Page 61 of The Agreement

The man Maxim was ...

A boss hiding in a big house, really. Trusting that just his presence and name was enough to ensure the men on the streets were all doing as they should—because his yes men said so.

What good did that do?

Useless.

The show of material-wealth and paid-for taste wasn’t something that impressed him. Instead, it annoyed him, leaving him with heaviness in his stomach that was unsettling and uncomfortable. Pretty things usually hid ugly truths, and even he was a good example of that.

What was hiding here?

The more time he spent in Chicago, the clearer it became to him that Maxim was making errors with his people. In little ways, sure, but he caught it all the same.

Roman smiled to himself as he surveyed another painting. The last thing he had any right to do was offer advice to the pakhan of a successful bratva, and yet he couldn’t help but consider how different things might be in Chicago if Maxim cared to run the streets, on the streets.

He wandered the halls until he found the guest toilets. He decided to go for a piss—even took extra long to do so, and washed his hands with a pearl-colored soap that smelled like vanilla and cream, before spending some time staring at himself in the mirror. Just to increase the chances of bumping into Dima again.

Roman was clearly bored if he was actively looking for trouble. For a man with his issues, nobody could say he wasn’t self-aware. There was a method to his madness, though. He wanted the asshole to know he would continue doing exactly what he wanted, whenever he wanted.

It was a good lesson to learn.

Just when he was about to step outside the bathroom, he heard Leonid’s voice echoing in the corridor. He wouldn’t have stayed inside if he hadn’t heard the tone of Leonid’s voice—a shaky aggression that made Roman pause just long enough to actually hear what was being said.

“The day of the wedding. That is when you need to make it happen.” Leonid’s obvious growing frustration spilled out with impatient words for the person on the other end of the line. “No, of course it’s not too soon, Katina. For fuck’s sake—I’m starting to think you don’t have it in you to see this through.”

Through the crack in the door, Roman watched Leonid pace up and down the corridor. He’d never been the type to eavesdrop. That shit only led a man into trouble, and the truth was, Roman wasn’t all that interested in other people’s affairs.

This time, though, something stopped him from pulling away from the conversation in the corridor. He wanted to listen. Something about Leonid’s voice compelled him to remain there, peering through the small crack in the opened door, even though he had no idea what was being discussed.

“August thirty-first. Do you get me? Maxim has to die by then or you’re not getting what you want, Katina,” Leonid added, the sharpness in his words feeling like the edge of a blade raking across Roman’s skin.

And shit ...

He wasn’t even the person Leonid was directing his orders to in the first damn place.

Roman had to look away, even though that did nothing to erase the words that had already infiltrated his mind and wouldn’t leave. Leonid, one of Maxim’s most trusted men, was planning his boss’s assassination. Or that was certainly how it sounded to him.

Despite the fact he was now privy to a plot against the boss, Roman wasn’t truly shocked at the news that there was one to begin with. It was a lesson his father had given him long ago. He’d made Roman promise not to trust anybody.

Literally nobody.

Roman was fourteen at the time when a plot was hatched to execute Demyan. Initiated by a man Demyan considered to be a friend, the plan was seen through until almost the end. Until it was almost too late.

By someone they trusted.

His father had come out of it alive and well, of course. At the same time, he had armed himself with a life lesson which he imparted to his son.

As the boss of a large organization, Demyan expected to face criticism and disrespect from the outside, typically, even from friends and people he trusted, at times. A boss always had to remind people why he sat where he did compared to everyone else. Finding out a friend was plotting against you, on the other hand, was a whole other matter.

Roman would never forget the look on his father’s face when he found out what was happening—rage, and fear.

Real, true fear.

Because they were never safe. No man in this life was, no matter how hard they tried to make it so. Reality was not as kind when it came back around to remind a man where he actually stood.

On shaky ground.

Roman tried to think back on that time as a young man, and how it all unfolded in the streets between the men when the truth started to leak out. It hadn’t gone over well, really. It never did.