Page 115 of Feral King

Orlov is the fourth. He runs the counterfeit corridor through the Baltics. He’s never been one for idle chatter,and tonight is no exception. He stands at the window, watching the rain with the hollow focus of a man who’d come within inches of death.

Kuznetsov hangs up his phone and slips it into his pocket.

“Well?” asks Baranov.

“Cleaners are en route to the council meeting site,” he says. “They’ll have it sorted within the hour.”

Baranov nods his head slowly. “One less thing to worry about. And if I can make a request, have them dump Dobrov’s rotting corpse into the nearest landfill.”

“What about your family?” I ask Kuznetsov.

“On the private jet. They’ll be in London by morning.”

“Good.”

Semenov chooses this moment to finally speak. “We should’ve seen this coming. A goddamn takeover. How did we not see it?”

“None of us could’ve predicted that Julian’s own brother would do something like this,” Baranov replies. “There was nothing to be done.”

I disagree. I could’ve done a better job seeing through Alexander, should’ve trusted my gut when it told me that he was up to no good.

But maybe part of me, against my better judgement, believed him when he came to my office, telling me he wanted to put this all behind us and be brothers again.

My affection, my love for him as a brother, was the one card he hadto play.

And he played it.

“Dobrov, Lee, your brother,” Baranov says. “They were all working together. This was coordinated and planned. Nothing was left up to improvisation.”

Orlov turns from the window. “Yang. We know that he’s dead?”

Semenov looks up. “Lee wouldn’t have done what she did if there was any doubt.”

“Lee was running her own operation inside the Triads. She wanted Yang’s seat and used our council as the opportunity to take it,” I tell the group. “She’d take Triad leadership from Yang, partner with Dobrov, and install my brother as a puppet.”

Orlov’s jaw works. “Then the Triad partnership is dead. If she wanted to kill all of us, there’s not a chance in hell we’ll work with her.”

Baranov chuckles. “They tried to kill us once, and they’ll do it again. No doubt they’re dedicating every resource they have to tracking us down.”

“How safe are we here?” Semenov asks.

“Safe enough,” I reply. “They’d have to do some major digging to find this location, and they may find it eventually. But we have time.”

But it’s not me I’m worried about—it’s Lyra. And Misha. I’ve not heard from either of them, and every second that passes without contact increases the chances that something is terribly, terribly wrong.

Semenov sips his vodka.

“Yang is dead, and Lee now controls their U.S. operations. She’s aligned with your brother against you. It’s only a matter of time until?—”

“Yang may not be dead,” I state.

Every head in the room turns.

I clear my throat. “Lee said he wasno longer available. Yes, it could mean that he’s dead. Or it could mean that she wantsus tothinkthat he’s dead. Or perhaps that she’s assuming so.” I pause. “I negotiated with Yang for months. I know him, and that’s why I know he’d never do something like give Lee broad powers to change our arrangement.”

“She said she was his representative in the U.S.,” Baranov points out.

“Right,” I say. “Representative. It was a bullshit assertion that she was anything more than his U.S. mouthpiece, but she wanted us to think otherwise. And, most importantly, Yang is a planner—Lee moving against him would almost certainly be something that he’d have contingencies for.”