Timofey pats his cheek, almost gentle. “You want to telldyadyahere the truth? Or you want to keep hiding behind Anton’s shadow?”
He stands again, takes a slow drag from his cigar, eyes flicking my way with the faintest smile. “My men tell me the accounts ran through a shellsomeoneset up years ago,” he says, casual, smoke curling from his lips. “Old trick. Smart one. Who would ever questionhim, right?”
Lev lets out a sharp, disbelieving laugh. I turn just enough to catch his eye—a single look that saysdon’t. He shuts up.
Igor’s gaze lifts from the table—finally—settling on me.
Viktor swallows, eyes darting between us, panic clawing at his face. His mouth works like it’s full of gravel.
Finally, he rasps, “It wasn’t—”
And that’s when Timofey moves.
One clean shot. Right temple.
Viktor drops like the strings got cut, blood already spreading dark across the concrete. No gasp. No scream. Just gone.
Timofey lowers the pistol smoothly, like it weighs nothing. Like it’s a pen he just finished signing with.
“He was about to lie,” he says, voice flat.
Viktor’s body is still twitching when silence swallows the room. Smoke hangs low. The copper tang of blood mixes with the burn of Timofey’s cigar.
Igor doesn’t move at first. He just watches me, as if the corpse on the ground is nothing but background noise. Then he takes a long, unhurried drag from his cigar. Lets it out slow, smoke curling around his face like fog over stone.
Lev breaks it first. A dry scoff. “Wow,” he drawls, clapping twice, slow and mocking. “What a fucking show.”
The sound bounces off the walls. Dima doesn’t move, but his eyes cut sideways at him, warning.
I don’t give Lev a look. Don’t give anyone anything. My gaze stays on Igor.
Because this isn’t about Viktor anymore. It’s about what comes next.
Igor leans back in the chair, sets the cigar between his fingers. Then he speaks, voice quiet enough to make us all lean in.
“You’ve been under a lot of pressure lately,” he says. The words are calm. Patient. But the weight behind them is deliberate. “Maybe some rest. Step back from operations for now. Let others handle the transfers.”
Translation: My leash just got shorter. Timofey’s holding the chain.
Lev goes rigid against the wall. The mockery is gone now, replaced by something sharp. Dima’s jaw flexes once, tight as stone.
I don’t let anything show. Not anger. Not insult. Not the fact that Timofey just rewrote the story in front of us all, and Igor let him.
I keep my posture straight, shoulders squared, eyes on the man who made me. Every muscle in my body wants to react—wants tomove—but I don’t. Not here. Not in front of them. Not when the wrong breath could be taken as defiance. I swallow it down, the heat, the humiliation, the urge to put my fist through something, and make myself smaller. Colder.I nod once. Steady. Controlled.
“As you wish, Pakhan.”
10
Anton
Boris drives like he’s transporting eggs. Steady hands, smooth turns, no sudden movements. The kind of care that comes from years of moving bodies and evidence through Vegas traffic without drawing attention.
Forty-three minutes back to the penthouse from the warehouse district.
The industrial landscape slides past the windows. Empty lots. Chain-link fences topped with razor wire. Billboards advertising bail bonds and divorce lawyers. The glamor of Vegas stops about ten miles from The Strip, and this is what’s left. Concrete and rust and businesses that operate in cash.
Lev rides shotgun, drumming his fingers against his thigh. Dima’s in the back corner, silent as always, but I can feel himprocessing what just happened. The tension in the car is thick enough to choke on.
