Bound Together (Sea Haven/Sisters of the Heart 6)

"And?" Maxim said.

"Shackler inherited billions from his brother, but also a huge international shipping company. As international president of the Swords, he had already built his own empire on human trafficking. It's outdoing drugs and he caught on to that very early. With the ships, he can charge an outrageous amount of money to special clients with special needs. They like to kill their victims after or during the time they use them."

Maxim nodded. "I ran into them a few weeks back. Four of the children are with me now. I couldn't save their sister." There was regret, even sorrow in his voice.

"Evan is extremely paranoid. He moves constantly and isn't easily tracked. By the time I get to one hideout, he's already gone. Deveau marrying Elle Drake changed all that. As a member of the Swords club I knew sooner or later I'd get a chance at him; now I'm certain of it. He sent me here, without wearing colors, to set up a camp for more Swords to come in. I'm supposed to find out everything there is to know about the security around Jackson and his wife. From the way it looks to me, he plans on killing Deveau and taking the wife."

There was silence. Ilya pinned him with the same silvery eyes. Their father's eyes. "What are your plans?"

"I'm going to talk to Deveau and Elle Drake. I have to do it carefully. We just arrived so I need to scout around and make certain Evan didn't send any other scouts ahead. It's like him to put something like that into play. My brothers are on that now."

"What brothers?" Maxim asked. It was asked a little belligerently.

There it was. The question he knew would come. The only person he would ever tell his story to was Blythe. No one else. In the telling he would be revealing things to her about the others, things that were nobody else's business. Still, it was important to him to integrate his two families. On the other hand, he wasn't about to apologize to any of them, not after what he'd done for them.

"There were only eighteen survivors of my school. We formed a family of sorts." A very lethal one. "We watch one another's backs, and they watched yours. When I was given the assignment to go after Evan, they were already disappearing because Sorbacov would put a hit out on one of them after some trumped-up offense. We knew it was a matter of time before he went after all of us. We devised a plan to escape, but once I really looked into Evan, I knew he had to be taken down." Viktor wasn't about to tell them the real reason he took the assignment, not with Ilya in the room.

"One by one they came out of hiding and joined the Swords in order to back me up. When this is over, I plan to live here. It's Blythe's home and she needs to be here with her sisters and all of you. That means I make this my home. And they'll be with us."

He didn't dare look at Blythe's face. Fortunately, he'd chosen well, and she didn't contradict him in front of the others. He would have to thank her for that later. He massaged the tension gathering in the back of her neck.

"You plan on settling here with seventeen other men?" Stefan asked.

"Two of them are women."

Blythe moved, a subtle retreat, but he settled his fingers around the nape of her neck and kept her close.

"We plan to purchase some land and houses. Set up businesses. Go legit. Or as legit as we're able to go. We have our own club with our own colors."

"Bikers," Ilya said. "Outlaws."

"Of sorts." More like assassins, and every single one of his brothers knew that. They weren't all clean, with the exception--maybe--of his baby brother.

10

THERE was a longer silence while his brothers did exactly what Viktor was doing--drinking coffee to give themselves a little time to figure out how to respond to that. Blythe bit her lip to keep from breaking the silence. Seventeen others? Good God. Was he crazy? If they all were as scary as his friend Reaper, then she was moving out and leaving the house to all of them. His birth brothers could deal with them.

"So you plan to bring an outlaw biker club with you to settle here. Blythe?" Ilya looked straight at Viktor's wife. "How do you feel about that?"

Viktor's fingers tightened involuntarily on the nape of her neck in warning. She moistened suddenly dry lips, feeling as if she were walking through a minefield with all the Prakenskiis.

"I want Viktor to have a home near his brothers--his family," she hastily added. "If these other men and women mean that to him--that they're family as well--then of course they should be close to him." That was as diplomatic as she could possibly make it. She stumbled a little under every single one of the Prakenskii brothers' eyes. They were weighing her words, watching to see if she was under duress of any kind.

