Hunt the Villain

“I can fix him."

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REVIEW

Would I read this again? Yes No Maybe

Spice Level Legend How spicy is this book?

Tropes	Trigger Warnings
Enemies to lovers, Forbidden love, Bi/Gay awakening, Morally grey MMCs, Mafia romance, College romance	Parental abuse, Homophobia, Death of a parent, Violence, Murder, Cheating (but not by MMCs)

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SUMMARY

Want to just skip to the spice? I got you: 8, 9, 13, 17, 18, 20, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 36

This book is in the Rina Kent Universe. Most of these books can be read as standalone. Check out the reading order page for the recommended reading order.

Recurring Characters

Glyn & Killian - FMC and MMC of God of Malice

Jeremy and Cecily - MMC and FMC of God of Wrath

Nikolai and Brandon - MMCs of God of Fury

Gareth and Kayden - MMCs of Kiss the Villain

Kirill and Sasha Morozov - MMC and FMC of Monster Trilogy

Characters

Cyrus - Yulian’s best friend. No one knows who he belongs to. Yaroslav brought him home one day and said he would be living there. Starts acting weird and Gareth implies that he has a secret thing going on with someone who hangs out with Kayden (Gareth’s boyfriend).

Alina - Yulian’s younger sister. She was in an accident on the day their mom died and is now paralyzed in a wheelchair.

Lukas - Yulian’s half brother. Yulian doesn’t trust him or Mikailo (his other half brother) because he thinks they want to kill him to take over as heir.

Yaroslav - Yulian’s asshole father. Leader of the Chicago Bratva.

Uncle Anton and Uncle Maks - Vaughn’s gay uncles who live in Russia.

Plot

Vaughn Morozov, son of the New York Bratva Pakhan (leader of the New York Russian Mafia in simpler terms), Kirill Morozov, is a very mature, calm, and rational 15 year old when he is sent to summer camp. It's not a normal summer camp though. This one is strictly teenagers of Bratva leaders from around the United States. This camp is a training - not only for skills but for how to get along with each other.

Yulian Dimitriev, son of the Chicago Bratva Pakhan, Yaroslav Dimitriev, appears to be Vaughn’s complete opposite. He is loud, adventurous, loves to fight, doesn’t seem to have any regard for his own life, and is constantly breaking the rules at camp.

Vaughn is a little stuck up and instantly doesn’t like Yulian. Although, he does admit that he reminds him a lot of Nikolai, who he has grown up with, although he doesn’t dislike Niko.

For four weeks, Yulian tries to get Vaughn to fight him. Niko fights him almost daily but Vaughn had been refusing. One day, he gives in, and they’re beating the crap out of each other when Yulian gets Vaughn's arm behind him and is whispering in his ear telling him to tap out or he’s going to break it. They are pulled away from each other by a mentor at camp. He had been yelling at them to stop fighting but Vaughn couldn’t hear him while Yulian was whispering in his ear. They both get punished and get told they will have to go into the woods later, alone, to gather wood. Something Yulian has to do often as his punishment.

Yulian gets up in Vaughn’s face again, just talking shit, but Vaughn refuses to fight again. So Niko jumps in and him and Yulian start punching each other. Vaughn doesn’t understand why he feels … weird … that Yulian immediately left him alone to go after Niko.

Niko finds Vaughn later in the gym. Niko tells him that Yulian’s dad showed up and so they stopped fighting. No Bratva leaders, especially Pakhan’s, are supposed to be at this camp so Vaughn is instantly suspicious. Vaughn breaks into the room next door to Yulians, and sneaks onto the balcony to look into Yulian’s door.

