Twenty minutes pass before Lev breaks.
“Boss,” he says, not turning around. “Are we really going to let this slide?”
My jaw tightens. I don’t answer immediately because the answer is complicated, and Lev doesn’t do complicated.
“Let what slide?” I ask finally.
“That fucking theater back there.” He twists in his seat to face me. “Timofey just rewrote history in front of us. Viktor’s dead. Our evidence is garbage. And Igor basically told you to go sit in the corner.”
Boris’s eyes flick to the rearview mirror, watching my reaction. Dima shifts slightly, listening.
“Igor gave an order,” I say. “We follow orders.”
“Bullshit.” Lev’s voice has an edge now. “Since when do we follow orders that fuck us over?”
The anger starts low in my chest. Slow burn. The kind that builds from years of swallowing things that should be spit out.
Fifteen years.
Fifteen years of following orders. Of cleaning up messes. Of putting Igor’s interests ahead of my own. Of sleeping with one eye open and a gun under my pillow because loyalty in this world is measured in blood.
I’ve killed for Igor. Bled for him. Watched my father die loyal to this organization while Igor sat in his office counting money.
And for what?
So his nephew can waltz in and paint me as a traitor? So I can get benched while Timofey rewrites reality to fit his agenda?
“Nineteen years,” I say quietly. “Nineteen fucking years I’ve been loyal to this family.”
“And what’s it got you?” Lev asks. “Timofey just threw you under the bus, and Igor believed him.”
Boris takes a left turn, heading toward the main road. The city lights start to appear in the distance. Civilization creeping back into view.
“It’s got me alive,” I say. “It’s got all of us alive.”
“For how long?” Lev shoots back. “You think Timofey’s done? He just eliminated the one witness who could expose him. Next move is cleaning up loose ends. And, boss? We’re loose ends.”
Dima finally speaks. “Lev is right.”
I look at him in the mirror. Dima doesn’t waste words. When he talks, it matters.
“Timofey will move against us,” he says. “Tonight was a test. To see if you fight back. You didn’t. Now he knows.”
“So what?” I snap. “I should have started a war in front of Igor? Put bullets into his nephew with thePakhanstanding right there?”
“Maybe,” Lev says. “Maybe Igor needed to see you had balls.”
The car goes quiet. Boris navigates through traffic, steady and calm, while the rest of us sit in the wreckage of what just happened.
Then Lev says it. The thing that cuts deeper than any blade.
“You know what, boss? You’re just like your old man.”
My blood goes cold. “Excuse me?”
“Your dad. Loyal to the bone. Did everything Igor asked. Followed every order. Put the family first.” Lev’s voice is matter-of-fact. Clinical. “And where did it get him? Six feet under while Igor moved on to the next useful idiot.”
“Watch your mouth,” I warn.