Of course she was under duress with Viktor back and all of them watching her like hawks. She took another deep breath. "And all of you should accept them into the family."

"All of us, Blythe?" Gavriil said very gently. He rarely spoke above a low tone, but for some reason, one could always hear and understand him.

A faint tremor went down her back. She'd made a mistake and she could feel it. Although it didn't show on their faces, they knew.

"Blythe, why don't we go get some beer for everyone rather than this coffee," Ilya suggested.

"Why don't you leave my wife the hell alone," Viktor snapped, sitting up straight. Menace poured off of him in waves.

Immediately tension ratcheted up another notch. Blythe despised being the bone of contention, but really? Seventeen members of an outlaw biker club in her home? On the farm? What?

"That's still to be determined," Lev said. "I think I'd like to go with Blythe and Ilya into the other room and talk this out."

"Maybe the two of you can step outside with me and I'll teach you some manners. Whether you like it or not, I'm still the head of this family, and Blythe is most definitely my wife."

"Fuck that," Ilya said crudely. "You don't show up after thirty years of silence and decide we're going to follow your lead. It doesn't work that way, and just for your information, Blythe is our family."

Viktor was out of his chair so fast Blythe didn't have time to catch ahold of his arm. Ilya and Lev both leapt up as well.

"Seriously?" Gavriil's voice was calm. He didn't move from his chair. "That's how you plan on handling this situation? Sit down, you two, unless you want him to beat you to a bloody pulp."

"He couldn't," Ilya stated.

"He could," Gavriil said. "What's more, he would. He is the head of the family whether you want to accept that or not. Blythe is his wife. You wouldn't allow anyone to interfere in your relationship with Joley any more than I would allow it with Lexi."

Ilya shook his head. "He was gone thirty years. He didn't do a fucking thing for me, for any of us. He has his own family and has chosen to become an outlaw biker."

Blythe inhaled sharply. That wasn't true. All of them had made bargains with the devil in order to keep their youngest brother as clean as possible. He went to the least brutal school. He worked for Interpol in a legitimate business. She knew they'd all looked after him. Her sisters had told her how much keeping the baby of the family as clean as possible meant to them all.

She expected Viktor to object, but instead, he went absolutely still and then like ice. At least his exterior was like ice. Beneath that glacier was a red-hot volcanic roiling mass that could explode at any time.

"That's enough, Ilya," Gavriil said quietly. "You have no idea what you're talking about."

Viktor paced across the room to the wide stone fireplace, his back to his brothers. He stood staring at the pictures on the mantle, and Blythe found herself standing as well, suddenly terrified for him. There was nothing she could say or do; it was already too late. She knew the exact moment when he saw it. His hand reached out and his body jerked as though someone had punched him hard right in the gut.

She'd framed it in gold filigree. The calligraphy said Held with love, surrounded by two loving hearts. Their daughter, Viktoria. She'd lived two days, and a nurse had taken a picture of the tiny infant lying on Blythe's stomach. It was the only picture she had of their child and she'd put t

he only picture she had of Viktor on the other side, so their child had her mother and father with her in that moment. She'd had the same picture put on canvas for her wall in her sitting room, but for him to see this now . . .

Viktor's finger stroked a gentle caress over the infant as if he could somehow touch her through the glass. Blythe had done the exact same thing so many times she worried she'd wear down the glass. Grief filled the room, so strong, so intense she couldn't stop herself from going to him. For her it was five years. For him, their child had just died. How much more could he take?

She wrapped her arms around him and just held him, feeling the shudders go through his body as he tried to remain upright and unbowed in facing the reality of the death of their child. There was silence in the room. She knew the Prakenskiis were gifted, she just didn't know in what way. She had no way of knowing if they felt his grief. He wouldn't like that. He wouldn't want to appear vulnerable in any way. She desperately wanted to shield him, she just didn't know how.

Blythe knew the others couldn't see the picture, not with Viktor in front of it. She slipped around Viktor until her front was pressed tightly to his side. The position enabled her to reach up to the mantle.

