by Renee Strong
“This is a slightly delicate matter, Vlad,” I began. “Which is the reason I did not wish to speak to you in front of your men. I believe this is a matter that solely concerns you and me.”
He leaned forward.
“Speak plainly then.”
“Thank you.” I took a sip of my coffee to settle my nerves. How I approached this could be the difference between me living or dying. Even the small pistol that Dominic had insisted I slip into my purse gave me no comfort. If Vlad took offence at this, I would be dead before I could reach it.
“I’m afraid I had cause to lie to you when we met in your office. It was out of respect to you, I hasten to add.”
My speech had become formal, stiff, but I thought now was not the time to be chatty or to make wisecracks.
Vlad stiffened and I watched him watch me suspiciously for a second before I continued.
“You asked me if I recognized the other man who had taken me. I told you no. The fact is I did, Vlad, but I could not say so in front of your men.”
My nerves were jangling, and I willed my hand not to shake on the table. It twitched a little but I pulled my fingers into a half fist to still them.
“The other man who took me introduced himself as Jules. I recognized him from the picture on your desk.”
Vlad licked a corner of his bottom lip.
“No, you must be mistaken. Or someone was impersonating him.”
I shook my head sadly.
“I told you that I escaped from those two men. I did not tell you how I left. On a blue Vespa.”
Vlad paled and pushed his chair back, the feet scraping on the floor. I had guessed he would recognize the vehicle his son used. I had guessed right—but not on the ferocity of his reaction. His voice was loud when he spoke again and by the door, I saw his man’s hand hover over his gun.
“So what do you mean to do,” Vlad hollered, his face coloring again with a rush of red to the cheeks. “You mean to have your revenge on his father? For the sins of his son?”
He stood up and my heart pounded in my chest. The next move he made, one or both of us would be dead. I stood up too and reached my hand out to grab his arm. Huge mistake, I realized as I did it. His bodyguard lifted his gun out and trained it on me.
I put my hands up to show that I had no weapon on me, looking at him quickly to see if he was about to squeeze the trigger, then turning back to his boss to try to stop this situation from careening right off a cliff.
“No, Vlad,” I said, desperately trying to keep my voice from breaking. “I asked you here in good faith. I mean to cause no trouble.”
His arms shook with rage and his face, so congenial before, was frightening. In that moment, I realized how quickly he could turn.
From my left, there was a crashing against the door and I spun round to look at its source. Vlad’s bodyguard had dropped to the floor, a fresh spot of blood on the wall where his head had hit it.
Dominic stood with his gun raised, his handsome face twisted in rage and defiance. I pieced together that he had rushed the door, knocking the other man against the wall with such force that he had been knocked unconscious.
He kicked the door closed behind him, the little bell jingling with inappropriate levity as it shut. Dominic didn’t say a word, just kept staring down the barrel of his gun. He had Vlad dead in his sights and if he took his shot, Vlad would be dead before he even hit the ground.
No, no, no. He wasn’t supposed to be here. This was something I was supposed to handle quietly and discreetly. In and out—no need for raised voices and definitely no need for raised guns.
“Dominic,” I said, “put the gun down.”
He didn’t break his line of vision to look at me, just kept his intense stare on Vlad.
“Go ahead and shoot me,” Vlad said. “That was the plan here, wasn’t it? To get me on my own and to take me out? I’ve suspected it since I found out one of yours was conspiring with Serge. Serge told me so before I cut off the last of his fingers.”
I looked to Dominic again. “Put it down, Dom.” I flicked my gaze back to Vlad, hoping that in my wide, pleading eyes, he could sense I was telling the truth,
“There was no such plan, Vlad, I came here to be honest with you with the intent that we’d all walk away.” My throat had turned so dry that the words were hard to get out, but I also couldn’t ignore the surge of adrenaline that was coursing through me. It was heady, intoxicating, and I felt more alive than I had done in a long time. Ironic given that I might be dead soon.
“The guy who was conspiring with Serge wasn’t one of ours,” Dominic shouted from across the room. “He’s a snake that’s about to be weeded out. The wheels are in motion on that as we speak.”
Vlad’s face was getting so red that I was legitimately worried he was about to have a heart attack. For as impish and playful a man as he was—when not acting like a straight-up psycho—he was older than he acted.
For a split second, I wondered if him dropping dead from his own overworked heart might work to our favor, but then I dismissed the thought as quickly. Better the devil you know in this situation. And if Yulian was the guy coming up behind him, that didn’t bode well for my future interests in, you know, breathing or being alive. Not since I’d left to bleed on a cold warehouse floor.
Behind the counter, the waitress hadn’t moved an inch. In this part of Angel City, she probably knew better than to call for the cops. Anyone who tried to be a hero in this part of town would likely be thanked for it with a bullet to the frontal cortex. Her bottom lip was shaking as if she’d been plunged into an ice bath but other than that, she was standing as stiff as a mannequin.
“Please,” I said nodding to the scared waitress. She was still holding the coffee pot that she’d been about to carry over when Dominic crashed in, her knuckles white around the coffee pot handle. “She’s frightened. She doesn’t need to be. And you don’t need to mistrust me.”