He watches as Yaroslav hits Yulian. Which shocks Vaughn. His dad may be the Pakhan of New York but he has never hit Vaughn. Yaroslav is mad that Yulian has been getting into trouble at camp. Yulian is being Yulian and making jokes about it. Yaroslav says that if Yulian doesn’t stop messing around, he might get Alina in trouble (Yulian’s sister). That’s when Vaughn sees Yulian angry for the first time as he snarls at Yaroslav. Then Yaroslav proceeds to beat the shit out of Yulian. Vaughn wants so badly to go in but what is he supposed to do? If he’s caught snooping, it will start a war with Chicago. And he highly doubts Yulian wants Vaughn to be seeing this. Vaughn is about to go in anyways when Yaroslav finally stops kicking Yulian and steps away.

Later, when they are taking their trip up the mountain, Yulian makes fun of Vaughn for bringing a backpack with him. Vaughn says it has necessities in it just in case. Yulian thinks it’s ridiculous because what would they need? They’re going up to get wood and coming back down. Not to mention, because they are two Pakhan’s sons, there are guards in the woods following them. They aren’t supposed to be there, but they are. Yulian talks some smack to Vaughn about girls and Vaughn throws him against a tree. Then they hear gunshots, Yulian sees someone over Vaughn’s shoulder, and doesn’t hesitate when he pushes him out of the way and gets shot himself.

They take off running. Yulian knows of a little cave that is hard to see so they make their way there. They both assume they won’t have to wait long because their guards will come find them once they handle whoever is out there. Except, no one comes.

And that backpack that Yulian made fun of? Saves his life. Vaughn had bottles of water, some protein bars, dressings, a first aid kit that included an antibiotic shot. Dude has everything in there.

Yulian was losing a lot of blood so Vaughn, with his handy-dandy first aid kit, removes the bullet, sews him up, and bandages his side. And gave him an antibiotic shot. It’s kinda chilly up the mountain and Yulian, who really just wants Vaughn to touch him for reasons he doesn’t understand, suggests they huddle together for body heat. Vaughn gets behind Yulian and positions Yulian so he is relaxing on his chest.

Vaughn ends up nodding off and his head falls onto Yulian’s shoulder. Yulian can’t stop staring at his lips and finally gets into temptation and leans over and kisses him very softly. Then he passes out.

We find out the following later in the book, but for timeline sake, I’m putting it here.

Vaughn wasn’t fully asleep yet. He felt Yulian kiss him. And then he fell asleep, exhausted and confused. The next morning, Yulian wasn’t waking up, so Vaughn hoists him over his shoulder, and carries him down the mountain. His father’s security finally found him, then Yulian’s detail turns up, and tried to take Yulian out of Vaughn's arms. Vaughn almost didn’t want to let go but he knew they needed to get him to the hospital.

From there, Vaughn must have been taken home with his security, because Vaughn talks about how he ran away from home, hopped on a plane to Chicago, and snuck into Yulian’s hospital room. Yulian was still unconscious and Vaughn goes to his bedside and holds his hand. He isn’t sure why he is but he just knows he needs to. Then he leans forward and kisses Yulian (while he’s unconscious….totally not creepy). Yulian’s mom walks in.

She yells at Vaughn to get away from him. Vaughn tells her who he is and she asks if he came there to get Yulian killed. Vaughn realizes it would have been very very VERY bad if Yaroslav had walked in instead of her. Vaughn apologizes and she tells him that if he cares for Yulian at all, he will never get in contact with him again. Because Yaroslav will kill Yulian for being gay. Vaughn agrees even though he absolutely does not want to but he gets it. Neither one of them can be gay. They will both be leaders of their cities Bratva and the Bravta is homophobic. So Vaughn leaves and doesn’t speak to Yulian for four years.

Yulian wakes up and his dad tells him that Vaughn left him in the cave to die. Yulian doesn’t believe that he would have done that. Yaroslav believes that New York is behind the attack so no peace treaty will be happening. His mom comes in, lies to him by saying no one but Cyrus has been in to visit him. She asked him what happened in the cave and Yulian admits that he kissed Vaughn. She tells him he cannot ever kiss a guy again, he must get married to a woman, and have kids just like every other man in their family. She makes him promise that he will not mess around with guys anymore, just women. He promises. (She’s dying of cancer, he’ll say anything to make her happy).