"Gavriil is with Lexi," she said softly, reaching up to touch Lexi's picture. "She's the youngest and a sweetheart. You'll love her immediately, Viktor. No one can help it. Isn't that right, Gavriil?" She'd chosen him because he remembered his brother. He knew what Viktor had gone through, at least part of it. He'd help her defuse the volatile situation and at the same time give Viktor the minutes he needed to recover.

Gavriil stood up as well and came to the fireplace. She thought his approach was interesting. He didn't come up behind them, but rather from an angle, keeping his pace slow and deliberate. His eyes were on the pictures. Not Lexi's, but the one his brother had touched so gently. He reached out as if he would touch Viktor's shoulder.

"Don't." One word from Viktor. A warning. A statement.

Gavriil's hand moved to Lexi's picture. "I'm working on getting her to marry me. She said yes, but we haven't actually gotten to the priest. I'm afraid if I push it, she'll run. She's a beautiful person, inside and out, and she has tremendous patience with me. I can't wait for you to meet her."

There was the smallest of tremors in Viktor's hand when he took the picture from Gavriil. That nearly imperceptible shake made Blythe's heart clench in reaction. She knew Gavriil had to see it because he didn't miss anything. She knew if he looked at her she would shatter. She moved closer to Viktor, if it was at all possible, her fingers curling tightly in the tee that was stretched across his broad chest. At once Viktor's hand covered hers.

"I'd love to meet her. As soon as this mess is over, Gavriil, I'll be more than happy to meet my future sister-in-law. I take it she's the one who works the farm." Viktor's voice was rock steady. He turned Blythe away from the fireplace, wrapping his arms around her as he did so.

She remembered the feeling of being safe and protected from earlier, when they were together. Viktor could do that, wrap her up in his strength. He would fight for her if there were need. He would console her and comfort her. He was the one needing those things, yet the moment she was distressed, he offered them to her.

"I cook," Lev volunteered before anyone else could say anything. "Maybe we should throw a big party."

"Barbecue," Maxim added. "The women can make all those side dishes that are so good. And Lucia makes this dessert that's sheer heaven. I'm putting on weight with that girl's cooking. Airiana and I are adopting Lucia and her sisters and brother. Benito is a mini-me, unfortunately, and determined to keep his sisters from ever coming to harm again. Expect him to come down Blythe's chimney or something."

Blythe was certain they'd read the grief filling the room. They didn't understand it, but several of Viktor's brothers glanced at the framed pictures she kept on the mantle. She knew they were unable to see what had upset their oldest brother, because Viktor had deliberately turned the picture away from their line of sight, but they followed Gavriil's lead in spite of the tension between them all.

"Sounds good," Viktor said. "I want to meet all the wives."

"If you don't mind," Blythe said, "I need a little air." She could barely breathe, Viktor's emotions choking her. She wished she could be stoic like him, an expression of stone, cold eyes and steady hands. Once past the initial moment, that first piercing of his heart, he had stood unbending. She hoped if she got Viktor out of the room, Gavriil would be able to talk his brothers into being kinder. He saw the photograph.

"We'll be right back," Viktor said immediately. He took her hand and, without another glance at his brothers, led her out onto her spacious wraparound covered porch.

Right in front of her stood the man Viktor had called "Reaper." He rested one hip against a tree, eating an apple. Blythe narrowed her eyes at him. "Is that my apple?"

"Yes." Reaper kept eating.

That meant, with all the Prakenskii brothers, including Gavriil, in her living room, Reaper had entered her kitchen undetected. That was a scary thought.

"Is everyone still here?"

Reaper paused in the act of taking another bite. He nodded. "Yep."

"Are they all eating my apples?"

Reaper nodded again. "Yep."

Blythe couldn't help it. She knew she shouldn't encourage Viktor or his brothers, but Reaper standing there without expression, looking scary with his tattoos and badass persona, eating an apple he'd filched from her kitchen, was too funny. She burst out laughing.

"Have you eaten anything tonight?"

Reaper glanced down at the mostly eaten apple. "This apple."

