Chapter One
Bohdan
Heat bathes me as I close my eyes and turn my face to the sun. Who knew even six months ago that I’d be here on Corfu helping my friends build something new?
From a city rat and street thug to an investor in a paramilitary-style private security operation with Konstantin ‘King K’ Silvanov and Andrius-scary-motherfucker-hitman.
Yep, I’ve come a long way from a tiny flat in St Petersburg, with an abusive father and alcoholic mother.
I’m sweating, hot, and happy, which is a new feeling for me. It’s as if the sun is burning all the horror of my past away. Maybe if I stay here long enough, I’ll rise from the ashes like a phoenix. The idea makes me smile.
It won’t last, this surprising burst of joy. It never does. Happiness always seems so fleeting.
K told me something the other day, something deep for a hard fucker like him. Ex Bratva he may be now, but he’s still got that toughness bone deep in him. K told me that happiness is overrated; it is contentment we should be chasing.
I think he’s found his contentment with his partner, Cassie.
Andrius has certainly found his with Violet and their baby.
They’ve named her Eliana, which means daughter of the sun, but this is the third name that Violet has come up with. I’d go nuts if my wife kept changing my baby’s name, but Andrius doesn’t care.
Violet says she’s naming her as she gets to know her and that changes. She’s a bit of a hippy chick, I think. Total fucking opposite to her husband.
I glance over at her, laid out in the shade and flipping through a gardening magazine.
To her left, seated around a table, drawing furiously are Zoey, the dark-haired girl Konstantin hired for Bridge Tech and his friend from Russia, Maxim. Konstantin tracked Maxim down figuring he and Zoey would work well together, and they certainly do.
Bridge Tech is the only business he’s still interested in managing, other than this new security enterprise. He wants to make the games side of things big again, and once K gets his teeth into something, he sees it through. He’s leaving most other tasks to Margaret.
Maxim and Zoey are staying in a villa for a few days, which is only a three-minute stroll away. They came here today for a meeting with K, and they’ve stayed to work around the pool.
Maxim nearly shit a brick when Andrius went through his bag; he looked utterly terrified. Seeing it from his point of view, I could understand it. He and Zoey were greeted at the gates by an armed guard and ghostly-eyed Andrius demanding to inspect their bags. Now, though, he seems relaxed enough.
Us ex-Bratva men are playing rugby, except I don’t know the rules, so I’m mostly just hanging out in the sun enjoying the feeling of camaraderie and belonging.
I ought to soak it up before I fuck life up for myself again.
In a few days, I fly out to Paris. Hopefully to see the love, or maybe the hate, of my life. She has no idea I’m coming, but as soon as Damen gets my name to her husband as the best bet for close protection, I’ll be there, in her life.
Dasha. World famous ballerina and another street rat like me. A childhood friend from our shitty upbringing in St. Petersburg and now the darling of the world ballet scene.
Beautiful Dasha.
My love.
My hate.
My obsession.
My betrayer.
That woman fucked me over in the worst way and simply vanished. I thought she’d be a nobody. One of the millions of people who simply eek out an existence in Russian. Instead, she’s very much a somebody.
Married, too, as I found out when I saw her only weeks ago on an impromptu trip to the Paris opera with this bunch of reprobates.
It was an outing I had very much not wanted to be part of, organized by Maya, the wife of a Greek mobster. However, I could kiss Maya now for her crazy idea because it led me to my Dasha, the girl I thought I’d never see again. It has to be fate.
God wouldn’t show her to me if he didn’t mean for me to do something about it, right? So, I have.
I’ve created a false threat against her to enable me to infiltrate her life. Her new security guard will be little old me. I think of her face when she sees me and it makes me smile. I’m so fucked up because part of me wants to screw her life up completely, and part of me wants to save her. I’m like some lovelorn Jekyll and Hyde.
All I know is that I need to be close to her. And all my beautiful little ballerina will know is that her shitty husband has hired someone to protect her. Not because he loves her, but because she’s his cash cow.
I love this sun on my face, I think idly, my thoughts coming back to the present and the heat of the day.
Wind disturbs my hair, and I snap my eyes open and lower my head in time to see a rugby ball whizzing by me. I raise my arms in a belated attempt to catch it but miss.
“Fucking catch the ball,” Andrius shouts at me. “That’s the point of the game.”
It’s not my fault I suck, as I don’t know the rules. I’m only half assed anyway because it’s a stupid game, much less with everything else on my mind.
Jesus, Andrius and K are competitive. For two men who were so high up in the Bratva, their names literally have people crossing themselves in fear, they seem awfully childish about who wins this game.
Andrius drew the short straw when he got me on his team. K has one of the Spetsnaz guys, and he seems super competitive too. So Andrius has me, and I’m shit at this. He’s staring at me; his cold gray eyes storm clouds in his tan face. Next to him, grinning because he’s playing against us is Konstantin.
Andrius grabs the ball, shoots me a disgusted look, and walks back toward a still laughing Konstantin.
K has changed. The man who was Moscow’s most feared Bratva Pakhan has already changed once when he became a bona fide businessman in Britain. If you look up the word oligarch in a picture dictionary, you'll find an illustration of K. Now he’s gone back into his cocoon and come out all shiny new once more.
The man used to be serious. Focused. Hungry. Always wanting more. Now? He’s almost laid back. He laughs a lot too. He never used to. The reason he laughs a lot these days is sitting behind us on a lounge chair in the shade, a light blanket wrapped around her shoulders, and sipping at a frothy coffee she’s made.
The first thing K’s girlfriend, Cassie, did when she moved into the spare property on Andrius’ land was install an expensive coffee machine.
K and Cassie’s temporary home is where Andrius houses armed guards. Those guards are now living in a rental villa a few doors away. It’s a huge, cavernous place where they’re staying while everything is finalized for us to complete the purchase on the property and land next door to this. The place where we will build our security empire.
Two of the soldiers patrol the grounds, as they do on rotation every day.
So far, there are ten men in total waiting to be trained. They were all recruited by K and Andrius from their time in the Spetsnaz. Two of them I know. They were the pilots for the private jet K had as part of an airliner he owned. An airliner he’s now sold. He’s sold most things. More than I think he intended to at first. It means he’s rich. It also means he’s free.
I’m rich too. Not his level of course. But I’ve been paid very well for years by K, and I invested it wisely. I invested in the markets and did all my own research. No financial advisors or investment funds for me. I buy and sell all my shares myself and focus on emerging markets. I’ve made a killing. An absolute fucking killing of the highest order. If I had been born in a different country, I’d have been a Wall Street asshole for sure.