A week later, Yulian has been released from the hospital and he sneaks off to New York. He just needs to see Vaughn for a minute, just to ask him what really happened in the cave. But when he sees Vaughn from afar, he’s kissing some girl. Yulian is standing there watching them wondering how to get rid of this girl when Cyrus texts. Yulian’s mom has died and his sister was in an accident.

Four years later has brought us to the year of the most eventful initiation in Heathen’s history.

Vaughn has chosen not to go to King’s U like all the rest of his friends. He stays in New York and attends Columbia. He visits the island but mostly on initiation nights or something else important.

Yulian is the leader of the Serpents and attends King U. It bothers him that Vaughn doesn’t attend and why he stayed back in America.

Vaughn is very rigid in life. Metalicious. He knows he has to be leader of the Bratva so he carries himself that way now. Can’t ever relax, can’t ever make a mistake, perfection. He also has a perfectly acceptable girlfriend, Danika.

One night, they are out to dinner at a new restaurant that’s opening and guess who walks in? Yulian. Even though he’s supposed to be on the island, and he’s definitely not supposed to be strolling around New York, but there he is. Danika gets up to go to the bathroom and Yulian comes over and sits in her seat. Vaughn doesn’t want to see him. He has spent four years convincing himself that he hates Yulian and he doesn’t want to see him, but he does want to know what the hell he is doing there. Yulian just wants to know why he isn’t at Kings U and who the girl is. Vaughn tells him it’s none of his business. Yulian says “Let that girl go and change schools to Kings U…because I want you to.” Vaughn thinks this must be a joke and Yulian is like alright, well we can do it my way, and by the end of the evening, you’ll break up with her.

The next morning, Vaughn gets a text and a video from an unknown number. Its an extremely long video of Yulian fucking Danika. Vaughn watches the whole thing and hardly feels anything towards Danika. He’s done with her. At the end of the video, Yulian turns the camera around and says, “This could be us, Mishka.”

That night, Vaughn breaks up with Danika in a very public way to make sure that her family is disgraced in society. Then uses Jeremy’s men on the island to put a bomb on Yulian’s motorcycle. He waits until he’s off of it and then he blows it up. He texts him to let him know he could have killed him but chose not to. Yulian responds, “Are you flirting with me? The answer is yes, by the way.”

For the next three days, Yulian texts Vaughn frequently. And sends him videos. But Vaughn doesn’t respond until Yulian makes a comment about how he might seduce Nikolai. That gets a response. Vaughn tells him to stay away from Niko or he’ll kill him.

And what happens? Vaughn shows up on the island. On the night of the party that Gareth attended at the Serpents. Vaughn actually sees Gareth and is like wtf is he doing here? Vaughn sneaks into Yulian’s room where Yulian is passed out. (In case you don’t remember, Gareth roofied him). Yulian wakes up and is like oh you’re in my dreams now? Yulian kisses him and Vaughn doesn’t like the feelings that occur and he runs off.

Yulian wakes up and remembers none of this so he goes back to his text and video harassment. Vaughn reads every single message but doesn’t respond.

Yulian ends up getting an invite to the initiation and he goes.

Side note - here’s a good question. If you’ve read Legacy of Gods and now the two Villain books - we know what everyone was doing. Who the hell was eliminating everyone? All the guys were just fucking around (metaphorically and literally) in the woods.

Vaughn finds Yulian in the woods, wraps a chain around his neck, and drags him off, but gets mad when Yulian isn’t fighting back. Actually, he’s flirting. Vaughn tries to intimidate him by standing over him and all that accomplishes is that Yulian knocks him down to the ground, pins him down, and kisses him.

They end up making out and Yulian jerks him off. Then Vaughn runs away…again.

