King of the Underworld by RJ Kane

Chapter Two Hundred Twenty-Two

Misha

I felt my cheeks blush. “I honestly didn’t mean for it to come out like that,” I sald, somewhat sheepishly.

She laughed again. “Don’t worry, my adorable Russian guardian, he thought it was funny. He appreciated your frankness because he knew it was ultimately for my benefit.” We walked a few more steps, then she stopped again. “I want you to pinky swear that you will always be that frank when you get that reaction,” she said, holding her pinky up to me.

“What does that mean?” I asked, completely confused.

“Jesus, what do you people do in Russia as children? Not pinky swear, I know that.” She sighed. “Okay, so the pinky swear is the holiest of holy swears. Like so holy that legend has it Jesus only used it once then promptly had his pinkies removed so he could never use it again. It’s that serious,” she said. She was trying not to laugh at her own explanation, but she ended up giggling through most of it.

“Okay, so how do I do the holiest of holy swears?” I asked, clearly amused at her. This felt like a secret that only she and I had, even though I’d heard her and Adrik talking about it before. That was one of the things we all loved about Sephie. She had little things that she did with all of us that clearly meant something to her, not even caring a little bit that it was sil ly and childish.

She lifted her hand, with her pinky out. “Give me your pinky,” she said. I held my hand in front of me, matching hers. She grabbed my pinky with hers and said, “you pinky swear you will always be frank when you get the goosebumps reaction.” She looked at me like she was waiting for me to say it too, so I repeated it back to her. She grinned at me, completely satisfied in our holiest of holy swears.

Strangely enough, I felt compelled to always honor it. It might’ve been si lly and childish, but when it comes to Sephie, all bets

are off.

Sephie

rest of the way to the house, laughing, but he kept his arm around my shoulders and I kept mine around his waist.

of the house, Viktor met us with his phone in hand. “Chen,” he said, motioning us to follow him. He walked quickly back to the kitchen, everyone else waiting for us. I glanced

his phone on speaker

keep

worries, my girl. I know how you are when you go for a run. I was expecting to wait for another hour, minimum, so technically

help but laugh. Apparently, I’m slightly more predictable than I thought. “What

other guys that are kind of running things with him. They want in as well. And, uh, when were you going to tell me that you datin’ Ghost? Like THE Ghost? Like THE man that runs the whole da mn city?” he said. He sounded like he was trying to be mad, but he was likely

he walked the few steps to me and the phone. He asked Chen, “that’s not a problem, is it?”

Chen said. I could hear the nervousness in his voice now. I couldn’t

You’ve done nothing but help us in all of this. You have nothing to worry about,” I said, trying to help calm

sh it this is way bigger than I thought,” he said. We could all hear

the phone from me with one hand and wrapped his other arm around my waist. “Chen, you can get out now and no harm done. Sephie was right. You’ve done us a massive favor. You’ll be safe as long as you’re in the city, you have my word. You can always call us if you’re in trouble, too. This

able to sleep at night knowing this was going on and I didn’t try to help stop it. I’m still in. I’ll do whatever I can to

the dealers for now? I

sir. I can

Monday and a time. Can you make

“Absolutely, sir.”

touch,” Adrik said, ending the call. I couldn’t help but laugh a little at how scared poor Chen was. I think his reaction surprised me, honestly. Adrik could be intimidating, for sure,

idea that your reputation was so ominous,” I said, grinning up at him. He just smirked down at