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What really pisses me off is almost a year ago, Valdez contacted me asking to work for him. If I had said yes I’d have access to everything I could need. I’d said no without even thinking about it. I didn’t want anyone telling me what to do and my own work was more important. So now I’m almost three months into searching for anything to take them down with nothing to show for it. For a long week, as I scoured for the tiniest thing on any of the family, I wondered if the Levins were exactly as they appeared.
To the city of Chicago, the Levin family were nothing more than third-generation Russian immigrants made good. They were more American than Russian despite growing up speaking Russian. They’d successfully brought a taste of Russia to Chicago by way of their three supermarkets that carried the best of Russian food items, with one of them a true gourmet-only store. Then there were the two restaurants, one opened by Victor—their father—and the other opened by Milos.
Aleksander ran one of the most popular nightclubs in the city. The richest and the most beautiful played there. Even though it was a poorly kept secret gambling was happening inside, nothing was done about it. Because supposedly there was no house take, just men sitting around playing poker, roulette, and craps with each other for fun. Yeah, right.
While I have no doubt the restaurants and club are where they’re cleaning their money, I can’t find anything to prove it. It was only if you kept asking enough questions, pushed harder on the Outfit—the Italian mafia that runs the city—you’ll get the answer that the Levins are Russian mafia, Bratva. Milos, the oldest at thirty-nine, is thepakhan. Aleksander is next at thirty-eight and the two spies or what the Italian mafia would call an underboss, and Nikita, the youngest of all six brothers, is the bookkeeper who keeps track of all their money.
In Philadelphia Vasily, the third-born brother, is thepakhan. I wondered—hoped, really—that Aleksander resented not beingpakhanof Philadelphia, but he’s so close to Milos that he didn’t want to go to Philadelphia. The brothers had taken a vote and made Vasily the head of the family there, with Damien the bookkeeper and Maxim his two spies.
Frustration twists me into knots. For the thousandth time I wish to hell Raymond’s girlfriend had contacted me sooner. I pull up the recording of the conversation I’ve listened to so many times I know every word by heart.
When the phone rang I was asleep after being up all night crawling through the internet for a lead on a trafficking operation out of Poland. The only reason I woke up was because I was startled by the uncommon sound of the house phone ringing. I hadn’t used the phone in months, only to call my cell when I misplaced it. The only reason it was connected was because I was too lazy to change it when Beth died, also the internet was less expensive as a bundle than alone. Since it was an unlisted number it didn’t ring often.
“Hello?” I mumbled.
“Lisa?” The woman’s voice was strained, barely more than a whisper.
That the person knew the name no one has called me in years had me instantly awake. Confusion mingled with fear in the pit of my stomach. “Who is this?”
“It’s Diana. Do you remember me? I was dating Ray when he disappeared.”
Relief had me sagging into the arm of the couch. I did. I hadn’t liked her. She resented me as much as I resented her. “Yeah, you agreed with the police and FBI that Ray took off.”
I hated her for agreeing with them. It meant people stopped looking for him when I knew better. He wouldn’t have left me. I don’t care if he was being investigated for mishandling a case. Something happened to him, no one looked for him but me. And at sixteen—a week away from seventeen—I was too young to do much. Not even the newspaper or television reporters were willing to help me.
Since he went missing two days before Christmas, media wanted only saccharine sweet or injustices fixed by the holiday season. The networks didn’t care about a questionable FBI agent, and I was terrified to tell anyone what happened to me even if it would have made Ray look good for taking me in.
There are times the guilt threatens to consume me. If I had used my sob story maybe the press would have helped. I was so fucking selfish. I failed Ray after all he did for me. “What do you want?”
“I’m sorry. I was too afraid to piss off the Levins. Milos is terrifying when crossed. He’ll order whole families killed, not just the ones who wrong him. I had my kids to think of.” She sniffles, her voice throbbing with regret and tears.
“What? Who?” Before her phone call I had no idea who she was talking about. The name Levin sounded familiar in the way of a B-list actor on a television show you didn’t watch. Chicago and the surrounding suburbs has more than three million people in it. I knew of basically the mayor, the governor, and our senators—I don’t even know who my alderman is. It’s easy to live in a bubble of a three-to-five-block radius of your home in Chicago, with either an El or bus stop so close to everything. Especially, if you never left the house like me.
I knew of the heads of state and local police forces of the countries that had the most trafficking, and that was it. Life in Chicago didn’t really exist for me outside of my delivery people and housekeeper who made it possible not to leave the house.
“Milos Levin, the head of the Bratva here in Chicago. Look, I still think Raymond left on his own. But I also think they know where he went and helped him get there. If you go to them, I think they’ll tell you since it’s been so long.”
Bratva? The Russian mafia? I’m up and at my computer typing in a search on Milos Levin. “Why do you think that? And why are you just calling now?”
Air shudders out of her. “Because it’s time. I’m dying. I’m in hospice now. They said I have a few weeks, maybe only a few days. I’d rather it was days. I can’t take this pain anymore. I’ve wanted to tell you for a long time. With the end close, I finally can. I do think Ray is out there. I might have thought I loved him, but he was a selfish bastard who didn’t care about anyone but himself. A man like that doesn’t allow anyone close enough to kill him.”
I close my eyes against the description of Ray.She was wrong,I want to scream. He loved me. He was never selfish with me. Only I don’t dare, scared of angering her and making her hang up. “Why do you think Milos Levin knows? I’ve never heard or seen the name in any of his files.”
“Because you’ve never heard of or seen the name. He was getting paid off from them since his second year here in Chicago. They were more than that though. He was friends with the whole family. Ray joked about marrying you off to the youngest son Nikita when you were old enough.”
I’m only half-listening, too pissed at her, thankful the call is recording as are all my calls—cell phone and landline. Holy shit, she wasn’t exaggerating, the Levins are top fucking dogs, or should I say lions? Since it’s what Levin means in Russian, or so every freaking reporter tells me when writing about them. “I don’t understand, if he was so close to them, how I never knew or saw anything on them.”
Her sigh is loud. “It’s like I said. They might be titans in this city, but they are also into some scary and dirty shit. Milos has worked hard to keep their name squeaky clean. Ray didn’t even call them by their names in his phone or appointments with them. Victor, their father was Vincent, Milos was Michael, Aleksander was Adam, and Nikita was Nathan.”
Memories flash of Ray using those names. It wasn’t often he did, but he spoke of them more than a few times. Before I can ask more questions, I hear an exclamation in the background.
“Who is this?” a woman demands.
I’m not sure who to say—Lisa, a name I’ve done my best to forget or Phoenix—the name I chose for myself. I don’t have a chance to respond to either before the call is cut.
Fuck!I want to scream.
At the time I decided to wait a day for Diana to call back, only she didn’t. When I broke down and called her two days later, it was to be told she was dead. I cried, but not for the reason the woman thought I did.
