The Reluctant Mafia Bride

Episode 4

Kirill's Pov

Scott’s eyes widened, his pleas coming in desperate, muffled noises behind the gag as he saw the gleam of the brass knuckles in my hand. I didn’t rush. There was a certain satisfaction in taking my time, in letting him feel the dread pooling in his stomach. He knew exactly what was coming, and he deserved every second of it.

I tilted my head, letting him see the calm that filled me, the calm he’d disrupted with his arrogance, his pitiful betrayal. I slipped the brass knuckles onto my fingers, feeling their weight settle into place—a solid reminder of the consequences Scott Alistair had earned.

He shook his head, his eyes filling with tears as his gaze flickered from my hand to my face. The look he gave me was that of a man clinging to hope, as if maybe, just maybe, he could appeal to some hidden part of me for mercy. But there was nothing there for him—nothing but cold, calculated anger and a promise fulfilled.

I didn’t waste words. I raised my fist, and the first blow landed with a sharp crack against his cheekbone, the sound echoing in the otherwise silent office. His head jerked to the side, and blood immediately appeared, trickling from the corner of his mouth. I gave him a second to process the pain, to understand that this was just the beginning, and then I hit him again, this time in the jaw, feeling the crunch beneath my knuckles as bone gave way to force.

Scott tried to twist in the chair, to pull away, but Matteo had secured him well. He was trapped, helpless to do anything but sit there and take it. His muffled screams filled the room, desperate and choked, as he writhed in the chair, every attempt at escape only making the scene more pathetic.

The blows came one after another—steady, precise, each one a punctuation to the crimes he’d committed. The side of his face was already beginning to swell, his left eye starting to bruise, and his mouth hung open as blood pooled, dripping down his chin. His breaths came in labored, frantic bursts, his chest heaving as he tried to breathe through the pain.

I paused for a moment, watching as he struggled to focus, his head rolling back to face me. His eyes, swollen and bloodshot, were filled with fear, but more than that, with despair. He knew he was done. And that realization—seeing it wash over him—was almost as satisfying as the impact of my fists.

“Did you really think you’d get away with it?” I asked quietly, my voice low and even. There was no need to raise it; every word cut through the room like a blade.

He shook his head, a miserable, pitiful attempt at a plea, but I had no sympathy for men like him. Men who stole, men who lied, men who used their power to hurt those weaker than them. Scott Alistair was nothing more than a parasite, and I had no qualms about showing him what happened to parasites in my world.

I drew back, landing one final blow to his face, the force of it snapping his head back against the chair. His body went slack, his head hanging forward, blood dripping in slow, steady drops onto his pristine white shirt.

I stood over him, my breathing steady, unaffected by the violence I’d just unleashed. This wasn’t personal, after all. This was business, and Scott Alistair had crossed a line that could never be uncrossed.

“No one steals from me and lives,” I said, my voice as cold as the winter night outside.

I took a step back, slipping the brass knuckles off, feeling the weight of them disappear from my hands.

Ilya stepped forward, his movements quiet as he handed me a sleek black pistol fitted with a silencer. The weight of the gun was familiar, almost comforting as I wrapped my fingers around the cool metal, feeling its power. It was a sleek, matte black, fitted with a silencer to keep this encounter private. Ilya’s eyes met mine briefly as he handed it over, his face unreadable, a silent nod of approval in the slight dip of his head. He knew, as well as I did, that Scott Alistair’s days had been numbered from the moment he chose to cross me.

Scott’s head lolled forward, his swollen face barely recognizable beneath the blood and bruises. His breaths came in short, panicked gasps, the cloth shoved into his mouth soaking up his desperate pleas. He tried to shake his head, some primal part of him clinging to the impossible hope that he could plead his way out of this.

I took a step closer, feeling the weight of the gun in my hand as I raised it, leveling it between his eyes. The barrel of the gun was inches from his face, and his gaze focused on it, his pupils dilated with raw terror. His muffled cries grew frantic, his wide, bloodshot eyes searching for a way out, but he was trapped, just as he had trapped himself with his greed and his weakness.

The room seemed to narrow, the walls closing in until it was just me, Scott, and the inevitable end he’d brought upon himself. I leaned in close, my voice low and cold.

“See you in hell, Scott,” I whispered.

His eyes widened further, the terror there morphing into a silent scream as he registered the finality in my words.

And then I pulled the trigger.

The shot was quiet, barely a hiss in the air, but the impact was immediate. The bullet punched through his skull, hitting him squarely between the eyes. His head jerked back, the light in his eyes flickering out in an instant. Blood spattered behind him, a single drop hitting the glass on his desk, staining the expensive, carefully arranged papers with a sharp, dark smear. The gunshot was clean, efficient—no theatrics, no mess. Just the blunt, swift execution of a man who had lost his right to mercy.

Scott’s body slumped in the chair, his head hanging at an unnatural angle, lifeless. The silence that followed Scott's last breath was thick, pressing down like a final, heavy curtain. I stood over his slumped body, the faint scent of gunpowder lingering in the air, mingling with the coppery smell of blood. I let the weight of it all settle, savoring the cold, quiet satisfaction of a job finished.

But then—a sharp, piercing scream cut through the silence, snapping me back to the present. My head jerked up, every muscle on high alert as I spun toward the doorway.

There, framed in the dim glow from the hallway, stood a woman. She was frozen, her brown eyes wide with horror, locked onto Scott’s lifeless body. Her hands flew to her mouth, trying to stifle the scream that had already escaped. And in that moment, I felt a jolt—a rare flicker of something unfamiliar.

Even through her terror, she was stunning. The world seemed to narrow around her, the horror on her face only amplifying the light in her eyes. They were a warm, honeyed brown that seemed to hold fire, like polished amber. Her skin was flawless, rich and brown complementing the dark curls that framed her face, tumbling down her shoulders. She wore a fitted blue dress that hugged her curves, and despite the fear in her eyes, there was something strong about her, something unbreakable. For a moment, it felt as though the whole room was caught in the tension between us.

Her gaze darted from Scott's body to my face, and I watched the realization dawn in her eyes—She knew what I had done. I held her gaze, my expression cold, calculating, assessing her as she stood rooted to the spot, trapped in a mix of shock and terror. There was something electric between us, something that stopped her from running but also kept me from moving, a strange, silent connection that pulsed in the space between us.

Then, like a snap, the spell broke. She spun around, fleeing from the doorway with a grace that matched her beauty. I felt a surge of adrenaline as I watched her go, her figure disappearing down the hallway.

Matteo took a step forward, instinctively moving to handle the situation, but I raised a hand, stopping him. There was no need for that. She wasn't like the others, and I knew—I couldn’t explain it, but I knew—she would keep her silence. And perhaps more than that, she intrigued me. The way she looked at me, the way fear and defiance fought in her eyes, was something I hadn’t encountered in a long time. Most people either crumbled in my presence or tried to flatter their way into my good graces. She did neither. She just…stood there, staring at me like she was trying to figure me out.

I could have sent him after her—he could catch her easily, silence her if needed. But I didn’t want that. The thought of her terrified eyes, the honey-brown depths that had dared to hold my gaze even after what she'd seen, stayed with me. She wouldn’t be running far. She was already caught, even if she didn’t realize it yet.

"Let her go," I said, my voice soft but final.

Matteo hesitated, clearly unsure, but he didn’t argue. He knew better. I knew, as certainly as I knew my own name, that she would be mine. She might run, might try to escape, but it was futile. She was already tangled in my world now, and soon enough, she’d realize that nothing—not fear, not distance, not time—would be enough to sever the tie we’d forged in that fleeting, intense moment.