About two weeks later, Yulian is fighting Niko in the underground fighting ring that Niko loves so much. As they are beating the shit out of each other, Yulian sees Vaughn in the crowd. Vaughn realizes he’s been caught and leaves but Yulian leaves the ring and chases him outside. Yulian jumps on his motorcycle, passes Vaughn, and then stops in front of him. They end up arguing on the side of the road. Vaughn tells Yulian to leave him alone and Yulian’s like you’re the one who keeps hopping on jets and coming over here. Yulian threatens to jump off cliff and if he lives, then Vaughn has to give him a chance. Vaughn walks away and then Yulian jumps off the god damn cliff.

Vaughn jumps in after him. Yulian got knocked unconscious as the waves pulled him under but Vaughn gets him out of the water and takes him to a hotel. They end up 69ing and after as Vaughn is laying there in a post orgasmic haze, Yulian misinterprets it as regret. Yulian doesn’t want Vaughn to say something mean or to hurt his feelings (again) so he leaves first. Vaughn is super confused as he watches Yulian run away this time.

Yulian ghosts Vaughn. He realizes he has no one who he can talk to about this. Niko would understand, but Niko has a big mouth, and Vaughn doesn’t want everyone knowing about his gay awakening. So he makes a fake profile and goes on a Reddit thread. He ends up talking to this one guy who is in a similar situation as him and when he hacks the account to see who it is, he’s shocked to find that it’s Gareth. Gareth has no idea, right now anyways, that its Vaughn.

The next time Vaughn sees Yulian is at a charity event in Washington DC where members of every Bratva city are in attendance. Yulian is ignoring him, which Vaughn refuses to accept. Now that Yulian hasn’t been giving Vaughn all of his unwanted attention - he wants it. Yulian sneaks out of the ballroom to get some air and Vaughn catches up with him and pulls him into a conference room. They end up making out until Vaughn shoves him away and tells him he doesn’t want to be another notch on his bedpost. Yulian hits the wall with his back, the same back that his dad just beat the hell out of a few hours earlier, winces in pain, and tells him he needs to quit running away then.

Vaughn notices the wince and pulls his shirt up to see him covered in bruises. He makes a comment about his dad “still” hitting him. Yulian wants to know how he knows that but gets distracted by gun shots coming from the ballroom. Alina is in there so he takes off running back in that direction. Vaughn follows. They go to the backstage room where Alina was while she was getting ready to play the piano for the party. Her wheelchair is there, but she isn’t. They’re searching for her when some big dude comes around the corner, holding an unconscious Alina in his arms. He says he found her trapped on the balcony. Yulian takes her and Vaughn has to go find his parents before they start freaking out.

A couple weeks later, Vaughn is back to ignoring Yulian. Yulian starts sending him old pictures of guys touching him just to piss him off. Vaughn continues ignoring.

One night at a Serpents party, a friend and ex fuck buddy of Yulian’s is dancing with him and takes him upstairs. Yulian isn’t sure why he’s allowing him to lead him around, he doesn’t want this guy anymore. They go into Yulian’s bedroom and the guy tries to kiss him. Yulian is pushing him away but then all of a sudden, he isn’t there anymore. Vaughn grabs him by the back of the neck and throws him out of Yulian’s room.

Vaughn tells Yulian that he needs to stop being a whore, that he belongs to him now, and if anybody else touches him, he’ll skin them alive. They ending up fucking. Vaughn tops Yulian, then Yulian tops Vaughn. They spend all night fucking.

Vaughn spends the night and wakes up before Yulian. He’s laying there wondering how he can get over his addiction to Yulian, when Cyrus walks right in. He tells Vaughn he knew he was there but he needs to leave before the rest of the Serpents wake up and see Vaughn leaving. Cyrus tells Vaughn that Yulian is using him for revenge and that if Vaughn hurts Yulian again, Cyrus will kill him. Vaughn is a little confused. Revenge for what? Hurt him again…when did he hurt him the first time?

