"You need to do something about that. The skin looks raw." He twists his lips in thought. "Aloe vera might work."
I scoff at that. "I assume you didn't come in here to offer skincare advice."
"No, I didn't." He retrieves a folded piece of newspaper from his pocket and slides it across the desk to me. "Orlov sent a message."
I open the newspaper to find a picture of Katya and me at the gala last night. Orlov obviously got this hot off the presses.
"Has this mystery beauty tamed the beast?" I read the headline aloud. The journalists at the Forum Dispatch must have worked overtime to come up with that. The paper, I note, is smeared with red. "Whose blood is this?"
"The newspaper was placed on top of a cloth bag inside a shoe box. The bag contained a dove with its heart cut out. It was delivered by courier before dawn, addressed to Katya."
"Fuck!" I slam my fist down on the table. "The dove represents her, I assume."
"That would be my reading of it," Lukas concurs.
"Was there anything else? A note?"
Lukas shakes his head. "I guess he thought we'd get the message."
It's not hard to understand. Orlov hasn't been subtle, which confirms everything I've heard about the man.
"Do we know where Orlov is?"
"He's not at the Wraith's compound," he says, referring to the MC Bernardo Andretti runs. "My guess is he's at one of their safehouses, plotting his next move."
"How the hell did Orlov and Andretti get involved with each other?"
"My guess is Andretti needs money. Nobody in Rome will touch him. Orlov needs local knowledge, men who can operate in the shadows if they need to. No one else would dare go up against us so he's stuck with Andretti."
That makes sense. In the aftermath of my attack, I eliminated every possible threat in the most bloody, brutal way I knew how. Some gangs operate in the city now but no large mafia organization remains.
The Bratva have never got a foothold here and there's no other international criminal fraternity to speak of. Orlov doesn't have many potential allies here so he'd have to rely on the one man stupid enough to think he can move against me.
"What are their numbers like?"
"Orlov brought six trusted men with him. He's relying on Andretti's muscle to get the job done."
The job being to kill me and take my wife, two things that will never happen. Though I'm confident about that, hubris has never been my weakness. Until the threat has been dealt with, some precautions will need to be put in place.
"The house goes on lockdown," I say. "I want extra men on every door in or out of the property. Any deliveries must be thoroughly checked by Eduardo himself before they're brought up to the house."
I think about all the packages my wife has had delivered over the past few days. Eduardo is going to be a busy man.
"Okay, anything else?"
"If anyone dares try to fly a drone over the property, shoot it down and interrogate the operator to find out who they were working for."
It's become an increasing nuisance in recent months. Sometimes it's just kids curious about the property with the enormous walls around it. Other times it's a paparazzo pushing his luck. Occasionally it's something more sinister.
"We do that anyway," Lukas says. He eyes me speculatively. "What about Katya?"
"She doesn't leave the house. I want Santo on her whenever she steps outside her bedroom."
"She'll love that."
I shrug. "She grew up in the Bratva. She knows the score."
Lukas shoots me a skeptical look. He gets to his feet and casts another glance at the sketchpad still lying open on the desk. Whatever his thoughts are, he keeps them to himself. "What are your orders concerning Orlov and Andretti?"
