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Chapter One
Gavril
Yuri slid the paper across the desk towards me and bounced up on his heels. “We’ve had more bets than we can keep track of these last six months running. Expanding our reach is necessary unless we want to continue turning people away.”
“Expanding our reach how?” I asked, bored.
Usually, I liked talking business, but today it all felt mundane. The four walls of my office felt like a wood-clad cage. Being the boss and having people to command was great, but occasionally I missed being on the ground, seeing the action. I felt like a professional athlete who’d been benched.
Ivan stepped up next to Yuri, glancing at his partner before taking a deep breath and addressing me. “Boss, we have options. We can expand our ranks, take on new initiates.”
I shook my head. “Not right now. It can wait until after we finish expanding the warehouses.”
Ivan faltered for a minute, then nodded. “Okay, then we expand our territory. We spread the guys we have a bit more thinly, and we will be able to handle a slightly larger volume. It won’t solve any issues long term, but it will set us up for when we are ready to take on more recruits.”
I rubbed my finger across the end of my nose. Yuri and Ivan weren’t telling me anything I didn’t already know. But I wasn’t ready to take on new recruits. It felt like I was still trying to assert my control over the family since taking over after my father a year earlier. Adding to the ranks when my hold over them still felt slightly tenuous didn’t seem like the best idea.
Just as I was about to dismiss Yuri and Ivan, there was a knock at the door. Before I could say anything, the knock was followed by a thud and then another. Finally, the door clattered open, and a struggling man fell through the opening and collapsed on the floor in a bloody heap. Three of my men followed after him.
“Sorry, boss,” one of them said, gesturing to the man in a what are you gonna do kind of way.
“He’s slippery from all the blood,” the other explained.
I’d noticed that, not least of all because the stranger’s blood was soaking into my new rug. My father had always kept the room bare – hardwood floors, wooden desk, wooden walls, no décor. But I didn’t see anything wrong with making the space my own. I spent most of my time there, after all. However, I was beginning to realize that perhaps he’d been right about getting rid of the carpet. I’d already had to have blood scrubbed out of it three times.
“What is this?” I asked, sitting up, curiosity outweighing my annoyance.
“Thief.” Aleksei grimaced and kicked the man who was still hunched over, his face buried between his arms.
The man groaned and rolled to his side, revealing his face. Or what had once been his face. His right eye was swollen and purple like a ripe plum, and both of his lips were split and bleeding. Dried blood streaked out of his nose and was swiped across his face where he’d tried to staunch the flow with his sleeve.
“He’s one of our dealers, right?” Yuri asked, bending down to get a better look at the man on the floor.
Aleksei nodded. “He was until we caught him skimming off the top. He has been keeping drugs and some money off the top for himself.”
“What should we do with him?” Ivan asked, turning back to me.
He was practically licking his lips, eager to punish the man. Clearly, he grew tired of talking business sometimes, too. I resisted the urge to sigh. Predictable. Another man who didn’t know his place. Another man who let greed and addiction rule his thoughts. Did no one have a moral code anymore?
“It’s obvious,” I said, reaching into the top right drawer of my desk and pulling out my handgun. “I kill him.”
Suddenly, the lump on the floor lifted himself up onto shaky arms. Blood dribbled from his mouth like a slobbering baby. He licked his bright red lips and looked up at me with the one eye that was still open.
“Wait,” he said with a croak.
“For what?” I asked. “For you to die? You look like shit, but that could still be hours away. I’m a busy man.”
My men laughed, but the injured man only shook his head. “I’m sorry.”
I groaned. “Unfortunately, sorry doesn’t pay. If it did, I’d be ten times richer, and there would be a lot fewer bodies for my men to bury.”
I lifted the gun, the muzzle less than a foot away from the man’s bleeding scalp. The rug was salvageable now, but as soon as I pulled the trigger, it would be a lost cause. I briefly wondered whether I shouldn’t move him to the tile bathroom, but then thought better of it. I didn’t want my men to think I was overly concerned with décor.