Yulian wakes up to Vaughn gone and Cyrus in his room. Cyrus tells him what he told Vaughn and Yulian gets pissed thinking that Cyrus ruined what they had. But that thought changes when Vaughn calls him on the phone 5 minutes later. He apologized for leaving but said he didn’t want anyone to see him so they didn’t report back to Yulian’s dad. He tells Yulian he better not put his dick near anyone else and that he will send him an address, some keys, and he’ll be back on the weekend. He bought them a place so that they don’t have to sneak in and out of the Serpents place.

The weekend arrives and Yulian is fighting with Niko. Vaughn shows up and Yulian thinks he’s hallucinating him. Vaughn texts him later and says he’ll see him tomorrow, he’s spending tonight with the Heathens. Yulian doesn’t like that. He threatens to invite a fuck buddy to the new place and fuck him on the bed if Vaughn doesn’t show up. He sends Vaughn an old picture and tells him has 30 minutes. 20 minutes later, Vaughn arrives. No one is there but Yulian, he used an old picture because he knew that that would make Vaughn show up.

Every week, for two months, Vaughn takes a private jet to the island, and him and Yulian spend the weekend together.

Then there’s a weekend Vaughn can’t come. He has to go to some art gallery thing with his parents. Yulian feels like he’s a toy for Vaughn. No one, except Cyrus, knows about them. Yulian feels like Vaughn holds him at arms length. And he’s sick of it. So he catches a plane to New York and shows up at the art gallery. Vaughn is shocked to see him and is not happy that his parents caught them talking and are confused as to why Vaughn and Yulian seem to know each other. Vaughn’s mom asks why he didn’t tell them that him and Yulian have reconnected and Vaughn says, “it's not important”, and Yulian feels like he might die. These past two months have been the best of his life and Vaughn is saying he isn’t important. He makes an excuse and leaves quickly.

Vaughn follows him in the parking lot and tells him that he didn’t mean that, it's just because they need to keep this a secret, and he can’t be telling his parents. Yulian shoves him against his motorcycle and ends up kissing him. Vaughn pushes him off and tells him to stop because they’re in public. Yulian wants to know what he is to Vaughn. Vaughn tells him they can’t be in a relationship, this has to be temporary, it can’t last. Yulian says then why are we wasting time, lets just end it. But that's not what Vaughn wants. Yulian tells him he either gets all of him or none of him and then he leaves. When he arrives at his hotel room, he gets jumped by his dad’s men.

Vaughn texts Yulian and calls him but he never answers. He finally breaks down and talks to Gareth via text and they both admit they knew who the other one was. Gareth tells him he needs to stop fighting his feelings.

Vaughn’s parents come in and his dad shows him a picture he was sent by Yaroslav. It's from the night before, Yulian has him pushed on the bike, kissing him. Vaughn’s parents are super supportive and they’re mostly upset that Vaughn felt like he couldn’t talk to them about this. He feels awful that what he has done will hurt them and fuck up everything. His moms is like it isn’t going to fuck anything up, he’s their son first. He says but I can’t be a leader of the Bratva if I'm with a guy. His dad says, “says who?” Vaughn is like uhhh the codes of the Bratva. Kirill says, “Fuck those. We’ve evolved.” He tells him that he isn’t planning on going anywhere anytime soon so Vaughn doesn’t have to worry about being a leader right now. Once Vaughn realizes his parents don’t hate him, he gets super concerned that Yaroslav might have Yulian.

Cyrus calls him. Tells him that Yaroslav does have Yulian and they need to get him out because Yaroslav will kill him for this.

Kirill says he won’t send his men into Chicago and start a war. But he’ll go, and so will his mom, plus two bodyguards and his uncle. Yaroslav is holding Yulian underground. Cyrus helps hack the security cameras so Vaughn can get in easier. When Vaughn finds him, he is unconscious, his face is swollen, one eye sealed shut, just laying on the floor in his own blood.

He gets him out and flies him to his uncle's home in Russia where they can’t be found. It takes a few days for him to wake up. A doctor said he had a few broken ribs, concussion, dehydrated, and multiple shallow cuts all over his body.

