AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I shake the thoughts away. I just have to get through today.
Over the sound of the trickling faucet, I hear Vadik’s office door fly open, and I immediately identify the loud voice that follows as that of Kir.
“Looks like someone had fun. Did Cinderella run away and leave her glass slippers behind?” Kir asks, laughing.
Dammit, I left my shoes by the sofa.
Vadik responds evenly. Like always. “Fuck off, man. What do you want?”
“Hey, Niko needs some reinforcements. Let’s go.”
“Why? What’s going on?” Vadik asks.
“Not sure, but I think he has a lead on the cargo and wants to confront Dimitri with some backup.”
With my ear pressed to the door, I hear some clicking, which I can only imagine is the loading of a pistol.
“Hey,” I say, bursting out of the bathroom.
I run to the sofa and put my shoes back on.
“We’re heading out, Charleigh,” Kir says, Vadik following him to the door.
“I know,” I say, tagging right behind them.
I have no plan. I just want to see what I’m involved in. And up against. As long as they’ll let me.
Vadik and Kir stop in their tracks, first looking at me and then each other as if each is waiting for the other to tell me to go back to my room.
Neither says a thing.
* * *
CHAPTERFIFTY-THREE
Charleigh
I follow Vadik and Kir out the building and we climb into the back of a big, dark SUV with a driver up front. I look back at the warehouse and spot Dominika looking out the window, watching me leave with the guys as the driver floors it and hits the road.
This is going to chap her ass, for sure. And the best part is, she knows she can’t say a thing.
“Do you think Niko’s in over his head?” Kir asks his brother as if I’m not even there.
They are totally ignoring me, which is just fine.
I can’t believe they let me tag along, and figure if I don’t draw attention to myself and keep quiet, they’ll forget I’m here. I have questions, but file them away for later.
Vadik takes a deep breath. “He may be in too deep. You know, he’s new to some of this shit. He hasn’t been at it as long as you and me. Papa protected him for a long time. Niko will catch up, but Dimitri can be formidable when he has his shit together. The fucker is determined unlike anything I’ve ever seen. He won’t stop until he’s dead.”
A cold shiver runs over me the way Vadik speaks so casually of death. Just another day at the office for the Alekseev brothers, I guess.
“Do we know for sure Dimitri’s people intercepted the shipment?”
Vadik looks out the window as we pull into a parking lot not unlike the one at the club—sprawling, overdue for maintenance with large cracks and potholes, and all the cars parked at one end, closest to a run-down warehouse like theirs.
“Who else could it be?” Vadik asks. “It’s not the authorities, we’ve already had our contact check on that. And other than them, who would be stupid enough to mess with our shit? ThePakhanis not going to be happy. There’s been a lot of pressure to keep the peace in order to maintain our low profiles. Dimitri is getting close to fucking all that up.”
Why haven’t they gone to thePakhanto resolve this issue, then? Isn’t that what he’s for?
