We shrug out of our coats in the entryway. I hand mine to the waiting man dressed as a butler, but with a shoulder holster. I loosen the top button of my shirt and roll my shoulders once, twice. The tension across my back has been there since we walked into the bar and I saw Rosie.
I could tell she was tired and bothered by the phone buzzing in her back pocket like a mosquito. But she smiled at the regulars, wiped the tables, acted like the world was not sitting on her shoulders.
When she looked at me, fear flashed in her pretty sky-blue eyes, but there was also a glimmer of something else.
No, I cut off that thought. This is transactional, and I can’t afford wishful thinking about emotions that were not there.
“Office,” Danyl says, already moving down the hall.
I follow him past framed photographs of him and Liza at a beach, of a blurred toddler running through sprinklers, and of all three of them at a picnic. I catch myself looking, cataloguing the details, then force my gaze away. Danyl is my cousin, actuallysecond cousin, but blood is blood, but although we are family, his life is not something I should covet.
Although he and Rurik, Danyl’s first cousin and ourPakhan, both grew up on the streets of Moscow, my life’s path started in an even darker place. Too dark for ever having what they both have now, genuine families.
In the office, the door clicks shut behind us. The desk is a solid slab of dark wood. The shelves lined with books and files and small pieces of art that probably cost more than my first car.
Danyl drops into the chair behind the desk and gestures for me to take a seat opposite. I stay standing instead, hands loose at my sides.
He studies me with that flat, assessing look that runs in the family. His eyes have the same shape as mine, but where mine are gray and cold, his blue ones have a spark of amusement most days.
Not tonight.
“Sit, Alexei,” he says. “You make me nervous when you stand. Like you’re about to pounce on me.” He says it with a smile because he knows I would never turn on him. Even if we were not related by blood, he’s family, my brother because of the brotherhood we’re in.
The Bratva.
I lower myself into the chair. It creaks under my weight.
He steeples his fingers. “Well? What do you think of her?”
My jaw tightens. He doesn’t have to specify who. We didn’t go to the bar by accident or to see the owner. Tonight was all about Rosie Morgan.
“She works hard,” I say. “Keeps an eye on everyone. Knows when to cut people off. Smart enough not to ask questions she doesn’t want answers to.”
“And?”
I meet his gaze. “She is her father’s softest spot.”
“Weak spot,” Danyl corrects me and smiles, slow and sharp. “And definitely his softest one.”
He leans back, chair groaning quietly. “I told Rurik you are ready to move beyond breaking bones. He approves because he thinks you have both brains and muscles, but this arrangement is also a test.”
“I am not here to be tested,” I say, before I can pull the words back.
Danyl quirks an eyebrow. “You’re here because you want to stay.”
Silence stretches between us.
He is right. I do want to stay. It’s not like I need a visa to do the work I do, but I want a bank account that doesn’t get frozen every time some bored immigration officer decides my last name sounds too foreign. And when I need to leave the country, I want to be let in again without having to buy a fake passport because my legal one has overstayed its welcome. Technically, I could get a work visa through one of the brotherhood’s many shell companies, but we don’t want immigration—or any government agency—to scrutinize them too closely.
To make things easier, I need permanent residency, a green card, but even better would be dual citizenship.
I exhale through my nose. “Let’s hear the plan.”
“She’s the perfect candidate.” His mouth curves. “Rosie is twenty -two and has no criminal record. She’s a naturally born citizen with clean credit, well as clean as it can be with a father like hers.”
“She is a bartender,” I say. “She makes minimum wage and tips.”
“You make more than enough for both of you,” he counters. “And with your new responsibilities, your income increases. We’re not talking about money here, we are talking about legitimacy.” He opens a drawer, pulls out a thin folder, and slides it across the desk toward me.