When he does wake up, he is immediately concerned for Alina. Vaughn tells him that she’s safe with Cyrus. Yulian is being standoffish because he’s confused. Vaughn had just told him they were temporary and now Vaughn has risked starting a war between Chicago and New York. Vaughn tells him he lied, they were never temporary. Vaughn was just scared of being found out and of his feelings towards Yulian.

Vaughn tells Yulian what happened four years ago, because Yulian still doesn’t know that Vaughn didn’t abandon him in a cave. Vaughn shows him the bullet he carries on his key chain - it’s the bullet he pulled out of Yulian in the cave. He also tells him the numbers on his thigh are the coordinates to the cave.

Vaughn tells Yulian that his parents know and he wants to come out to his friends and tell them about Yulian.

They stay there for 10 days while Yulian heals. Vaughn tells Yulian he wants to take him to Yulian’s grandfather's place where Yulian has good memories as a child. Yulian has gotten a phone call from Cyrus and is acting a little weird but agrees. They have sex and Vaughn tells him he loves him for the first time but Yulian doesn’t say it back. When Vaughn wakes up the next day, Yulian is gone.

He left a note saying that his dad has Alina and plans to marry her off. But he won’t, if Yulian comes home and marries the daughter of the leader of Boston.

As soon as Yulian lands in Chicago, he is taken to the wedding venue for his wedding. Alina comes into the room and tells him that he can’t do this, she doesn’t want him to marry someone he doesn’t love just to keep her safe. Alina tells him that the guy who rescued her all those months ago during the shooting is the leader of Boston’s illegitimate son. They have been talking and have fallen in love. She will talk to Yaroslav and agree to marry this son, not any other one from Boston. She has the guy, Levian, come in to meet Yulian. She assures Yulian that she really does love him and wants to marry him. She also tells Yulian to go find Lukas and talk to him. That he is planning something.

After Alina’s wedding, Yulian went to go find Lukas. He hadn’t seen his dad since the ceremony, when he got an emergency phone call and left. Yulian finds Lukas downstairs with Yaroslav tied to a chair. Lukas tells him that he’s been busy lately, and he has half of Yaroslav’s leaders on his side. The other half won’t acknowledge him as a leader since he’s a bastard child but that’s where Yulian comes in. Yulian says no one will follow him since he’s gay and he plans on spending his life with Vaughn. Lukas is like well, you’ll be the co-leader, we’ll just kill them all, and we’ll start over. Yulian is like well when you put it that way.

Lukas lets him do the honors and Yoraslav gets what he has had coming to him. Peace out bitch.

Vaughn had hopped on a plane and flown straight to Chicago. He calls his dad on his way to find Yulian and Kirill tells him that the marriage has already happened between Boston and Chicago, Vaughn needs to come home now, get out of enemy territory. Vaughn goes straight to Yaroslav’s house. No guards meet him at the gate, but it opens, he walks in, and Yulian runs to him. Vaughn doesn’t let him talk, just starts threatening Yulian’s new wife, telling Yulian it doesn’t matter if he got married, he is still Vaughn’s. Yulian laughs, which pisses Vaughn off more. But finally Yulian tells him he didn’t get married, his sister did, and oh by the way, he killed his dad.

He also tells Vaughn that he has been in love with him since the cave. He has a tattoo on his chest which says, “I’m with you”, in Russian. Which is what Vaughn had kept saying to Yulian in the cave.

Epilogue - a month later. Vaughn has transferred to Kings U and now him and Yulian live together. They’re hanging out at the Heathen’s mansion and now everyone knows about them. Aw look at the Heathens, Serpents, and Elites all getting along. Adorable.

Epilogue 2 - two years later - Niko and Brandon’s wedding. Yulian is planning on proposing to Vaughn but doesn’t know how to do it. He asks Gareth for help because he’s Vaughn’s best friend but Gareth tells him not to do it. But that’s only because he knows that Vaughn is already planning on it. After the ceremony, Vaughn asks Yulian to marry him.