I sat back down and put my hands on the table, palms up. I knew, logically, that I should have been terrified, but the strange thing was that I wasn’t. I felt calm, in control, and positively buzzing with energy. Every nerve ending in my body was alight with the feeling of power. With just a nod of my head here, Dominic would end Vlad’s life—but I had the power to navigate this situation to just the right conclusion. A conclusion of my choosing. Whatever I did next, Dominic had shown again and again that he would be there to empower and protect me.
“Please, sit, Vlad,” I said, my voice stronger and more commanding this time.
He still stared me down, his face almost tinged purple now, and I kept his gaze, never wavering or shaking from it. I nudged his chair closer to him with my foot.
“Sit,” I repeated. This time, he did as I asked and sat down stiffly on the chair, sliding it so that he could keep an eye both on me and Dominic.
“Dominic is going to kick your man’s gun out of arm’s reach. Then, he’s going to put his own beside it and step away.”
Dominic looked at me in bemusement for a second before acquiescing. He kicked the prone man’s gun until it slapped gently against the wall, then put his own beside it. He stepped back from it and pressed his back against the café’s door, turning the catch on the inside so that no one could walk in.
“No one’s armed now, Vlad,” I said. “There’s no reason for anyone to get hurt. We’re just having a conversation, you and I. We’re working toward a solution.”
The normal color had started to return to his face and I left him to gather his thoughts and to calm himself.
Neither of us spoke for a long few moments. Then, Vlad spoke again, his voice back to a normal, even quiet, register.
“So what is your intention here, Ms. Wilson?”
He had declined to use the name I gave my friends. The slight didn’t escape my notice but I pretended not to register it. I pushed a hand through my hair while I chose my next words.”
“I have no ill intention, Vlad, I assure you.” I cou
ld still see the waitress from where I was sitting. Her eyes were closed but her lips were moving. I couldn’t read lips but I would put money on it that she was praying to make it out of here alive.
“My only intention was to let you know what the truth was,” I said calmly. “You are a respected man—by the DeLuccas especially. No one wants to see trouble between our two camps. That’s why I wanted to come talk to you personally. I thought you were owed that respect.”
He stared toward the window vacantly. The longer he didn’t look or talk to me, the more my nerves started to grow until the first touches of a cold sweat prickled the back of my neck.
“You know,” he said with a voice that was little more than a whisper, “I asked him not to get that stupid Vespa. Offered to buy him a muscle car—one of those Mustangs. But he turned it down.”
He finally turned his attention to me, a look of incredulity in furrowing his brows, knitting the gray hair into an expression of perplexedness.
“Can you believe that, Lexi? What sort of young man wants a goddam Vespa? Especially the son of a Russian gangster.”
He laughed joylessly. “But that’s always been Yulian. Knows better than the family. Always wants to do things differently. I blame his mother for indulging his whims, for turning him into a pampered little brat.”
He sighed heavily, lost in a world of thoughts I couldn’t begin to understand. Finally, he gave a single nod, as if deciding something to himself, and stood up again from the table, calmer now.
“I will deal with this, Lexi. I don’t like it but it is my problem, my responsibility.”
He inched his vision to the waitress. “Speaking of responsibilities, this waitress may be a problem for all of us.”
The young woman’s eyelids sprang open and the prayer she had been reciting died on her lips.
“She’s been witness to some things that she shouldn’t know,” Dominic agreed behind me. My heart sank. This poor young woman was just trying to make ends meet. It wasn’t her fault she had gotten caught up in this mess of a situation but the way Vlad and Dominic were talking about it, she might end up paying for it anyway.
I couldn’t let that happen.
I stood up too and moved quickly to the counter. I read the name on the waitress’s name tag.
“She won’t cause any problems.”
Vlad gave me a patronizing look. “There is no way you can know that.”
“But I can,” I shot back. I reached my hand across the counter and held it there. “Kelly, give me your ID.”
The waitress looked at me in surprise and babbled something back, unable to get a coherent sentence out.
“Kelly, these are impatient men. Hand me your ID. Better still,” I said, thinking of how nervy Vlad had been, “give me your purse and I will get it myself.”
She gulped a big breath of air and nodded once, bending down under the counter to grab the handle of her purse. Her other hand still held the coffee pot.
When she had slid the purse across the counter, I reached into her wallet and took her ID out.
“Kelly,” I said firmly, putting the thin plastic card into my pocket, “I’m going to keep this.”
She stared at me blankly,
“Nod again if you understand.”
She did so, giving a couple of quick nods of her head.
“Kelly here,” I said to both Vlad and Dominic, “does not want any trouble. If I had to guess, she’s working for some shithead who could not care less about her wellbeing. That’s why she’s working a late shift in one of the worst parts of Angel City. Am I right, Kelly?”
Her eyes were filling with tears. “I only work here to take care of my son. I see some shit on the regular and I never tell anyone. Who would I tell?”
Neither Vlad nor Dominic looked convinced. They were likely running through a list of people she could tell.
“What we’re going to do, Kelly, is that we’re going to give you some money. Enough to make you forget that anyone was even here. Then, I’m going to give this ID to one of my associates and he will find out everything there is to know about you.”
