“Give the boy a prize,” Lev scoffs viciously.
“You are my brother, Anton,” Yulian says with a wince. “And I have love for you. But you’re the one who’s always telling me to be ruthless when you want something.”
“Not against your own fucking blood!” Lev roars. “You broke the most sacred oath we make as a brotherhood. Except yours is a double betrayal, because he’s your blood brother as well as your don.”
“How could you do this, Yulian?” Jessa asks softly.
Her eyes bore into his. I can sense his will start to crumble under the weight of so many broken loyalties.
“Tell them, Yulian,” Marina says, bitterness coating her tone. “Just fucking tell them.”
“I love her,” he says, so quietly that I almost miss it.
We all spin wildly in place looking at each other for a moment before it clicks.
Lev speaks first. “Marina?” he exclaims, looking incredulous. “You love Marina? Are you fucking high?”
Marina’s expression turns into a sneer. “You see what you lost, Anton? Your brother saw what you didn’t.”
“My brother is a fool,” I tell her. “A naïve idiot who let himself be used. You don’t love him, Marina.”
“How can she love him?” Jessa asks. “When she’s only ever loved you.”
I stop short, turning to Jessa. “You’ve got that wrong—”
“No, I don’t,” she says with a straight face. “Why do you think she wanted revenge so badly, Anton? It was never about me. She started this way before I entered the picture. This was about punishing you for not loving her back.”
I turn to Marina and wait for her to deny it.
She doesn’t.
“Jesus…”
She meets my gaze and I see the truth reflected in them. If that’s how she loves, I wonder what she can do with hate.
I turn slowly to my brother. “You can’t be that much of a fool that you didn’t see this?”
Yulian only shrugs. “I’ve been second best to you my entire life. Every woman I’ve ever wanted has wanted you first. This wasn’t going to stop me.”
“When did your ambition grow past your loyalty?” I ask.
“When you started treating me like I was your errand boy instead of your brother.”
“You wanted me to take you seriously?” I demand. “You should have worked to earn my respect. You spent your nights in whorehouses and casinos and your days sleeping off your hangovers. You stepped up only in the last year or two. And now, I guess I know why.”
“He just needed the right woman,” Marina interjects. “And he found her in me.”
I look at my brother and shake my head. “She would have used you and discarded you, Yulian. She would have gutted you like a fish long before she let you take charge.”
“We would have been equal partners,” Yulian says, clinging to the delusion.
“Is that what she told you?”
“It’s the truth,” Marina says, and I can tell she really believes it. “I only ever wanted a partner, Anton.”
I scoff. “Very sensible. If only it came remotely close to reality.”
“You and I would have ruled the world together,” she snarls, trying to will me into believing the same thing.