After she comes down for the second time, I back away and hand her the jeans to slip back on.
“I know you have questions, and I’ll answer them. But right now, I have work to do tonight, and I need you to stay here,” I say as she stands up, her knees a little shaky.
“Work tonight? Just tell me what you do. Take me with you so I can see it,” Danielle says, her voice impassioned.
I shake my head. “No. You have to stay here. Nikolai and Dimitri will be here to watch over you. I promise I’ll explain everything; just be patient.”
Leaving Danielle at the penthouse with as many questions as she had was risky, but I didn’t have a choice. My only comfort is knowing that Nikolai and Dimitri won’t let her run away.
As prominent as Danielle is on my mind, I have to force her aside to work. I get to the nightclub, and Lev is waiting outside with a cigarette in hand.
“Glad you finally decided to show up,” he says, tossing it on the ground and stomping it out.
“What are we working with?” I ask, both of us pushing our way past the line of people waiting to get in. The bouncer recognizes me and waves us through.
“Adrian called me and told me about the Petrovs’ plan to attack you at the warehouse. He mentioned a lost shipment, and I did some digging about that. Apparently, the Petrovs lost close to a mil in guns. They seem to think that’s your doing,” Lev says as we maneuver through the crowds of people to get to the basement.
“Now, why would our good friends think that?” I ask, no amusement in my voice. I don’t take kindly to being threatened.
“Here’s the fun part,” Lev says with a mirthless laugh, stopping me at the bottom of the stairs before I open the door to see what he has waiting. “They think our most recent shipment of arms is as big as it is because we stole their goods. They think that because they have a mole inside our ranks.”
My blood runs cold. Who the fuck have I let into my family that’s going around and telling the Petrovs everything we’redoing? If I find out who they are, they’re going to regret ever crossing me.
“And who the fuck is that?” I ask through gritted teeth.
“That remains to be seen,” Lev says, opening the door and revealing a familiar face tied to a wooden chair, surrounded by boxes filled with weapons and drugs we’ve stashed here.
“Vlad, what have you gotten yourself into now?” I storm across the room to him. “Tell me, who is this mole I’ve heard so much about?”
Vladimir Petrov is one of the sons of Pyotr Petrov, the leader of their family. Vladimir is notoriously messy. He’s the youngest son with no chance of ruling.
As I get closer, pressing my hands against the back of his chair, he spits at me. “You’ll have to kill me before I tell you.”
I wipe the spit off of my face and glare at him, shoving the back of the chair so he crashes into the ground with a loud thud. “That’s no way to start a conversation.”
His eyes widen as I stand over him, kneeling down to get closer. I grab the collar of his shirt in my fist and lift him up, throttling him. “Tell me what I want to know, and I’ll send you running back to Daddy.”
He shakes his head, a laugh slipping out of his throat. “I’m dead either way. I won’t tell you.”
“Then I’ll just have to make you,” I say, my fist colliding with his cheekbone. Vlad lets out a grunt as my fist crashes against him. Blood splatters from his nose immediately, and I raise my eyebrows expecting him to give in.
It’s clear to me this is going to be a long session. I punch him again, lifting up the chair so he doesn’t choke on his own blood. I can’t have him dying on me before I have the information I need.
Someone has infiltrated my ranks and is selling information to my enemy. That puts me in danger alongside everyone in my family, and now Danielle. I don’t like to be fucked with.
Vlad doesn’t respond easily. My fists crash into his face, his chest, breaking ribs and bruising nearly every inch of his torso.
People in our line of work know how to take pain. But taking it for as long as I’m willing to dole it out to him is something else entirely.
By the time I get him to talk, my knuckles are cracked and bleeding from force, and I have his blood stained all over me.
“All I need is a name,” I say to him, grabbing the collar of his shirt again to force his limp head to look me in the eye.
He coughs blood, and I raise my eyebrows at him. I can see in his gaze that he doesn’t want to die. He doesn’t have to.
“Nikolai,” he finally says. I lean closer to make sure I heard him correctly, and he says it again.
My chest tightens when I think about it. There’s only one Nikolai in my ranks, and right now he is at my house watching over Danielle.
