Seven: Angel Ivanov

LISA

You're needed at home.

The message from Angel was as simple as that but I understood perfectly what it meant. I understood the unsaid words in the message.

You're needed to get rid of someone.

I splashed water on my face before walking out of the bathroom. Luckily for me, Tana wasn't around so I was saved from explaining to her that I was going home. Not that I've ever had to explain to her before,  I just tell her that I have to go home because of an impromptu and she'd never even tried to probe.

Hey Tana, have to go home for an emergency, will be back tomorrow.

I fired a quick test to her as I walked out of the hostel to meet the black Sedan packed outside on that spot where it was always packed and I opened the back door, stepped inside only to...

"What are you doing here?" was the question that left my mind at the image of Angel sitting on the other side of the car.

"A pleasant evening to you too," she sassed without looking up from her MacBook as she pressed a button on the door.

The car started gliding out of the school premises.

"Is it that urgent that you couldn't wait for me to get home? You never come to pick me personally."

Her fingers stilled over the MacBook and for the first time since I entered the car, she looked up at me, brows quipped questioningly.

I gulped.

I've taken a lot of lives without batting an eyelid, I've sat through a lot of torture and watched men suffer too much pain before their body decides they've had enough or before the mouth spurt out things we needed to hear, and I was not supposed to be afraid of anything.

I've stared death in the face so many times without flinching but looking into my sister-in-law's eyes always has me flinching.

Angel has not seen what I've seen with my two eyes. She has not sat through the number of tortures I've sat through, she has not tortured people the way I have, and Angel...

Angel has not taken a life with her two hands but I, the cold-blooded assassin still always feel like herself flinch whenever I was staring into her eyes.

There was something about Angel, something dark and unfeeling, something auspiciously sinister that'd make even the most feared don reveres her.

To the rest of the world, she was just Angel Volkov, wife to the biggest casino owner in the city and the owner of one of the best and most popular shopping complexes in the city but to the underworld, she was the Capo of the Volkov Mafia, second in command only to her husband, the Don.

The Capo was supposed to be my title after everything I've done for the mafia but I didn't care at all about titles, I just wanted to make Dad smile and the only way I could make him smile was to take an enemy's life without leaving a trace.

And also, come up with the best security codes so no one as much sniffs in the direction of our server not to talk of trying to hack it.

"What do you mean by is it that urgent?" she asked and her eyes immediately widened with recognition before she dismissively turned back to her Mackbook, "oh, that? We're not killing anyone today, Angel, It's Sean's third birthday and we're having a party."

What?

I slumped against the backrest of the chair, the relief I felt at the fact that I wasn't going to take someone's life too overwhelming and too surprising.

I thought I was past this but I guess I was never going to be past it.

Of course, I knew it was Sean's birthday. I face timed Steff this morning and I already wished Sean but I had no idea there was going to be a party and the fact that Angel had even driven all the way from home to pick me up was still not adding up. She must have something up her sleeve.

I knew her.

She couldn't just come all the way to my school to pick me up for her son's birthday. Something just wasn't adding up.

"The new security model you just set up is good, still the best in the country, or second best because it can only rival that of C47 but it still can't beat them but regardless, you did a very good job. Well done and thank you."

C47 was the best security company in the country and it well was formed by the Ivanov Mafia so the company works mainly for their mafia. I was good at my job but let's be realistic, it'd take a while for me to do something that'd be as good as whatever they were doing in C47.

"I was only doing my job, Angel, I wasn't doing it to hear compliments from you, and besides, why would you thank me for something that I did for my family?"

"Our family, Lisa," she replied without looking up from the MacBook, "our family."

"I guess I don't need to remind you that you're just a daughter-in-law, no matter your position and I'll always be a full-blooded Volkov while you'll always be a daughter-in-law."

"We'll revisit this conversation when you get married," she replied calmly and dismissively, without still looking up from her MacBook and it annoyed the fuck out of me.

It annoyed me more because she was right, when I get married, I'd become more of a family member of that family and less of a family member of my family.

What a fucking load of bullshit?

My phone pinged and I brought it out of my pocket angrily to see that it was a message from Tana.

Sure, no problem, bring some goodies for the make and my regards to the whole family.

"Is that Axel Ivanov?" Angel asked calmly and with so much stillness that it sent a tremor up my spine. I looked away from my phone to see that she was staring at me with that calm, yet terrifying eyes of hers.

"What do you mean?" I refused to stutter.

"What do you mean what do I mean?"

"Well, I'm asking you why you're asking if it that was... What? Axel Ivanov texting me?"

"Oh yeah, because I have every cause to believe that you guys might now be on a chatting level."

What the fuck?

She slide her MacBook across the space separating us on the leather seat and my blood turned to ice when I saw the image staring back at me on the screen.

"You might want to scroll," she added, oblivious to the murderous rage that was building a temple inside me, that was wrapping itself around my neck, suffocating me, making me devoid of air, and making it seems like I could only get a clean slate of air if I can only bang something.

Preferably her head.

I scrolled to the next picture and the next and the next.

The pictures were that of Axel whispering to my ear right before the challenge, me standing in his personal space and taunting him after the challenge, our bodies pressed against each other later that night, and then, us sitting in the class together.

I couldn't breathe.

"I don't have any interest in your romantic affairs or the guys you fuck, Lisa but that's Axel Ivanov and I'm sure you understand the implication of what being an Ivanov means."

I saw red.

I keep seeing red the more I couldn't tear my eyes off the pictures.

"I'm the Copa of our mafia and I'm not going to sit back and allow you fall for an enemy, I'm not going to allow you build a relationship with an enemy that's obviously out for blood, I'm not going to allow you to be an access point by an enemy to destroy everything I've ever worked hard for in this family."

Laughter bubbled from the pit of my stomach. Everything she has ever worked hard for in this family?

Everything she has ever worked hard for in this family?

Nigga has never even gotten blood on her hands.

Fine, she does the hard negotiations, the emotional and psychological blackmail, and she does a lot to keep the business afloat but she has never done any hard work and she has the nerve to sit there and lecture me on what?

Everything she has ever done for this family?

"Are we clear, Lisa?"

I ignored her.

"Lisa, I don't like repeating myself and I wouldn't want us to continue this conversation in front of your dad and brother, are we clear?"

Nah but I've really allowed Angel to walk over me way too much because what else would even give her the liberty to talk to me in this manner?

I rolled the glass down and I tossed her MacBook out.

She gasped, it was barely audible but she gasped all the same.

I turned to look at her to see that she was looking at me with a clear seething rage.

“You know what you did that was stupid, Angel? It's having the nerve and the audacity to put a tail on me, especially after I talked with dad and he called back my bodyguards.”

“I wasn't guarding you, I was trying to see if you’d do anything stupid which you did by indulging in a conversation with Axel Ivanov.”

I chuckled. A mirthless one.

“I don't tell you who to talk to, I don't tell you who you fucking build a relationship with and you'll do no such thing with me too.”

“You hold no position, Lisa, and I'm your Copa, you'll take orders from me.”

“You’re not my Copa, Angel and I'm not going to take orders from you and this will be the last time, I'll say it, call back the stupid men you put on my tail if you don't want to hold a fucking funeral.”

The car glided to a stop at the traffic light and I opened the door to slide out.

Angel fucking Volkov.

Her guts thoroughly irritate me.