AMT: 250,000 USD
NOTE: SERV/ROMA–"SCOUR"
REF: NICO/G–GW-11
"What happened?"
I almost miss my father’s question and hasten to fill him in. "The Venezuelans had him. Oksana was on a different mission when she stumbled upon him," Iexplain, pushing the numbers, the accusations, and the questions haunting me back down. For now.
"The Venezuelans?" I know my father. I've seen his acts hundreds of times when he's playing both fields, and my blood runs cold. Even without the bank slips, I would have known right then. He knew.Heknewthe Venezuelans had Nico, and he never told me.
For a moment, his face is a hundred moving things, all practiced, all played out before, never reaching his eyes. Then he asks, "They had my son?"
"Yes."
I feel Oksana's eyes on me. If anybody can read a room, it's her. I place my hand on the small of her back, asking her to stand down. I need to play this my way. This is my father.
"They’ll pay—" he starts, but something in my eyes must tip him off; he stops.
We size each other up. Father and son. Suddenly strangers.
"They’ll pay for having him," I vow, finishing his sentence, watching him. "They’ll pay for keeping him."
His voice drops to a whisper. "If you move on them, Edoardo won’t like that." Panic flickers across his features like a guilty animal. "He made it clear. The Venezuelans are not to be touched."
My palms slicken. The memory of the payments—lines markedsecurityandcontinuity—reaches up and clamps my throat. Dad had the logic of survival tattooed into his bones from birth:you play both sides. It's a balancing act; that's how the family survives. He had been the man who drew the lines, signed the checks, and kept the ledger tidy. The thought that he used my brother as a column in that ledger unspools something hot and ruthless in my chest.
"They had your son." My voice is cold, and the room tilts with it.
"And I would like to kill them for that," Gustave responds evenly. "But—" He stares hard into my eyes. "When you are capo, son, you learn when to put vengeance on ice for the sake of the family."
My laugh is a broken thing. "When I am capo," I repeat and stop. Too many emotions are running through me, accusations, suspicions, and anger, to finish the sentence. Because what do I say? I won't be like you? I won't bow to Edoardo? I've played his game for a while, and it sickens me. I am a man of decisions, not a tightrope walker.
He misreads my hesitation. "I'm going to see Nico now."
"No," I step in front of him. "Not now."
He straightens to become the capo he is. "You're not going to stand in my way, pup. Those men out there," he points into the hallway, "still work forme."
Before I can respond, Oksana’s voice rings out cold as a funeral bell. "That might be so, but the Russians out there," she imitates the way he pointed, "listen tome,old man. So, unless you want an old-fashioned shootout, right here in the hospital hallway, I suggest you pack and go."
He stares at her as if she'd sprouted horns. Then at me. His eyes ask,is she serious? I cross my arms over my chest.Try her. I glance at her and feel that small, feral pride that is hot and dangerous and entirely mine.
"You can’t do that," he says quickly. "You can’t?—"
Before he finishes, there’s movement at the doorway, shadows folding into the light. Russian faces. Broad shoulders. Cold eyes. Three of them, precise as glass. Oksana doesn’t smile as they approach. They slide in silently and professionally—too smooth to be anyone’s ornament.
Gustave’s face drains another color. He takes a few steps back. "What?—"
One of the Russians, a man with a scar that maps his cheek, inclines his head. "Metelitsa," the name sounds like a warning. His eyes are flat, unreadable.
The waiting room tightens. The helicopter outside thumps like a second heart. Nurses push past in scrubs—ordered, hurried—and a technician skims by with a portablemonitor.
My father turns to me, sweat beading in the hollow above his lip. "Stephano, tread carefully here. Very carefully. Some steps can’t be taken back."
I look at him—at the man he’s been—and I see all the things I was, and all the things I will not be. I could kill him. I could hand him over to Oksana; she would do it, no questions asked. I could let the ledger be erased with a body and call it balance. Instead, I breathe. Force all emotions to drain from my expression. The room smells of antiseptic and fear and the faint oil of a hundred other men’s sins. Keeping my fury from my voice, I ask flatly, "Why were you making payments to the Venezuelans for three years?"
The words hit him like a grenade. His eyes narrow, and for just a flicker of a second, he falters, then catches himself. His finger moves in front of my face, "You're playing with things you know nothing about. Dangerous things that could destroy our family."
