Leonid takes an automatic rifle from one of our men. He sends a spray of bullets at the doorway of the back room while I move down the hallway. A man who dares to stick his arm around the frame gets his hand shot off. A howl of pain lifts above the noise of the gunfight. Another man dashes forward, firing blindly, but he goes down before his bullets can do any damage.
My men follow on my heels. By the time we’re at the door, the shooting from inside has stopped.
“We surrender,” someone calls from inside.
“Come out,” I say harshly. “One at a time. And don’t fuck with me, or I’ll brick up every door and window and let you rot inside.”
We line up on either side of the hallway, our weapons aimed.
The first man steps out, his arms hanging loosely at his sides.
“Put your hands behind your head,” I say.
He sneers and reaches for something behind his back.
A sequence of rapid gunfire goes off.
His chest explodes, the gun he pulled from his waistband falling with a clang on the floor.
“Hold your fire,” someone shouts from the room. “We’re out of bullets. Unarmed.”
“Come out now and I’ll finish you off quickly,” I call back. “You know you’re dying here today.”
A man walks out with his hands in the air. He’s as tall as he is square, his puffed-up muscles steroid-induced. He wears a black shirt and pants with Italian shoes, apparently trying hard to imitate a crime boss. His shaved head shines under the bulb that dangles on a cable from the ceiling. A black tattoo of an eight-pointed star sits in the center of his skull.
Every muscle in my body goes taut with a need for violence. It takes all my self-control and then some not to off him right away.
Stopping in front of me, he spits at my feet. “Fuck you.”
Three of my men filter into the back room while the others grab the man. He struggles at first, until they’ve tied his wrists and ankles with cable ties. Then he lies grunting on the dirty concrete.
“What’s your name?” I ask, suppressing an urge to kick in his teeth.
“Vadim,” he says with defiant pride.
He’s brave but stupid. If he had one clever brain cell in that thick skull of his, he would’ve never laid a hand on Katerina.
One after the other, my guards shove the men from the back room through the door. There are four of them—three older men and a lanky young one with a dark stain on the front of his pants. The old men leer as they’re brought to stand in front of me. They’re hardened, old-school gangsters. They’re not going to bow to me or anyone else. Too bad I don’t give a fuck about their resilience.
Vadim went after Katerina, and these men are culpable by association.
I give the order with a nod of my head.
My men know what to do. They take them to the kitchen to finish them off. Only because of their age do they get to die quickly.
“Leave this one,” I tell the guards, motioning at the one who’s pissed himself.
He stares at me with owl-sized eyes, shivering in his shoes.
I point my gun at the bald-headed piece of filth on the ground. “Tie his ankles.”
In a few seconds flat, Vadim has a thick rope strung around his legs. He hurls insults as Leonid and one of the guards drag his heavy weight to the bathroom. I grab the arm of the thin guy, tugging him along.
The bathroom reeks of a blocked drain and overflowing excrement. Brown water covers the floor. Vadim curses me to hell as they drop him face down in the water.
Turning his face to the side, he spits. “Go fuck yourself, you motherfucking fuck.”
I go down on my haunches, studying his face with the passive curiosity of someone who’s about to dissect an insect. He’s red with fury, about to blow a gasket.
My voice is cold, collected. “You know why you’re here, tied up like a dog and lying in shit and piss, don’t you?”
His upper lip curls. “Because you’re frightened.”
I chuckle. “Do I look frightened to you?”
“You’re scared of what’s going to happen to you, Volkov. Admit it. I’m here, lying in piss and shit because you’re a coward.”
“Wrong answer.” My manner is calm, not betraying the cold fury inside. “You’re here, about to die, because you laid your filthy hands on my woman.”
“The American chick?” He gives a taunting laugh. “If I were in charge, I would’ve used her up nicely before delivering her.”
My vision goes hazy. The urge to rip out his windpipe is so strong I have to curl my fingers in a fist to prevent myself from acting on a whim. That will be too merciful for the piece of scum.
“Deliver her to whom?” I ask coldly.
He laughs. “If you think I’ll tell you that, think again.”
Straightening, I say to Leonid, “Let’s get on with it.”
“What are you doing?” Vadim shouts as my men drag him to the toilet stall.
He squirms like a worm, wriggling and spewing gibberish as they lay a metal pole over the stall and throw the rope tied to Vadim’s feet over the pole. It takes two men pulling on the long end of the rope to hoist him up.
Hanging with his head down, he twists from side to side. “You think you’ll break me with torture?”
He’s not worth the time or energy of torture.
When they carefully lower him, he starts to beg. He makes useless promises and offers futile bribes. His voice is an insult to my ears until his head dunks below the brown sludge drifting on the dirty water in the bowl. All that are left of his pleas are gurgles and another spout of indiscernible prattle.
I give it a few seconds before giving the signal. The men hoist him up until only his forehead touches the filth.
“Cut me down,” he says, coughing up brown water.
I walk to his side. “What were you supposed to do with Katherine?”
“Take her to an address and leave her there.” He gags and coughs again. “An apartment in Brooklyn.”
The answer makes me as volatile as a volcano on the verge of erupting. “What’s the address?”
“I don’t know. I was supposed to call a number—a burner, I think—once I had the woman. Instructions with the address were supposed to follow.”
“On whose order?”
He blows a string of snot from his nose. “Cut me loose.”
I raise a hand. The men lower the rope.
“Wait,” Vadim cries out. “It was Stefanov. Vladimir Stefanov.”
My rage is so enormous it takes me a moment to digest the name. Vladimir Stefanov? One of the biggest bratva bosses in St. Petersburg? What the fuck is Stefanov’s problem with me? We’ve never done business. We haven’t even crossed paths.
“Why?” I grit out.
Vadim shakes his head, sending drops of filthy water flying. “I don’t know. It’s not my job to ask questions.”
I believe him. Vladimir Stefanov is too high up in the hierarchy to share his plans or motivations with a lowly cockroach like Vadim.
I flick my fingers.
The men lower the rope. Vadim’s head disappears under the slimy foam again. He makes ugly gargling sounds as he twists his upper body.
Gripping the neck of the piss-stained young man—the last enemy standing—in a fist, I push him closer and to his knees so he can witness what it looks like when a man drowns in shit.