Chapter 428: Caught In A Bad… Romance??

[FROLO]

The Moskowskys never played dirty.

That was the first thought in Zhenya’s head as their car flipped a few times before they ended up in a ditch.

Sergei Moskowsky had made sure to let the realm know that he was a proud man. That he did whatever he did and was unapologetic about it.

Sergei Moskowsky never cared for reputations, much less that they could be stained.

For Sergei, only Yaroslav Gamov mattered. And lately... with Katya as an addition.

Sergei didn’t make his name by being a dirty-playing coward. Which could only mean one thing, even as Zhenya used his pheromones to break the door that was stuck.

He’d managed to claw the seat belt off of him, still holding his gun like he was ready to blow things to hell.

But this was one he knew.

Sergei never played dirty.

Maybe it was Yuriy, but Yuriy never did the dirty work. His brother was an annoyingly upright man who could have the entire Romanov madness in the underworld behind him but who refused to exploit it.

Besides, Yuriy would never try to kill Zhenya in a convoy like that.

The explosion wasn’t meant to contain them or scare them. It was meant to kill.

Zhenya could swear on his life that his brother would die before he sent anyone to kill Zhenya.

He knew Yuriy.

He knew Sergei... or at least Sergei’s methods.

Which meant that someone had betrayed them.

"Everyone take cover if you’re in a position to!" Zhenya shouted when the bullets began tearing through them. Whoever had ambushed them was not relenting.

Someone was desperate for them not to get to Romanov Steel, which was interestingly annoying because the people that Zhenya could have suspected were not cowards to do this.

What the hell was going on?

"Kill them all!! For Sergei!!" Zhenya heard one of their attackers shout, and the others cheered.

"For Sergei!!!"

And soon the shootout was intense.

Zhenya couldn’t help but roll his eyes at the absolute audacity these minions had.

It was obvious even in their scents that they were a blend of alphas and betas. They had different ranks spread out among them. The scents were nothing like hell.

But what made it even more hilarious was the fact that people who knew Sergei...

The real Sergei... Knew the alpha only ever employed betas as his mercenaries.

That Sergei never gave the other ranks a chance.

That the Hercules only had Svet and Andre as the eternal alphas because they were from the Romanov camp.

And the most ridiculous part of it all was the fact that trained Moskowsky soldiers never showed. Never talked in battle.

They came.

They murdered.

They left.

It was always that simple.

Even during the shootout two weeks ago that led to the government losing seven hundred and thirty-two personnel, the Moskowsky warriors had not once said a word.

They had simply done what they had been trained to do.

Fight back.

And when their alpha gave them the order to annihilate, they did annihilate everyone.

"What a bunch of clowns," Zhenya said, rolling his eyes before he got busy with the elimination.

In the SUV that was behind them that had also rolled to the side but not into the ditch, Aleksandr Petrov stayed bound to the seat. He’d tried to cut the seat belt, but he’d been unable to because his hands were bleeding profusely.

Or maybe because Alek didn’t want to go out there.

He didn’t want to fight and for Rastenkin to see him in that field.

He didn’t want to.

Perhaps that was why he smeared his blood on him and pretended to be unconscious while the government soldiers were fighting.

Kenzo noticed the change in Alek, but he knew better than to ask questions right now.

Instead, he dragged a pretending-to-be-unconscious Alek’s body out of the car and set him carefully to the side before he and the Bratva members he had come with began shooting.

Kenzo saw some of their men.

The low rankers. The ones who had much more to lose than those at the higher ranks.

He knew this was not fair. That they had not signed the people up only for Kenzo and the Bratva men to be shooting at each other.

But it was a sacrifice that had to be made.

And so Kenzo unfortunately joined, shooting at his own men because Aleksandr asked for it. Because there was a cover they needed to maintain.

It wasn’t fair.

Wasn’t right.

But the lines between right and wrong had gotten so blurry over the past weeks.

They had crossed into uncharted territory, and sacrifices were not things that they could pretend weren’t needed.

That was what this was.

A sacrifice.

The rest of the injured soldiers dragged themselves toward where Alek was, hidden behind the car and looking fairly normal.

If the injured government soldiers saw and noticed Alek pretending, they didn’t say a word about it. Because Alek was the Bratva leader. They had been briefed, and honestly, going against a man who was a Bratva leader was not what they had signed up for.

At the presidential palace, President Boris watched his chief of staff in action. He could see the way Zhenya was doing his best, but this wasn’t good enough.

Chief Zhenya could do better.

President Boris knew it.

So he dialed into the alpha’s earpiece while they were seated in the middle of a command room inside the presidential palace.

"Chief Zhenya, the goal was to go to Romanov Steel, not to shoot at Moskowsky subordinates who are clearly a distraction," President Boris stated, his chill, disapproving voice hitting his chief of staff’s ears.

"Sir, Senator Aleksandr is hurt. We can proceed, but we need him for the raid; otherwise this would have all been for nothing," Chief Zhenya said as he fired at the determined shooters.

What the fuck were these people made of?

So many of them had fallen, yet they were still shooting at Zhenya Levin.

"Then grab a car and drive him there. They probably know that you and your men are going for them in Romanov Steel. Hurry and let the rest of the soldiers do their job," President Boris demanded.

"Yes, sir," Zhenya said respectfully, falling back.

He shouted a few orders to his surviving men before he walked to a parked car on the street. The streets were clear, thanks to the shooting.

"Bring him along!" Zhenya shouted to his men, and they carried the senator to the next car, still with bullets flying around, but the mission had to be completed. Even if the senator was injured.

Aleksandr flinched when Kenzo looked at him.

"Stay with them. Cover us, Kenzo," Alek said once he was settled in the car.

"Are you done?" Zhenya asked impatiently, and three more soldiers got into the car while Zhenya started it.

Convinced all was ready, Zhenya drove off, his mind filled with questions about how the fuck their attackers knew their exact position and the exact makes of their SUVs.

Because it was no mistake that there had been RPGs there.

Someone sold them out.

And Zhenya would find them, even as he looked at the senator in the back seat through the rearview mirror.