Her eyebrows shot up.
“He won’t need to use that information unless you do something stupid like talk to some people.” I patted the pocket with the ID. “But he’s not going to have to do that, is he, Kelly?”
She shook her head vigorously and I was positive she wouldn’t say a word. No one working in this part of the city was dumb enough to climb into the mob’s mouth. Definitely not into two mobs’ mouths.
“Gentlemen, open your wallets,” I said turning to Vlad and Dominic. They each gave me a quizzical look.
“Between you, I’m guessing you have a thousand dollars in cash, right?”
The two of them reached into their pockets, Vlad pulled out a black leather wallet and Dominic pulled out a billfold.
“Yeah, I have five hundred,” Dominic said. “You, Vlad?”
Vlad peered into his wallet, then flicked through the notes.
“Looks like I’ve got about four-eighty on me. I’m short twenty. Can you spot me?”
Dominic laughed, the sound of it breaking the tension that had been hanging over the room the past five minutes.
“I’m sure I can manage that, Vlad. You can buy me a whisky next time I’m at that club of yours.”
Vlad gave a little half smile and pulled his cash out.
“Deal,” he said.
Dominic took the cash and counted out five one-hundred-dollar notes and a twenty on top of it. He passed it to me and I in turn held it out to Kelly.
“For the stress and having to clean that bit of mess off the wall,” I told her. “This makes us square, all right?” My voice was loaded with a warning undertone, to remind her that this was better than any deal she would have been offered by the two men beside me.
She picked up on the tone, and reached out to hungrily grab the wad of notes. Her whole face was more relaxed, a touch of glee on it, and I could tell she was busily calculating all the extra bills she could pay with it. I would be in her shoes.
Out of sight of Vlad and Dominic, her hands under the counter, she flicked through the bills rapidly to count them.
“You’ve got it,” she said, not even looking at me, her eyes locked on the small fortune moving between her fingers.
“And maybe think of a new job?”
She stopped counting the cash, her expression serious again.
“Yeah, I’ve been thinking that.”
I gave her a small smile, one that I hoped portrayed how deeply I understood her situation, one of those smiles only two women who have been through tough times seem to know how to make. The one that says, “I know your life and I support you.”
Already, I was beginning to have big plans for the DeLuccas organization, and my place in it, and being the rising tide that lifted all boats was a part of it. Not that I had let the DeLuccas in on my strategy.
Dominic and Vlad looked more satisfied now and Dom nodded to the guy on the floor. He had come round in the time that I was talking to the waitress but still seemed confused and a little out of it.
“Can I help you carry him out? And maybe give him some money to get his head seen to?”
Vlad snorted.
“Pah, money. If he had have locked the door like he was supposed to, his head wouldn’t be hurting him now. Let him pay for it.”
He shoved his wallet back into his overcoat pocket.
“I will take your help to drag his durak ass out of here though.”
Dominic bent down to pick up his gun and handed Vlad the other. The piece deposited into the back of his trousers, Dominic then reached down to help the recently conscious Russian up.
As Dominic did, Vlad turned to me and looked at me earnestly.
“I appreciate you coming to me directly, Lexi,” he said genuinely. “I will remember that in the future. But I can tell you, coming alone was either stupid or very naive. If you are to feature in the DeLuccas’ lives, I
would advise you to smarten up.”
I balked a little at the insult, given how I had just sorted out his waitress problem for it, but I didn’t say anything. He reached out and took my hand and patted it with a twinkle of amusement in his eyes.
“I will say, you have balls, young lady. Much bigger than some of the so-called men I ask to do things for me.” He gave a tiny smirk, nodding to the man Dominic was hoisting over his shoulder. “He gave my hand a kiss. “I look forward to seeing much more of you in future.”
Without waiting for a response, he turned to pick up his man, shouldering his right side with some effort. He swore a little in Russian.
“Shit, Yegor. You need to lay off the pierogis.”
Dominic gave a throaty laugh as he unlocked the front door.
How could I have even thought of sending Lexi away?
As she sat and chatted happily and animatedly to me in the car on the ride back to the weekend house, I was barely even listening to what she was saying.
That’s because my mind was too preoccupied with what an idiot I’d been. I had written her off as this delicate, breakable woman. Yes, I would still always protect her—with my life, if needs be—but this woman was not some blushing, easily rattled debutante.
Lexi Wilson was a goddamn warrior queen and I had almost overlooked that fact in my haste to do what was best for her.
She wasn’t fazed by everything she’d just witnessed. In fact, as far I could tell, she was still high on the experience. Her cheeks were flushed as she recounted the conversation she’d been having with Vlad before I burst in and her eyes were shining with excitement at how it had all turned out as she hoped.
My experiences had been coloring my perception of her. I had seen how my dad had treated my mom when Bobby and I were kids and that made me want to protect everyone I loved. But Lexi could stand on her own. She was just the kind of ally I’d dreamed of having when I was I was younger and still imagining a different life for myself.
“Will you stay with me?” I asked her suddenly, cutting her off mid-sentence. She raised an eyebrow.
