He gives me a curt nod. “That’s better.”
The watercolors do placate me, at least for a while. They’ll give me something to do tonight after dinner.
But then I see Pavel dressing in his formal uniform, with its military epaulets and bright brass buttons.
“Where are you going?” I ask him.
“The Policeman’s Ball is tonight,” he says.
I flush with envy. I’ve never been allowed to go to a party.
“I wish I could come,” I tell him.
“You are coming,” he says. “In a manner of speaking. You’re coming to the station so Zaitsev can keep an eye on you.”
“That’s ridiculous!” I shout. “I don’t need a babysitter.”
“Obviously, you do,” Pavel says.
I’m so angry I want to snatch his stupid hat off his head.
“Change your clothes,” he orders.
“What’s wrong with this?”
I hardly think I need something nicer than jeans, a tank top, and a cardigan if I’m going to be hanging around the station.
“That shirt is too revealing,” Papa says.
My hands ball into fists at my sides. I ought to put on the lowest-cut top I own.
Instead, I swallow down my fury and go to my room to change.
If I try to disobey him, I know he’ll just force me.
3
Dom
I get back to the monastery at around 10:30 in the morning, sore and cold from my unexpected swim in the river.
I came out on the bank two miles up, dragged myself through a field, and startled a farmer mending his fence. Seeing the Bratva tattoos on my neck and hands, he would have helped me regardless. But I gave him some cash for a ride back into the city.
He drops me off at the gates where Oleg is keeping watch.
“Maks is back,” he informs me. “No sign of Efrem, though.”
Of course Maks was the first one back. He’s more slippery than an eel, always finding his way in and out of trouble.
About an hour later, right when I’m starting to get seriously worried, we get a call from Dr. Marx. He’s at a safe house in the Kalininsky District, tending to Efrem, who apparently took a bullet to the left calf and right shoulder. Bulky, slow, and unlucky, Efrem was shot beneath the water, but still managed to swim a mile downstream and find his way to the nearest road, where he flagged down a car heading into the city.
“Put him on,” I say to Dr. Marx.
Efrem takes the phone, groggy from a shot of morphine.
“Hey boss,” he says.
Technically Ivan is the boss, but when he’s not in the room, the title passes to me. I couldn’t give two shits about titles. Efrem, however, is a Petrov to his core, and he respects the family above all else.
“You alright?” I ask him.
“Yup. Fucking fantastic, actually. I like this . . . this stuff that Marx has. He should quit sewing people up and go into business selling this shit.”
“That business already exists,” I tell him.
The opioid industry is alive and well, though we don’t sell it. The Petrovs stick to weed. I’d call marijuana a vice, same as cigarettes or alcohol. Heroin is life-destroying. The Chinese used to call it “chasing the dragon”—that dragon swallows you whole the moment it floods into your veins.
I’m no idealist. I’ve done a lot of nasty shit, and I’ll do plenty more. But I have no interest in creating desperate zombies who will literally do anything for their next fix.
“Rest up, then get back here,” I tell Efrem. “Call Oleg when you want a car.”
“Yup, will do,” Efrem says mushily.
When I end the call and slip the phone back into my pocket, I see that Ivan has come into the war room. His dark hair is still damp with sweat, and he’s wearing gray sweatpants and a tank top, the front of which is likewise soaked. Sloane must have run him hard this morning. The two of them like to compete to see who can destroy themselves the most in the downstairs gymnasium. When they do combat training, the rest of us clear out, because they tear the whole gym apart—fighting or fucking.
Ivan towels off his head and chest, his craggy face stern and cold.
If I wasn’t his brother, I’d be shaking in my boots right now, knowing I just lost a massive shipment. Even as his brother, I’m not exactly looking forward to explaining the situation.
“Efrem’s at a safe house getting stitched up by Marx,” I tell him. “He was shot twice.”
“Yobanaya suka!” Ivan swears. “Erdeli goes too far. I didn’t want an all-out war with the police, but he forces my hand.”
“How do you think he knew where we were going to be?” I ask him.
“He has an informant, clearly,” Ivan says. “We’ll find out who. Truth be told, we relaxed our caution when we had an arrangement with Utkin. We should have had security around the dock to begin with. We’re becoming sloppy.”
I nod. Ivan doesn’t blame me because that’s not his way. But I was in charge of the pickup. So, it’s me who should have put security in place.
“Will we retaliate?” I ask him. “They hit one of our men, we hit three of theirs?”
Ivan considers. “Perhaps. Efrem isn’t dead. But they shot at all of you.”
“And they have the weed.”
“The bigger problem,” Ivan agrees.
“I have an idea . . .” I tell him.
Ivan crosses his arms across his broad chest. It looks like a forbidding gesture, but I know him well enough to know that it means he’s listening.
“We could steal our shipment back. It would recover the asset and serve the dual purpose of making Erdeli look stupid. Show him that we don’t respect his territory any more than he respected ours.”
Ivan thinks on this. He’s not impulsive—he always considers the angles before making his decision.
“It’s probably already been taken to police headquarters,” he says,
“I know. That’s why it’ll be a thumb in the commissioner’s eye.”
“I don’t want to lose any more men over this.”
Efrem isn’t lost exactly, but he’ll be out of commission for the foreseeable future.
We stand silent for a minute, both thinking.
This is the only time Ivan and I really look alike—when we’re both lost in thought, scowling.
“If I can find a way to do it with minimal conflict?” I ask Ivan. “Before they move the product?”
“Yes.” Ivan nods. “Just don’t go in guns blazing.”
“I’ll handle it,” I tell him. “You can trust me, brother.”
Ivan claps me on the shoulder.
“I know I can,” he says.
I spend the rest of the day formulating my plan, in company with Maks and Zima.
Zima is an eighteen-year-old kid Ivan picked up who knows where, around the same time he met Sloane. Ivan brought him back to the monastery and told us to take care of him.
Zima may look like a space cadet, but he doesn’t need any taking care of. All I had to do was point him to the dining hall and prevent the other men from killing him when Zima beat them all at Call of Duty—easily, repeatedly, and with an excessive amount of taunting.