“You brought a guest,” he said and pointed to the ceiling that no longer creaked with footsteps above, though music still bled through. “The girl upstairs.”
Amelia.The corner of Emory’s mouth twitched in a nervous tick. Everyone had them. He knew his and worked diligently to eradicate them. Too late, Viktor seized on the momentary break.
“My sister.”
“No. The red head. I saw you with her out back.” Viktor smiled and ashed his cigarette. “Pretty thing,” he added on afterthought and stared across the table at Emory. “She’s yours?”
As above, so below—all eyes in the room turned to Emory, unified in their scrutiny. Who was Amelia Havick to him? The answer didn’t matter, only the vulnerability she might’ve infected him with. They scouted it out like a sickness in him.
“We both like pretty things,” Viktor continued when Emory hadn’t answered and lifted a hand to admire his rings. “Except I favor pretty things I can stand to lose. I wonder if you’re the same.”
The heat of the room moved through Emory. He tore his gun from his waistband and slammed it to the table. With the barrel end pointed at Viktor, his hand rested on top.
“We’re not the same. I come by my pretty things honestly. Cartel money paid for yours. I told you from the jump I’m not involved in that business. I wanted this joint run clean, and you swore up and down that you understood. So, here’s what it’s gonna be. You can keep your bullshit, but we’re done here. I expect you out by?—”
“That’s not what’s going on!”
Viktor pounded his fist to the table so hard the samovar toppled and bled tar-black tea leaves onto the felt. Emory gestured to the captain of Las Vegas post.
“You know Disco. He keeps an eye on you, makes sure everything’s good. You think he didn’t notice that you run the business dirty?”
Viktor rolled his eyes with a huff. He’d pay for the insolence. For the time being, Emory filled the room with the boom of his voice.
“Are you suggesting he’s a liar? Tell him! Go on. Look Disco in the eye and tell him he’s a fucking liar.”
Viktor either had to come clean or double down on denial. Coward that he was, he did neither.
“Maybe you don’t know your men as well as you think you do,” he said with delight in his eyes mismatched to the scowl on his lips. “You talk about liars, but do you trust these men here?”
One by one, Viktor examined each man in the room, but Emory refused the bait. He didn’t need to ponder the question or evaluate them too. These were his brothers. Simple as that.
“More than I trust you. They took oaths. You didn’t.”
Viktor laughed darkly and squashed his cigarette in the ashtray. “Your blood oaths won’t protect you from what’s coming.”
“And what’s that?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me.”
Viktor’s yellowed teeth split his lips with a sinister smile. “Your brother.”
“My brother?” Emory asked, the breathless question useless filler. He’d heard just fine.
Viktor leaned forward and whispered, “Ivan.”
Emory’s grip tightened on the gun, and his free hand curled into a fist, the nails digging into his palm.Name your demons. Make them real.
“Ivan,” he repeated, just as quiet. “You’ve been chatting up ghosts?”
That earned a round of laughter from the room. Viktor found no humor in it. Neither did Emory.
“I’m not lying. Ivan said you’d deny it, so he told me to tell you this. Remember the girl in the woods, the day it was just you and him. Do you know what that means?”
Emory nodded vacantly as the memory assailed his senses.The taste of blood in his mouth. The sun beating hot against his neck. Face down in the leaves. God, how they’d reeked of wet rot. No one knew about that day, not a soul on earth except Ivan and him. Emory’s stomach roiled, and he swallowed down a crippling wave of nausea.
“Ivan’s alive,” Viktor added, almost apologetically, “but you knew that, didn’t you?”
