Total pages in book: 95
Estimated words: 89090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 89090 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 445(@200wpm)___ 356(@250wpm)___ 297(@300wpm)
“What?” I swear my vocabulary is usually far more extensive than I’ve depicted tonight. I’m merely too shocked he went for the bargaining chip he regularly tossed on the table when he wasn’t old enough to gamble.
It was moves like this that regularly saw him on Alek’s hitlist.
It was just lucky he also let me renege on our bet as often as Alek threatened to kill him.
With his thick arms crossed and his brows still dotted with sweat, he repeats, “If I win, you have to kiss me.” The reason behind his bid makes sense when he adds, “In front of him.” He nudges his head to Vasily, who is still in negotiations with Sasha.
Twenty minutes ago, I would have been panicked out of my mind that he was about to ruin my plans to get my father back to his family this month. Now I’m not so worried.
Vasily doesn’t want me.
He wants his inheritance.
It doesn’t mean I’ll act as if I am worthless, though.
“And if you lose?” I can’t believe I’m even contemplating this, but my father isn’t the man who murdered my mother and almost killed my brother. He is the man who raised me for the past twenty-one years. The one who handed over every penny of his life savings so I could open a clothing boutique. Brecken doesn’t have my last name or an ounce of the same blood, but he is my father, and I will do anything I can to give him the opportunity to raise his daughter with as much love and respect as he instilled in me.
Yev’s grief doesn’t budge in the slightest when he replies, “That’s never going to happen, so you’ve got nothing to worry about.”
11
YEV
As the crowd moves in close to the ring, I squash down the tuft I forever gave Feo shit about with gel before making my way to the registration table. Although the fret on Polina’s face is genuine, I don’t believe a word she spoke earlier.
I fought in these circuits for years with Feo before I bolstered my skills abroad, and every single tournament refunded the bidders if a fighter forfeited.
There would be no bidders if the bookies scammed their clients of money.
Although I’m super curious to work out what the fuck is going on with Polina, I went along with the scam she instigated solely to see how Vasily would react to my barter. Does he give a shit his girl may be stepping out on him? Or does his interest in her have nothing to do with sex?
It is clearly the latter because no man with Polina Kotova in their sights will pay for her doppelgänger. That would be the equivalent of the screamers slipping into Feo’s bed instead of mine.
The remembrance that I lost my brother the chance to work out how fun the loud girls are, I toss down double the amount needed onto the registration table, then nudge my head to the ring.
“I want to be next.”
“The fighters have already been paired.”
I pull out the three thousand Vasily returned to me this morning before saying again, “I want to be next.”
The man with sable eyes licks his lips while dragging the bundle to his side of the desk. “Next it is.”
Pretending I can’t feel the hungry eyes of over three dozen women on me, I strip out of the Italian tourist sweatshirt I tossed on to authenticate my ruse that I’m not my brother before tying my laces and climbing through the ropes.
As I warm up my muscles for their second undertaking tonight, I keep my eyes front and center. I can feel Polina’s eyes on me. I don’t need to see them to know she’s watching me.
I also don’t want to acknowledge who she is seated with.
My job as a fighter is to give the crowd a show, but I was too fucking pissed when I spotted Vasily schmoozing up to Polina to give them their money’s worth. I knocked my opponent out in the first round and was warned by the fight organizer that he doesn’t care how much money I’ve made him—by me, he meant Feo—I’d be out on my ass if I did it again.
“Where the fuck are they growing these men?” The words tumble from my mouth as my opponent enters the ring from the other end. He’s bigger than the man I fought only twenty minutes ago and appears just as docile. “I thought Frankenstein’s lab was a myth. Shows how much I know.”
My opponent proves he’s all brawn and no brains. “Fe-fi-fo-fum—”
“That’s Jack and the Beanstalk, dumbass,” I interrupt a second before the referee signals the start of our fight.
To keep the invitations coming my way, I let my opponent get in a few hits, before stunning him with a left swung jab. I barely put any weight behind my strike, but he stumbles back like he drank too much moonshine in the swamp he was dragged out of.