Gavriil (Stepanov Mafia)

When Gavril rolled off of me, and I finally found the energy to sit up in bed, he leaned against the headboard, arms crossed behind his head, and sighed. “You may have noticed I didn’t bring you anything today.”

“Oh? No,” I lied.

Gavril turned his perfect lips up into a disbelieving smirk and then continued. “I know you were your mother’s main caretaker and I didn’t want her care to suffer in your absence. So, I sent a full-time nurse to your house this afternoon. She will live there until you return. Or indefinitely, if you wish.”

I turned to him, mouth open in shock. “You hired a nurse?”

He nodded. “The same company that took care of my mother when she was ill.”

“Your mother was ill?”

He nodded but didn’t offer any more information, so I decided not to push it. “Thank you, Gavril. Thank you so much. That is incredibly kind.”

Really, it was. Not just for Gavril, but for anyone. If anyone had hired a live-in nurse to take care of my mother, I would have been blown away by the gesture. Emotion welled up inside of me –weeks’ worth of pushed down worries and anxieties bubbling up in the form of uncontrollable tears.

“It wasn’t a big deal,” Gavril said, clearly looking uncomfortable. “You’ve earned it.”

My head snapped up, surprised. Was that praise? I’d been able to deduce over the few weeks we’d been together that Gavril enjoyed being with me, but he had never said it out loud. He’d never given me a compliment that was in reference to my performance and not just the shape of my body.

“It is a big deal,” I said. I wanted to reach over and grab his hand, but I knew he would only pull away. “I have missed my mother terribly and knowing that she is being taken care of will make me feel so much better.”

Later that night, Devin called.

“Who in the hell is the woman in Mom’s room?” he asked.

The question alone made it obvious Devin hadn’t been home most of the day. According to Gavril, the nurse had been at the house since late morning, which meant Devin had left Mom alone in the house for at least twelve hours, maybe longer. I didn’t mention any of this though.

“Have you asked her?”

“She said she is a nurse,” he said, sounding as if he didn’t buy her story. “But Mom doesn’t have a nurse.”

“Clearly she does now.”

“Did you do this?” he asked. “How are we paying for this?”

“We aren’t,” I said quietly.

It took a few seconds for Devin to catch on. I could practically hear his brain grinding out my words and making sense of everything over the phone.

“You aren’t serious,” he said.

“Enough of this, Devin. I’m going to bed. This is a good thing. Just leave it alone.”

“Now he is paying to take care of our mom? What is going on over there?” he shouted.

“Just leave it alone,” I repeated before hanging up.

Surprisingly, since living with Gavril, I’d been getting better sleep than I could ever remember getting before. I woke up every day feeling rested and refreshed. But the past few days I’d felt out of sorts. I couldn’t seem to get enough sleep – taking a nap every afternoon before Gavril arrived home and still falling into bed before nine every night. It was strange, but I chalked it up to the rather acrobatic sex we’d been having.

However, my question regarding my sudden sleepiness seemed to be answered the next morning when I woke up feeling nauseated and dizzy. The housekeeper brought me soup, and I stayed in bed all day, nursing my stomach bug.

Chapter Ten

Gavril

Now that I was the boss, I didn’t often get my hands dirty. Not literally anyway. Any time someone needed to be taught a lesson, one of my men would handle it. However, when the person needing the lesson was one of my men, I liked to take care of those personally.

My father had always taught me that the most important thing about being a leader was keeping people in their place, making sure they knew where on the ladder they fell. If bottom feeders began thinking they could swim with the big sharks, things would go to chaos. It was one of the few useful things he’d ever taught me. So, when someone in my family began stepping out of line, I didn’t hesitate to give them a nudge (or a kick) back into place.

This time, it was a relatively new recruit – a young kid with a big ego and no experience to back it up. He’d been running around town talking about his power over people. Apparently, he wanted to use my name to intimidate people into giving him what he wanted. So, I used my fists to give him a strong dose of reality.