“Enough.”
Her expression shifts, amusement fraying into annoyance. “God, you’re serious about this, aren’t you?” There’s a bit of acidity to her tone. “You know what would happen if you were to pull the trigger on that, right? You’d send both of us reeling as we tried to figure out how to work without one another. It’d create a nice little vacuum. And who, exactly, do you think would rush in to fill it? Peter, that’s who. You’d push me out to prove a point, only to become vulnerable to him in the process. Not a smart move, if you ask me.”
“I’ll expand my own operations, cut him out.”
Her smile drops. For the first time since she walked into myoffice, she seems to realize that she’s quite possibly not going to get what she wants.
“You’ve changed, Sasha,” she says, her voice small.
“I have.”
“It’s starting to sound like the rumors are true—that you’re looking to pull away from the Bratva, merge it with AngelCorp in a way that makes you completely legitimate.” She says the word with a slight, mocking lilt.
“I suppose you’ll just have to see what happens.”
She straightens, smoothing the front of her dress and rebuttoning the buttons. “Well, I suppose we don’t need to be too hasty about anything. But you must realize that this girl is a liability. If these big plans of yours don’t pan out, you might find yourself regretting keeping her so close.”
“Is that a threat?”
“It’s an assessment of reality. And Sasha, please don’t think so little of me that you’d think I’d disrespect you by marching into your office and issuing threats.”
“So just insults to my staff, unwanted seduction attempts—that sort of thing.”
She winks. “You’ve got it.”
I snort. “As pleasant as this has been, I’ve got work to do.”
“No doubt, you do.”
I press the button on my desk, the one that summons Bogdan. He appears an instant later, stepping through the office doors and holdingone open.
“Seeing Ms. O’Donnell out?” he asks.
She rolls her eyes. “I can see myself out, thank you very much.” She strides out. The click of Ruth’s heels fades into the distance, the echo of her stride down the hall reminding me of gunfire.
Bogdan allows himself a small grin, as if amused by her coldness. “Got some information for you on the near hit-and-run.”
“Tell me.”
“I’ll go get the file.”
He leaves, and I’m alone. The office is quiet, Ruth’s perfume still lingering in the air like a visitor that doesn’t realize it’s worn out its welcome.
Now that she’s gone, I’m able to turn my attention to what my mind is really on—the report. I pull the binder in front of me and open it. Minutes pass as I skim. It becomes clear that the proposal isn’t just competent—it’s perfectly done. I’d expected brilliance from Gabriella, but this is on another level.
Admiration clicks into place, and fear follows it like a shadow. Gabriella’s value to this company is made plain as day by the proposal. And that’s why someone would want her gone. If someone wanted to make sure the Orlov Bratva stayed in the criminal world, didn’t expand, didn’t go legitimate, taking her out would set my plans back quite a bit.
Rage boils in me again, the same as it did when I’d first heard the news about the attempted hit. It’s true that she’s valuable to the company, needed in a purely practical sense. But there’s more to it than that. She’s mine. And she’scarrying my child. I’d cut a bloody swath across this city to get my revenge for what someone tried to pull this morning.
And when I want something, I get it.
Gabriella is central to everything. If I can use her brilliance to cement this merger, everything will change. AngelCorp will incorporate Dandelion, and I can move it further along the path to legitimacy. A merger would make any kind of conflict between the Orlov and Morozov Bratvas prohibitively expensive and pointless. The men on the Orlov council would grumble, but no doubt they’d shut up as soon as the profits started rolling in.
Losing Ruth’s connections would hurt. Her channels move fast when I need speed. But I could build new ones—and I will.
For now, I’ll need to play nice with her, but I’ll be damned if it won’t be nice having a snake like her out of my affairs. One of my father’s biggest mistakes was getting tangled up with the O’Donnells, and it’s a mistake I plan on rectifying.
I flip the page and get back to work. A storm is coming, and I need to make sure we’re ready.
