"Who's been helping you?" I ask.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
I cross the room and grab him by the collar, hauling him out of his chair. The muscle starts to move, but Nenad shifts his aim and they freeze. Without their weapons, they know they'll end up dead before they can blink.
"Let me rephrase that," I say, my face inches from Andrei's. "Who in the Gravitch organization has been feeding you intel? Who told you where I'd be and when I'd be there?"
"No one. I've just been lucky." This fucker speaks so calmly, it's pissing me off. I could tear his head off and spit down his throat right now.
"Nobody's that lucky. Not for eight months. You've had help and I want to know who." I shake him hard and he only chuckles. Like this is some sort of a fucking joke.
Andrei's eyebrows rise and he asks, "What's it worth to you? What do I get if I talk?"
"You get to die quickly so your death isn't painful." I'm not giving this bastard a single thing.
"You think I'm just gonna give up my family that easy?" He shrugs and narrows his eyes at me. "That's not how this works, Gravitch. Let me go and we'll talk."
"Vadim," Vuk says, tapping on his watch. His reminder is frustrating because I am finally here to get my information and I don't want to pause this for anything. But we have to move. Ruslan is only minutes away and he's expecting us to meet him outside soon to charge the building. But I've already got what I came for. And I won't let Ruslan come in and ruin this.
I tighten my grip on Andrei's collar. "You're not in a position to negotiate… You killed one of ours, and I'm here to get to the bottom of it."
"I didn't kill Dominic," Andrei says coldly, and I don’t fucking believe him. I know maybe he isn't the one who pulled the trigger, but I need to know who was involved. All of them.
"Then who did?"
"Fuck you," he spits, and I shove him to the ground, then give him a kick to his ribs.
Lebedev curls into a ball and coughs hard, and I watch his goons tense up, but they can't do anything with guns pointed at them.
"Boss," Nenad says, and I get the point. We have to move now. I won't let Ruslan walk in on us here and cause a scene. He'll stage it to look bad and we'll either be arrested or killed. We have to get out of here.
I tell Vuk, "We're taking Andrei and leaving."
"What about them?" Nenad asks, gesturing to the two bodyguards.
"Leave them… Just tie them up…" Scowling, I yank the bastard off the floor to his feet and jam my gun in his ribs.
Vuk secures the muscle while Nenad and I drag Lebedev through the hotel hallway and out the side door. He's not resisting but he's not helping, either. It's like herding a stubborn sheep and I have to shove him a few times to get him moving faster before hotel security or staff sees us. We're almost to the car when I see vehicles pulling up.
"Fuck," I say, changing direction.
But it's too late. Ruslan's already spotted us. His SUV screeches to a stop and he jumps out of the vehicle before it's even fully parked. Ilya and Konstantin flank him. All three of them have weapons drawn and pointed in our direction.
"Vadim," Ruslan snarls. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"
I keep my gun pressed against Andrei's ribs and face Ruslan head-on. "My job. The one Yuri actually sent me here to do."
"I ordered you to wait. We were supposed to move together." He looks pissed, and it makes me giddy to think of just how much more pissed he'll be when I get Lebedev to talk and he implicates all three of them.
"Your orders don't mean shit to me. You're not in command here."
Ruslan's face flushes and he takes a step forward. Ilya and Konstantin move with him, forming a triangle that's clearly meant to intimidate. But I've been in worse situations than this and I'm not backing down.
"I'm in charge of this operation," Ruslan says. "Yuri gave me explicit authority."
"Yuri gave you nothing. I checked with Fyodor this morning." I lift my weapon from Lebedev's side to point it at Ruslan. "You're here to assist, not to run the show. So either holster your weapon or explain to Yuri why you're pointing it at family."
Ruslan's jaw clenches and I can see him stewing internally. Nenad and Vuk have positioned themselves around me and trained their guns on Ruslan's men. The parking lot is a powder keg waiting for someone to light the fucking match and I'm ready to watch it burn.
