“I’m here because you’ve taken something that is mine.” Fedor leans to the side, his eyebrows lifted, and catches my eye. He lifts his hand in a wiggling-finger wave. “Where’s my little boy?”
A low, primal growl tears out of Viktor’s throat. “He isn’t yours.”
“Then whose is he?” Fedor asks. “He certainly isn’t yours. I mean, look at how handsome he is. He clearly got that from me. No offense, Vik, but you are more of the muscled, masculine type. Theo and I are of the pretty handsome variety.”
Fedor leans to the other side and grins. “Isn’t that right, kiddo?”
I realize too late that Theo has straightened up on my hip and is looking at Fedor over Viktor’s shoulder. I twist him down and back, breaking their eye contact. Theo gasps and then buries his face in my neck. I pat his back and whisper quietly in his ear.
“It’ll be okay,” I whisper, trying to convince myself of the words as well.
“How did you know we’d be here?” Viktor asks. “I kept this location a secret. Only a handful of people knew where we’d be. Who told you?”
Fedor grins and shrugs. “Would you believe that I’m all-knowing?”
“Was it Petr?”
At that, Fedor frowns and it looks genuine. He is confused, and so am I. Viktor hasn’t mentioned any doubts about Petr to me. This is the first I’m hearing about it, and it makes me wonder what else has been going on that I’ve missed.
“What the fuck does this have to do with Petr?” Fedor asks.
Viktor shakes his head. “Just give it up. I know Petr is working for you. You might as well admit it.”
Fedor looks like this is news to him, and I’m tempted to believe his act. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Phone taps?” Viktor prods. “Or bugs in the apartment? Is that why you sent a goon to the apartment a few weeks back? Not to get Theo, but to leave a mic.”
“Damn. Missed opportunity,” Fedor says. “That would have been a good idea.” He shrugs. “Unfortunately, no. Even if that was true, I still wouldn’t tell you. It doesn’t matter, anyway.”
“It does to me,” Viktor says. He reaches back to touch my leg, as if to check I’m still there. I lean into his touch, trying to offer what little reassurance I can.
“Well, it shouldn’t. I’m here to end this, brother. Once and for all, and I meant what I said. I don’t want anyone to get hurt.”
“Tell that to your army,” Viktor grumbles.
“Don’t put up a fight and they won’t shoot.” Fedor shrugs like it is that simple. “Believe me, I’d end it quickly if I could. You’ve more than earned a bullet to the brain by now, but I think it will be easier to bring the rest of your men in line if you are alive. If they see you brought to your knees, they won’t respect you anymore. They’ll see that I bested you. That I’m the true leader of the Kornilov Bratva.”
“Why do you need my men? You’ve had the Italians sucking your balls for a while now.”
Fedor’s mouth tenses into a hard line. “They aren’t my men. They are helpful to me, but I want my own kin around me. The men I’ve grown up with, who I trained with. And you are the only one who can help me get them.”
Viktor takes one step forward and every gun in the room lifts slightly, ready to take aim should he do something foolish. I reach out and grab the back of his shirt, but it isn’t necessary. He is simply leaning forward so Fedor can understand how serious he is about his next few words: “Over my dead body.”
I wish he wouldn’t say things like that. Fedor’s eyes are pitch-black and wild. He is so far gone I’m not sure there is anything human in him left, and he might take Viktor’s words as truth. He might believe he can only get what he wants if Viktor is dead and decide to riddle him with bullet holes right now.
“Come on. Be reasonable.” Again, Fedor is playing at rationality, but he is incapable of it. “Because it wouldn’t be over your dead body, brother. It would be over hers.”
I don’t need to look up to know he is talking about me, and the meaning is apparently clear enough to Viktor as well, because he growls again.
“Just give them both to me,” Fedor says. “I won’t hurt them … much.”
“Not a chance in hell.” The words are out of Viktor’s mouth before Fedor can even finish. “There is no way you are leaving here with them today. None.”
Fedor laughs and the sound sends goose bumps down my back. “We’ll see about that.”
16
Viktor
I wish I could turn around and tell Molly it will all be all right. I wish I could squeeze her hand and tell her we’ll all get out of this.
Because we will.
She doesn’t know it yet, but I planned for this.
Well, not this, exactly. But I planned for this possibility.
I knew I had a leak, so I called the men I knew I could trust and posted them in buildings around the photo shoot, ready to strike should anything go wrong. Like, for instance, if Fedor came pouring into the building with ten armed men.
All I need to do is keep him talking, and my men will be here any second. It is easy because Fedor is convinced he is in control right now. He is pacing back and forth slowly, savoring what he believes is his conquest over me.
“Fedor, you don’t have to do this,” I say, changing my tone. Up until this point, I’ve been hostile, argumentative. I knew Fedor would want to break me down. He wouldn’t want to take me kicking and screaming. He wants me to go out with a whimper, not a bang. So, I whimper. “We used to be a team. A dynamic duo. We can be that again.”
Fedor’s smile is sad. He is looking at me like I’m an injured animal on the side of the road, and he is trying to decide whether he should put me out of my misery or not.
“Don’t beg, brother. It’s beneath you.”
“Maybe,” I admit. “But I don’t want things to end badly between us. We are the only family each other has. We shouldn’t be enemies. It’s not natural.”
A flicker of something flashes behind his cold eyes, and I think I catch a glimpse of my real brother. Not the emotionless monster in front of me, but the scared little boy I know is living inside.
Then, Theo whimpers. “Dada.”
Whatever guard Fedor may have dropped is hauled back up in an instant, and his eyes are bottomless wells of darkness.
“Do you really believe that?” Fedor asks. “Honestly, Viktor, do you think you would ever forgive me for seducing your now-wife and fathering the child you are trying to claim as your own? Is that something you could look past? That I fucked your woman?”
“Raped,” Molly says, stepping out from behind me just far enough to make eye contact with Fedor. “You didn’t seduce me, you drugged me. And it wasn’t a fuck, it was rape. It was criminal.”
Fedor grins, thrilled that he managed to draw her out and into the fight. I want to wrap her in my arms and hold her back, but Molly is unknowingly assisting me in my plan to keep Fedor preoccupied. Because all of his attention is on her now.