Alexei rubbed his face. His knuckles were still cut and raw from the beating we’d given—and taken—from the soldiers who’d thought to go to the local gang for backup against us. “I guess. Adrik didn’t even want confirmation that we’d handled them.”
“So what? He knows he doesn’t need to micromanage us.” My father never did, either.
“I thought he’d want to know that we’d handled it or something.”
“He already knows we’d handle it,” I said in defense of my older brother. Alexei and Adrik had always had a simmering antagonism that operated as friendly bickering.
“He’s just so much busier now that he’s married,” he said. “And expecting a child.”
“That’s kind of expected.” Sensing that my loner and gruff cousin wanted more than a couple of lines of small talk, I closed out the windows on my computer and locked it down to give him all of my attention. He wouldn’t take his “issues” to Adrik, not to his face. But since I was the second oldest, maybe he thought he could air his grievances with me. “And I doubt it’s the fact that he’s married or that Elena’s pregnant that he’s so busy. It’s the fallout from Morovov stealing money from us and siphoning it to Gregori’s network. And the fact that he’s even fucking alive.”
Alexei didn’t argue with me on the topic of his father. He—like Lev—wanted nothing to do with Gregori after he killed our grandparents and almost killed my father, too.
“I’m just saying that it’ll be a bad look if Adrik istoodistracted while he takes over for the family.”
I rolled my eyes. “Again—so what? He can rely on all of us, too. Just like my father did.”
He nodded, smirking as he looked off to the side.
“What, are you getting bitter that he’s taking over the family instead of you?”
Dynastic rules dictated that from my father, the throne would go to his eldest son. Adrik would be the full-fledged leader of our Bratva as soon as my father passed. Then, it would trickle down to the rest of us brothers. Alexei was the eldest of us all, a yearolder than Adrik at thirty-nine, but he wasn’t a son of Dmitri, only a nephew.
He narrowed his eyes at me and scoffed. “Shut the fuck up,” he growled.
I laughed lightly and nodded. I supposed the joke would get old. Even though he was the oldest of the six of us, he never would have wanted the responsibility of being the leader. He’d never wanted to train as the next Pakhan. Simply put, Alexei wasn’t a natural-born leader like Adrik was.
Neither was I. Feeling like the “spare” after Adrik, I never bothered with the worry of having to take the throne. Alexei and Lev had to feel even less of that concern. Viktor and Nikolai, my younger brothers, didn’t have to stress about being in charge either.
But there was no doubt I’d delegated myself as Adrik’s backup. His number-one confidante. We’d always been like that since we were kids, checking in with each other and almost always being on the same page about big decisions.
“If Adrik’s expanding his responsibilities as the interim boss and as a father—and as a new husband—then so be it.”
Alexei sighed. “I know. I just hate that anyone could view us as weak or unorganized.”
“Me too. That’s why I wanted to check back on everything for tomorrow.”
He arched a brow. “Need anything?”
I shook my head. Already, I planned to personally oversee the handoff near the border. From a distance, of course, since therewas always a higher chance of the border patrol’s presence in the area.
Alexei stayed a little longer to discuss the shipment, but he didn’t linger all night. After he’d left, though, Viktor showed up. He arrived just as I saw Alexei to the front door of my sprawling ranch, just a few miles from the massive mansion Adrik now called home with his new wife and our dying father.
Viktor parked and approached me before I could head back inside. Enjoying the cooler air now that the desert sun had descended behind the distant mountains, I shoved my hands in my pockets and rocked on my heels. “What’s up?”
“I wanted to stop on my way home.” He stood on a step below me and furrowed his brow. “I picked up on some rumors from the men. Rumors about increased federal interest in the family.”
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes again. Viktor was blunt. He was the most direct of all of us, but sometimes, he took things too seriously. I prided myself on being a problem solver, but that only made sense when there was a problem to address.
“There’s always federal interest in what we do,” I reminded him unnecessarily, shrugging it off.
“Yeah. No shit. But with this arms shipment tomorrow?—”
I shook my head. “Nothing to worry about there.” I hoped those wouldn’t be famous last words that I would regret. “I’ve just checked in with Dean and a couple of others. Our transport rigs are good to go and everyone’s well aware of how important this handoff is.”
It was more important than usual for this handoff to go well because it would be the first big transaction or delivery since thedrug shipment that had been initially screwed up with Morovov Financials doing us dirty.
Viktor nodded slowly, clearly still bothered about the rumors.
