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He despised liabilities.
But Samara was nice, a luxury restaurant in West Town, an area that had once been filled with Russians and Ukrainians but which was now gentrifying nicely.
The older Russians didn’t like it. They saw it as something lost. But Lyon was someone who looked forward, not back. What was the use in crying over the past when there were opportunities in the here and now? When every apparent catastrophe was an opportunity in disguise?
Gentrification of West Town meant the Russians who had holdings in the area would be rich, able to sell their houses and restaurants at many times the price for which they were purchased. And though many of them were fond of lamenting, “But where would I go?” Lyon knew the world was wide.
With money, there were a million places to go.
Money wasn’t everything of course, which was why Lyon sat in his favorite chair — the one upholstered in scarlet velvet, dragged in at some point from the dining area — and surveyed the men around him.
Power. That was everything. With power, one could go anywhere, do anything.
Undo anything.
“Why the fuck are you always lurking in the corner, Antonov?”
Lyon looked up to find Yakov staring at him from behind the carved desk at one end of the room. He was in one of his foul moods, still licking his wounds from the dressing down by Viktor Baranov last week.
Lyon had to force himself not to smile at the memory. Baranov’s words had been mild, but the meaning behind them was clear to Lyon: Yakov was on his last leg with Viktor.
And that meant the opportunity Lyon had been waiting for was coming.
“Just waiting to be of use, boss.” It was almost painful to acknowledge Yakov as his superior, but Yakov enjoyed it, enjoyed knowing Lyon, who was from a family far more illustrious than the Vitsins, knew his place.
“Well, stop staring into space like that,” Yakov said, getting to his feet. “It’s creepy as fuck.”
He paced the floor and the other men glanced nervously in his direction. Three of them — including Boris — were playing pool. The other two sat at the table they used for food, drinks, and cards between errands and jobs for Yakov.
“What are we doing sitting here with our dicks in our hands?” Yakov asked no one in particular. “We should be out there, working that bitch, getting her to drop the case against me.”
No one said anything. Word had gotten out, probably from Boris: Yakov wasn’t allowed to touch the woman or the boy without Viktor’s permission. She was a prosecutor for the State of Illinois, and even Viktor had no taste for harming a child.
It would be a lie to say that it had never been done, but it was a last resort, something no one with any honor wanted to see done, something Lyon himself would forbid if he had the chance.
But Yakov had no honor. He was a psychopathic opportunist, motivated solely by that which would elevate him in importance.
Still, it would be a mistake to remind Yakov of this fact. He was a brigadier. They were lowly shestyorka, or associates.
Errand boys, really.
All except Boris and Lyon. As Yakov’s personal security detail, they were somewhere in between, a hierarchical no-man’s-land Lyon was eager to vacate.
The men had resumed playing pool, albeit half-heartedly, probably hoping Yakov would abandon this line of thinking, maybe bring in some of the girls he called “hostesses” in the restaurant.
“The kid,” he said, still pacing, running his hands through his thinning hair. “He’s the key. No woman, not even a cold-hearted bitch, wants to see her child hurt.”
“But boss, I thought we weren’t supposed to touch the kid?” said one of the men at the pool table, a newer member of Yakov’s team.
Lyon suppressed a wince. He’d pegged the man as dim from the beginning, but this surpassed even Lyon’s expectations.
Yakov froze, his eyes homing in on the other man, who was already backing away, instinctively putting more distance between him and the threat of Yakov.
When you got right down to it, men were just animals. They knew when to hide. When to fight.
When to run.
Yakov stalked toward him, dark eyes blazing, an unhealthy sheen of sweat dotting his pale brow. He picked up one of the pool cues laying on the end of the table and kept on going.
