa
y.

  “Hey, Maxim!”

  Maxim turns. “Da?”

  “You think Kuznetsov would shit his pants if he saw this guy fight?”

  It feels like a knife jabbing into my temple. I freeze. The room suddenly feels cold. I feel numb. I turn to the man, my pulse thudding.

  “What did you just say?”

  He frowns. “That this guy would have shit himself—”

  “No,” I hiss. “The name.”

  It’s not a rare last name. I know that. Believe me, I’ve looked, and I’ve looked hard for the man who hurt my mother. I’ve dug deep, even delving into the dark web to pay shady people for iffy information. All I know is, the man’s name is Kuznetsov, he’s from Moscow, and he’s involved with the Russian Mafia. And that he’s heavily into boxing.

  “Kuznetsov?” The guy shakes his head. “Don’t tell me you know him.”

  I shake my head. “No. But I want to meet him.”

  The man looks at me strangely. “You don’t want to meet this guy, man. He’s straight crazy.”

  “And if I did?”

  He shrugs. “Join the bratva.”

  Present:

  Kissing her feels like coming home. It feels like coming back from war. I don’t ever want to stop, but I know we need to go. I know I’m about to kick over hell itself. And also, she needs to know me for who I really am. For what I really am.

  “Belle…” I pull back, gritting my teeth. “You need to know what I am.”

  “I know what you—”

  “No, you—”

  “Niko,” she whispers. She steps into me and raises a hand to my cheek. “I know what you are. They told me.”

  My jaw clenches.

  “I’m not scared,” she whispers. “I’m not running away, am I?”

  I groan as she raises up on her toes. I lean down to meet her lips, kissing her deeply. Then I just hold her. I kiss her and keep her in my arms where she belongs. I inhale the scent of her, and groan at the warmth of her against me.

  It feels like a piece of myself has been missing, and I’ve just found it to put myself back together. And I know right there that I’d take on the world for her.

  “I wanted to call you, or get you a message…”

  “It’s okay,” I groan. “Baby, it’s okay—”

  “It’s Daniel,” she chokes angrily. She closes her eyes, shaking her head. “He… he has these fucking pictures…”

  I snarl in rage.

  “The hacker—”

  “It’s him. He…” She looks down and then starts to crumble. I grab her fiercely in my arms, pulling her into my chest as she starts to cry.

  “He drugged me, a couple of years ago, and took these fucking pictures of me naked…”

  I close my eyes. My jaw grinds so tight I feel like my teeth might snap—just like I want to snap that little fucker’s neck. But I can be angry later. Now, I need to be the rock for her.

  I hold her, kissing the top of her head and stroking her back as she clings to my shirt. But slowly, she pulls away to look up at me. “I’ve been a prisoner. They’re making these terrible movies—him and my agent Jim, and these Russian guys.”

  “Vadik Rykov?”

  She pales, nodding. “Yeah, him.” She pulls close to me. “Niko, I’m pretty sure they’re laundering money or something.”

  I close my eyes and pull her tighter against me. Forget the “maybe.” This confirms it. And it confirms what I knew in my heart. She’s not involved with the Volkov bullshit. She’s caught up in it, like a bird in a net.

  Suddenly, I hear a crashing sound, and muttered, slurred swear. Belle gasps as I push her behind me and pull the gun from my jacket. A man stumbles around the corner. My lips curl in fury when I realize who it is.

  Daniel stares dumbly at the men on the ground I knocked out. His eyes slide up to mine, and he stiffens.

  “Aww fuck—”

  He chokes when I grab him by the neck and slam him into the wall. I see red. I see nothing but my rage. I want to kill him—right here, and right now. And I’m going to.

  But then a hand lands on my arm. I blink, and suddenly, the rage melts away. I turn to let my eyes lock with Belle’s. And just that look reminds me that I don’t have to be this version of myself. I don’t need to be the monster.

  I can just be the man in love with this girl.

  But this ends right here and right now. The hold this piece of shit has over Belle is over, now. I snarl as I slam him back into the wall. I do it again, making him sob as his face goes white.

  “You have something that does not belong to you,” I snarl.

  “Fuck you, man,” he slurs. “Do you know who the fuck I am?”

  I smile. “Do you know who I am?”

  He sneers at me. “Yeah, trash. You’re trash, and when my friends get their hands on—”

  “Let’s move to a better question, Daniel,” I hiss dangerously. “Forget who I am. Do you know what I’m capable of?”

  “I don’t give a fuck what you—”

  Daniel chokes as my gun barrel jams between his lips into the back of his throat. His eyes go wide and cross-eyed. And I watch the fight instantly deflate inside of him. He whimpers, gurgling around the gun.

