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A low hum vibrates from Efrem’s chest, and he reaches up to comb a lock of hair behind my ear. “Trust me, Dani Richelieu, you are anything but normal.”
Then he leans in to kiss me, making the world around us vanish once more.
12
EFREM
“We’re only keeping them here temporarily—until we know what to do with them,” Gleb, Pyotr’sbratok, explains in Russian as he leads us toward the back room of Satine. “But the raid was very successful.”
Even in the daytime, Pyotr’s Manhattan strip club is dim, lit only by colorful neon bars that line the corners of the ceiling and floors. They throb to the pulsing beat of the music that seeps through the walls from the front of the building.
How men can find time in the middle of a Sunday afternoon to sit and watch naked girls dance, I’ll never know. Their world is completely foreign to me.
I follow Pyotr closely down the door-lined hall to the far end, Val close behind me. And as we step into the open conference-type room, the music fades significantly. As the door latches quietly behind us, silence fills the room.
Gut twisting with revulsion, I scan the twenty-odd girls scattered about the place. They range in age from their early twenties all the way down to one girl who can’t be more than fourteen. Sick fury consumes me at the state they’re in.
Though they appear to have had the opportunity to wash up, and they’ve all been given clean clothes, it’s obvious that they’re in various stages of trauma. Several flinch and cringe away at the sight of us. Others stare, glassy-eyed, into space—most likely coming down from some drug.
Bruises litter their arms, legs, and faces, reminding me of the way that one Zhivoder man had handled Dani so roughly. Murderous rage tightens my chest at the memory. Mikhail and his men are sick, twisted fucks who deserve to die slow, painful deaths.
“A few were beaten pretty badly. We had to take one girl to the hospital,” Gleb admits, his tone dark as he maintains our mother tongue, perhaps to avoid upsetting the girls with anything he might say.
Pyotr flashes him a severe look. Any involvement by larger entities—the police in particular—could jeopardize our Bratva and implicate us in the gunfight that took place.
“Hey, cuts and bruises we can manage,” Gleb said defensively. “But her arm was most likely broken, and her cheekbone looked shattered. She needed a doctor.”
Though Pyotr’s captain took a risk, if the girl he took to the hospital was worse off than what I see here, I can’t disagree with his decision.
“Can anyone trace it back to us?” Pyotr asks, maintaining the conversation in Russian, his voice even. He must have come to the same conclusion.
“No one but the girl. She seemed clear-headed enough that I’m betting she got the broken arm refusing to let them shoot her up. And her legs worked just fine. We drove her up to the curb across the street from the hospital, and she walked herself inside.”
Pyotr nods, turning his attention back to the girls before him. “Have they said anything yet?”
Gleb shakes his head. “Not much. Most were high as fucking kites when we brought them here.” The icy hatred in his tone mirrors my own—all focused on the Zhivoder Bratva and their revoltingly lucrative business of sex trafficking.
Sure, the Veles are known for being brutal. Yes, we’re a major distributor of illicit drugs across the eastern seaboard, but I find it beyond fucked up that Mikhail Sidorov makes money by kidnapping women, pumping them so full of drugs that they can hardly remember their name, and then selling them off to the highest bidder.
And once they’ve been used so thoroughly that he can’t profit from keeping them? He sells them off, shipping them around the world to men who might use them for even darker, more sadistic fantasies.
“From the sound of it, this was a fresh batch they picked up from various cities around the Midwest. I think they drugged the girls to keep them passive. The drive from Colorado is a long one. I’m sure they had to make a few stops along the way.”
Sighing heavily, Pyotr approaches the nearest girl. Long, heavy waves of black hair cascade down her back and over her shoulders. Her oval face and delicate nose emphasize her dark, prominent eyes. Their elegant tear shape set in russet skin makes me wonder if she might not be East Asian or possibly Hawaiian in descent.
And unlike the number of glassy-eyed girls that sit around her, she levels us with a sharp, intelligent gaze as soon as we approach.
“What’s your name?” Pyotr asks, switching to his flawless English.
The girl tips her chin defiantly. Her eyes flick toward Gleb as if to ask whether it’s safe to answer, and he gives the subtlest of nods.
“Melody,” she states boldly, though I detect a slight tremor in her voice that reveals her lingering fear.
“Where are you from, Melody?” Pyotr questions gently.
“Oahu, originally. I moved to Colorado six months ago.”
“Is your family there?” he asks.
