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Victor would be getting the details within a few days, and he’d been clear with Nikolai that it would have to be a fully legitimate business—nothing having to do with things falling off of a truck, nothing to do with drugs or prostitution or anything like that. Nikolai had assured him that it was fully legitimate, something he was interested in as a “side venture,” and that none of the rest of the family would be involved.
It was, in a sense, Victor knew, a kind of money laundering; investing ill-gotten money into legitimate businesses was a time-honored tradition for the Sokolov family, and they’d benefitted from it immensely. They had grown to a point where the family income was split almost half and half between illegal and legal pursuits. As long as his hands weren’t going to be dirtied by the association, he was almost willing to go forward with it—but he hadn’t worked hard to make his business fully legitimate five years before, only to be pulled into the syndicates again.
He had a standing arrangement at 1925 Lounge, which meant that when he and Danielle arrived there was someone to lead them to the smallest private area they had. “I come here pretty often,” he told Danielle quietly as they settled into the plush, old-fashioned chairs. “They like me here because I tip well and I never yell at the bartenders.” He grinned at her.
“That would be a good reason to like someone,” Danielle pointed out.
“Seated here it’s not going to be easy for you to watch them make our drinks, but I’m assuming that if you don’t see me tampering with yours, you’ll be comfortable enough?” Victor raised an eyebrow in query. Danielle laughed.
“Fine, fine,” she said. “I’ll stop assuming you want to drug me and have a little faith. It’s not easy, but I’ll go along with it.” Victor chuckled. A server came, dressed in the stylish uniform of the bar, and he ordered his usual for himself.
“What alcohol do you like?” He looked at Danielle for the answer. He knew quite a few of the old-fashioned, classic cocktails the lounge was able to make—and he wanted to give Danielle a drink she would love.
“Vodka, whiskey...pretty much anything but tequila is fine with me,” Danielle said. Victor pressed his lips together as he considered.
“I think the lady would enjoy an Old Fashioned,” Victor told the server, who nodded and turned away to take their orders up to the bar.
“Just what’s in an Old Fashioned?” Danielle’s dark hazel eyes—the color visible in the better light of the lounge bar—looked at him with some lingering distrust.
“Whiskey, bitters, sugar, ice, an orange wedge and a cherry,” Victor told her. “Though you really don’t get much of the last two, since they’re pretty much a garnish.”
“And what was it that you got for yourself?”
“I got myself a sidecar,” Victor replied. “Cognac, Cointreau, and lemon juice.”
“Sounds tasty,” Danielle said with interest. Victor smiled.
“If you want, we can taste each other’s drinks when they get here.” Danielle smiled back at him.
“You’re just being all kinds of charming,” she said, and Victor laughed.
“I have good reason—I want you to feel good around me,” he said. Their drinks arrived and Victor handed his to Danielle to give her a chance to taste it first, sipping hers at the same time.
“Oh man—that is good,” Danielle told him, handing it back. “Now, to taste what you got for me.” They clinked glasses and took their first sips of their proper drinks, and Danielle nodded with approval. “This is not as good as what you have, but it’s pretty damn good,” she said with a little, playful grin. Victor chuckled.
“If you want another when we finish these we’ll switch—how about that?” Danielle snorted.
“We’ll see how tipsy I get with this one,” she said.
Chapter3
“Are you sure you’re okay with coming to my place?” Danielle smiled slightly at Victor.
“I am sure I’m okay with it,” she said. She’d gotten a text from her brother while they’d been at the bar: he had managed, barely, to slip through the net of the police raid. She was relieved but at the same time, the news had left he
r feeling restless; so when Victor had playfully suggested going back to his place, she’d gone along with it.
They hadn’t even taken the car; Victor had told Alan he was off for the night, and they’d walked the three minutes from 1925 Lounge to the huge building where Victor apparently lived. “I got this place for a steal,” he told her. “They hadn’t done anything at all to it—it was just this...basically a giant cavern with insulation, and so I could make it exactly what I wanted.”
“That sounds awesome,” Danielle said—but really, it sounded almost overwhelming to her. She’d already gotten the impression that Victor was beyond the realm of wealth that even the richest of Sam’s friends, or the members of various families she’d met, had managed to accumulate. But as they’d entered the building on 18th Street where Victor lived, Danielle had begun to expand even that notion of his wealth, and with that came the worry of why someone with that much money would take notice of a nobody like her.
“It was really gratifying to be able to just...make everything exactly the way I wanted it to be, without having to worry about pre-existing structures, or waste time tearing anything out, or dealing with a historical society telling me what I could and couldn’t replace,” Victor explained.
They got to the door of his apartment, which was down a very short hallway from the elevator, and Danielle felt her skin actually beginning to tingle as she watched Victor take care of the locks not with something as basic as a key—but instead a fingerprint scanner on the door itself and an app on his phone that apparently went with it. He opened the door, and for a moment Danielle could only stare into the entryway. Even without going into the apartment itself, she could tell that it must have cost easily almost as much to decorate and finish the place as it had for Victor to buy it in the first place.
The wall facing the door was floor-to-ceiling windows looking out over downtown Philadelphia, and the entryway was marble flooring, with a Persian-style rug leading from the door to protect the stone. “Are you having second thoughts or something?” Victor’s words cut through her thoughts.
“No, just appreciating how...amazing this is,” Danielle said.
