“Boss, you’re wrong.” Mitch’s voice carries the weight of five bullet holes and fourteen years of guilt. He tilts his head, drawing Dad’s attention like he used to do when Jake and I were kids. “It wasn’t Leonid.” His eyebrows draw together, the scar above his left one pulling tight. “You’ve been lied to.” His eyes flick to Ludis. “We all have.”
“Play it.” Ludis’s command cuts through the air.
The recorder clicks. Static crackles. Then Stephan’s voice fills the basement, and my lungs forget how to work.
“Jake had to die. He was too loyal, too soft. He’d ruin everything.”
My knife handle bites into my palm. When did I grab it?
“Maxwell? That weak drunk? He’s too busy drowning in his bottles to notice anything.”
Dad’s face crumples. Tears cut tracks through years of alcoholic bloat.
“I stood right in front of Clara at Jake’s funeral, and she never even suspected.”
The pearl handle warms against my skin—Stephan’s sixteenth birthday gift. His voice keeps playing, but blood rushes in my ears, drowning out everything except the memory of him straightening my black dress at the funeral, wiping my tears with his monogrammed handkerchief.
“No…” Dad’s whisper scrapes raw. “No. Jake… my boy…” His fingers dig into the wheelchair’s arms until the metal creaks.
Stephan’s laugh sprays blood across the concrete. “Oh, come on, Max.” His words gurgle wet through torn flesh. “You reallythink you were a father? Jake was weak, just like you. Someone had to take control, and it sure as hell wasn’t going to be you.”
The pearl knife slips from my numb fingers. It hits the floor with a sound like breaking glass.
Something snaps inside my chest. My lungs burn. Can’t breathe. Can’t think. Tears blur everything except Stephan’s bleeding face.
Leonid’s boots scrape concrete. “Clara—”
I slam into him, fingers clawing for his shoulder holster. The Glock comes free before he can grab my wrist. The grip is cold. Familiar. Stephan taught me how to shoot with one just like it.
The first bullet takes out his right knee. His body jerks like a puppet, curses dissolving into wet choking sounds.
The second one explodes through his left thigh. Blood sprays.
The third shot punches into his shoulder. The recoil travels up my arm, but I barely feel it.
“Do it, bitch.” Blood bubbles between Stephan’s teeth. “Finish it.”
The Glock shakes in my hands. Fourteen years of lies stare back at me through one swollen eye.
Metal scrapes behind me. Dad’s grunt of effort. His feet hit the floor.
“Dad—”
He stands on trembling legs, gripping Mitch’s Colt .45 in both hands. Fourteen years of bourbon weakness vanish as the barrel finds Stephan’s mouth.
“Go to—” Stephan starts.
The Colt roars. The back of Stephan’s head paints the wall red.
68
Leonid
Two weeks later
The scotch burns going down. Two weeks. Fourteen fucking days of silence from the room upstairs.
“Still brooding, boss?” Maksim sprawls in the leather chair across from my desk, boots propped up on mahogany like he owns the place. “Or is this your new thing now? The whole dark and mysterious act?”