"You're not going to fix them all food. Get out of here," Viktor snapped before she could offer. "I mean it, Reaper. Take everyone with you."

"Not gonna happen, Czar."

"Do you think my own birth brothers are going to take out a gun and shoot me?"

"Sounded like it," Reaper said. "'Course I would have blown his fuckin' head off first," he added in the same casual tone. "Maybe one or two of the others, but Savage, Storm and Ice would have taken them."

Blythe shivered. For a moment she'd forgotten she was dealing with men who had no compunction about killing. Reaper was so casual, as if he was talking about the weather. These men were trained assassins. She'd thought Gavriil was bad, that the others had done what they needed to do to survive. Yes, they were capable of killing if they had no other choice, but Viktor and Reaper and probably the others would make it their choice. They didn't seem to have a middle ground.

"You don't lay a finger on those boys," Viktor said, his tone low and mean.

"Wasn't plannin' on using my hands, Czar. A bullet would have worked." Reaper sounded as calm as ever.

"Get. The. Fuck. Out."

Blythe threw her hands into the air. "That's it. I'm done. I'm at my absolute limit. Viktor, leave. Take your men with you. All of them. I'm going in and going to bed."

She turned and Viktor's six birth brothers were fanned out behind them, all staring at Reaper with cool eyes.

"And you. All of you. Go home. I'm perfectly fine. Perfectly fine. I'm sorry you got called out in the middle of the night, and I thank you for coming, but go home. Ilya and Lev, both of you should be ashamed of yourselves. Your brother comes home and instead of welcoming him you are nasty and mean. I'm ashamed of both of you. I don't care what resentments you harbor, the least you could have done was ask him how he is. Now go. All of you."

She pulled away from Viktor, stomped right through the wall of Prakenskii brothers, slammed her screen and then the door, flipped off the porch light and stormed upstairs. She was shaking by the time she got to the top of the stairs. Hopefully no one got killed on her front porch. If they did, she was burying them out in the forest and then she was getting in her car and driving away.

Sinking down onto the top stair, she covered her face with her hands and let herself cry. She thought she wouldn't have any more tears, but Viktor

had unleashed an entire flood. She didn't even bother to listen to hear if the men came to blows or not. Eventually she made her way up to the master bedroom. Viktor's scent was everywhere. His ragged denim jacket was on the end of her bed.

She should have tossed it out of her room, but she couldn't. Instead, she ignored it completely, took a hot, scented bath in the hopes that her perfume would cover Viktor's outdoorsy, spicy smell, the one she loved, and got ready for bed. In the end she picked up his jacket, held it to her like a favorite blanket, pulled up her covers, turned off her light and went to sleep from sheer exhaustion.

*

BLYTHE came awake fast, aware she wasn't alone. She took in the air around her to try to determine who was in the room with her and if she was in danger or not.

"Are you awake?"

She recognized the voice. Reaper. Viktor's friend. She immediately sat up, clutching Viktor's jacket to her, thankful she hadn't slept in the nude as she normally did. She'd been a little afraid Viktor might show up, and she didn't want to feel vulnerable. Anxiety gripped her. She pushed back the hair tumbling in her face and looked frantically around for Viktor. Reaper had to be able to hear her heart pounding. She felt like her heart might just come right out of her chest.

"Is something wrong? Did something happen to him?" She pushed back the covers quickly. "Take me to him. I'll call Libby. She's home and she can heal anything." There was no hiding the sudden terror in her voice. Viktor had just come home. Had Evan found out already that he was undercover? Had they shot him? Killed him? Had his birth brothers lost their minds and attacked him?

Reaper shook his head as she dropped both legs to the floor in preparation for finding her clothes. She didn't even have time to be embarrassed about being caught in her thin, racer-back night tee and little boy shorts, or that she had Viktor's jacket held so tightly against her. Only then did she become aware they weren't alone. She turned her head toward the corner where her reading chair was. A woman was curled up there watching her closely--the same woman who had been sitting so casually, as if she belonged, on the back of Viktor's motorcycle.