  “I could kill you,” I hiss quietly. “Right here, right now. And I would sleep like a fucking baby tonight afterwards.” My eyes narrow. “Have you ever seen what a gunshot to the back of a throat does to someone’s head, Daniel?” I lean close to his ear. “Not in the movies, you little shit. I mean for real.”

  He sobs.

  “I have. And I won’t flinch to see it again.”

  Daniel whimpers and chokes. I look down to see the dark stain spreading over the front of his suit pants. I smirk.

  “You have something that belongs to Belle. Pictures of her, you disgusting little piece of shit.”

  He sobs and nods eagerly.

  “They’re just on his phone,” Belle says quietly from behind me. “And he’s a terrible liar. I believe him.”

  I turn back to him. “Phone,” I hiss.

  Daniel fumbles, shaking as he jabs a hand into his pocket and all but throws the phone into my chest. I glare into his eyes as I pass it back to Belle.

  “Take the SIM card out.”

  I hear her fumble with the phone. “Okay, got it.”

  “Smash it into pieces.” I smile. “Bite sized.”

  I yank the gun out of Daniel’s mouth as I hear Belle stomping her heels into the floor behind me. Her hand slides into mine with handful of little broke up bits of SIM card.

  Daniel stares down at the bits of plastic in my hand, then up into my eyes. “You’re joking.”

  “Open wide, fuck-face.”

  He shakes his head. “No. No way, man! Look, you got what you wanted, okay!? And I can pay you—”

  “I don’t want your fucking money, Daniel,” I hiss. I raise the gun. “I want you to open your goddamn mouth and eat this fucking SIM card, or I’ll find a different way to get it into your digestive track. And trust me,” I sneer as I lean close. “That way will be much less pleasant.”

  He stares at me. “You’re fucking insane.”

  I smile. “Yes, I am. Now eat.”

  I don’t watch Daniel as he chokes down the bits of plastic. I watch her. Belle stands next to me, staring at him. And the look of triumph and relief on her face is… well, perfect.

  “There!” Daniel sobs, choking and wincing as he swallows. “There! Are you happy now?!”

  I turn to Belle. “I’m going to knock him out now, if that’s okay.”

  Her lips curl into a sneer at him. “Yes please.”

  “No! Don’t—”

  Daniel slumps against the wall as the handle of my gun slams into his temple. He grunts as he drops to the floor.

  “Come on,” I growl. I holster the gun. Belle gasps as I scoop her into my arms. I whirl, bolting down the hall and then through a set of doors into a maintenance hallway. I follow the way I snuck in here, all the way
to the security door I disarmed and jammed open.

  Outside, I stop and I kiss her—long and slow. I keep kissing her until I know we can’t put off leaving another second. Then I put her on my bike, and I swing a leg over to settle in front of her. Belle’s arms slide around me. Her face presses to my back. For the first time in six months, my heart starts to beat again.

  The engine rumbles and throbs beneath us. The tires find purchase. And then, we’re gone.

  I know this is trouble. I know I’m shaking up hell itself right now. I’m disobeying a direct order from Lev, and I’m stealing something important from the Volkovs.

  I know this could mean war. But I don’t give a shit. I don’t care about the consequences, or the fallout from this. Come what may, I’ll fight, like I’ve been fighting my whole life. And now, I finally have something to fight for.

  I have her. And I’m never giving her up.

  The bike roars into the night. Into the wind, with an angel on my back.

  We’re miles outside the city when my earpiece begins to ring nonstop. And it’s Lev’s ringtone.

  I bring the bike to the side of the road and turn the engine off. I turn, and I grin when I see her looking at me. She bites her lip, and I can’t stop myself from leaning down to kiss her.

  “I missed you so much,” she whispers desperately into my mouth. I groan and keep kissing her, until my lips are numb and the phone in my pocket is about to explode.

  When I pull back and finally pull the phone out, her eyes drop to it.

  “You’re really blowing up there.”

  I shrug, raising a brow. “Yeah.”

  “We’re in a bunch of shit, aren’t we?”

  I smile. “Me, not we.”

  Belle shakes her head. “I know what I said. Just so we’re clear, it’s we.”

  I grin. But then the fucking phone starts blowing up again. With a growl, I answer it and bring it to my ear.

  “You goddamn idiot.”

  “Lev—”

  “Goddamnit, Niko!! Do you have any fucking idea what you’ve done?!”

  “Lev…”

  “Do you even fucking care?! Niko, you just turned this from a negotiation into a war that we—”