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Dimitri doesn’t fire. Our fights are always fair. Stefanov takes a wide stance, breathing hard. He’s severely overweight and unfit. He hasn’t done his own fighting in years. In the second he catches his breath, I strike. Slicing with the other shard, I cut his face from his eyebrow to his lip.
Blood spurts over his eye. It looks worse than it is—a head wound always pisses blood—but he squeals like a pig being slaughtered.
Galina screams.
Stefanov comes for me, but the blood pouring over his face blinds him. He’s stabbing at air. Grabbing his wrist, I squeeze hard enough to crack his bones. He utters a cry and splays his fingers, dropping his weapon.
“That’s better,” I croon, bending his arm behind his back.
Dimitri throws me a pistol.
I push the barrel between Stefanov’s shoulder blades. “Walk.”
We go up the stairs, following in Dimitri and Galina’s wake. I move my coat away and steal a glance at my side. Blood drips through the tear in my shirt. The cut needs stitches, but it’ll have to wait.
“Get everyone out of the house,” I tell Dimitri. “Leonid will know where to take them.”
While Dimitri and Galina go to the lounge, I shove Stefanov ahead of me to the kitchen. “Don’t move. If I shoot you in the back, you’ll finish your life in a wheelchair. I don’t imagine it’s the kind of life a bratva boss wants.”
He says nothing, complying with silence.
I keep the gun aimed at his back as I go through the drawers. It doesn’t take me long to find what I need. It’s a child’s skipping rope, shoved into the drawer with crayons and pens. His daughters are in college. The skipping rope must be a keepsake. Good. That seems fitting.
I make quick work of tying him up in a chair. He regards me with hatred until I walk to the stove and switch on the gas. Then he starts to beg.
“No, please,” he says, blinking away the blood that colors the whites of his eyes red.
I stop in front of him. “My father said those same words. Except he didn’t beg for his own life, only for my mother’s.” I cock my head, studying his features so I’ll always remember the look of defeat on his face. “You didn’t show mercy then, but now you ask for it?”
“I have money,” he says through slobber and tears. “Lots of it.”
I bend down, putting us on eye level. “Do you think I need your money?”
“I have power. I can make anything happen. What do you want?” His manner turns feverish. “A nice big house full of women? You want men to kneel when you walk into a room? Say it,” he urges, leaning toward me. “Say the word and it’s yours.”
“Spare your breath for the devil,” I say with disgust.
“No,” he yells as I take an ornate candle from a shelf and put it on the table in front of him.
The odor of gas already taints the air.
“Please, Volkov,” he says, stumbling over the words.
I take the box of matches next to the stove. Pulling one out, I bring the flame to the candle. The wick catches. An orange flame springs to life.
“I’m a father,” he cries. “I have two daughters.”
I don’t listen to more. I throw the charcoaled matchstick over my shoulder as I exit the room.
Dimitri waits by the front door.
“Did you evacuate the house?” I ask.
He nods. “Leonid and the rest of your men drove the guards away, sir. Galina called her sister to fetch her.”
I didn’t give her time to take anything valuable from the house. Stefanov left me with nothing. His family will be left with nothing too.
“Where’s Katerina?” I ask as I make my way down the driveway.
“She’s waiting in the car,” he says, lengthening his stride to keep up with me. “Igor is with her. Yuri is waiting by your car for your instructions.”
My chest expands as I drag in a breath.
“Sir. Alex?”
The way he says my name makes me look at him. “What?”
He motions at my side. “You’re bleeding.”
“It can wait.”
He knows when not to argue with me.
We stop outside the gates. Igor leans against the hood of the car, smoking a cigarette. I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve seen him smoke. I breathe even easier when I spot Katerina in the passenger seat of the car. She clutches the dashboard with both hands, her eyes brimming with tears. I need to get her out of here. She’s encountered violence in her profession, but she hasn’t experienced it firsthand. I just need a moment longer.
I turn around. Dimitri stands next to me, our backs straight and our faces solemn as we face the house. It’s quiet, like when I arrived. The eeriness rides on the brilliant sunlight that’s broken through the clouds. The rays make a fan of light, and then the gap closes and everything goes gray. The birds are quiet, as if they know.
