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Maksim smiled down at me as we stopped in front of a heavy metal door. “The fact that you can admit that shows you will be a great leader, Ava,” he said proudly. “Remember that there are two sides to every coin. Sacrifices that must be made. You want to save women like your mom and Kenzi? Then you need to play outside the law. It’s not cheap to do what we do.”
I smiled up at him and nodded as excitement bubbled up inside me.
“I get that,” I told him honestly as I bounced on my feet. “Now can we go inside? Mark is going to die when he finds out I was in here first.”
Maksim grunted. “That kid will never be allowed in this place if I have anything to say about it,” he grumbled. “The damage that hellion could do.”
“You know he already has his own access to almost everything, right?” That included the Dashkov satellites, although he was highly monitored and only given access in dire circumstances.
“Don’t remind me.” He opened a small black box to the right of the door that was painted the same black as the door itself. If he hadn’t opened it, I wouldn’t have guessed it was there. “Just like the vault at the Dashkov Building, every designated person has their own individual code that rotates at the end of every week.”
“Who are the designated people?”
Maksim’s smile widened. “Matthias and Vas, obviously,” he told me. “Dima and me because we share duties as head ofBratvaenforcers, the six people who rotate shifts in that room, and you.”
I thought about that for a moment. “What about Nicolai and Leon? Wouldn’t they have access as well since they are part of the upper cadre?”
Maksim shook his head. “Nicolai’s and Leon’s duties have nothing to do with our cyber security unit. Nicolai, asObshchakdeals in money and businesses. His responsibility is managing the smaller businesses such as the nightclubs, restaurants, and strip joints we launder our money through.”
“And Leon?”
The giant Russian winked at me. “Leon the liaison is what we call him,” Maksim chuckled. “He is the face of most of our businesses. Matthias may be the CEO, but Leon is the one everyone sees. Press meetings, marketing, all of that is him and our PR coordinator Melanie.”
“I feel like I should have known this already,” I mumbled petulantly, embarrassed at my lack of knowledge on the inner workings of my own…empire? Yeah, empire sounded perfect and badass.
“Honor demanded vengeance,” Maksim assured me softly. “That is why you have us. You’ll learn as you go. Matthias had years to be trained by Tomas to bePakhan. You weren’t even given a how-to manual.”
Ugh, the amount of wisdom this man had in his head was maddening. Once again, he hit the nail on the head. Fuck. Maksim entered his passcode into the silver keypad and tilted his head back slightly for the retinal scanner.
With a small beep, it granted him access, the lock on the door disengaging. Cool air wafted into the warm corridor, causing goose bumps to break out over my exposed skin. Maksim waved me inside, closing the door tightly behind us. Funny thing about this room was that you had to use your code and retina scan to leave as well.
The room was painted in a light cream color. I had been imagining something much darker, like a hovel of some kind where they were all hunkered down and saw very little light. That wasn’t the case since my imagination wasn’t conducive to a good work environment and would probably make vampires out of everyone being unable to see the sunlight.
Which they couldn’t, but the walls had artificial windows with digital landscapes inside them. The lights in the room produced a type of artificial sunlight. It was genius really. This had to be the best room in Washington, where seasonal depression was a huge thing because of how little the sun shone throughout the fall and winter months.
There were no individual desks or offices in the room, save one that was used during an active op. The analysts in charge of the mission could use the room without being disturbed or crossing channels with anyone else in the comms center. Otherwise, the desks were shoved together in the middle of the room with obvious stations set up, but there were no boundaries or dividers.
“They don’t have separate workspaces because most of the time they aren’t working alone but as a team, and the teams change.” Maksim read my mind. “This allows them to switch up where they sit and who they sit with to better accommodate their needs.”
Some of the analysts looked up from their laptops, interest sliding into their gazes as we walked farther into the room.
“Great,” one of the analysts muttered. “Another one to babysit.” The girl across from him ducked her head, cheeks burning hot with embarrassment at his less than subtle jab at her. Clove was her name, if I remembered correctly. Maksim had given me a dossier on each of the analysts in the room. She was the only female, but her skills and credentials were far more impressive than most of her male counterparts.
Especially this one.
“Travis,” I looked down my nose at the man. “Isn’t it?”
He glared up at me, nose wrinkled in disdain. “Yeah? Want a cookie or something for knowing my name, princess?”
Next to me, Maksim growled at his insult but stayed quiet. I smirked at the dark-haired man before me whose obvious dislike of his coworker and immediate distaste for me spoke volumes about his character. He was smart, for sure. Off the charts. But his background held a large history of misogyny, and his current projects were somewhat lacking. As if a newbie was doing his workload on top of their own. He had a history of having other people do his work, using his power over others to get ahead, and skimping out on his own duties.
When I pointed this out to Maksim this morning, he had been livid at having missed the signs. I couldn’t blame him, though; he was stretched thin. The problem was that Matthias had his men trying to run both the criminal side and the legal side of the businesses. It wasn’t to say that they couldn’t do it, but that was how things like this slipped through the cracks.
“Travis Dorchester, born March 18, 1990,” I recited his information. “Lived with his mother and father until two years ago when they finally kicked him out on his ass.” The man before me paled. “Resigned from his last few jobs because he said they weren’t working out. Only, come to find out, you were forced to resign due to complications with your coworkers. Specifically of the female variety. Making them do the work that was assigned to you. Taking the credit where it didn’t belong. Applied under the last name Crenshaw so that no one would put two and two together.”
“I don’t…” He stuttered and tried to come up with a believable lie. Wasn’t going to work for me.
“You don’t what?” I asked, eyes narrowed at him. “Don’t know why you did it? Don’t know what I’m talking about? Don’t care?”
