Chapter 13
Anton
Iease the key in, careful not to snap the lock off its hinges.
Three grown men in a sad excuse for an apartment. We look like hired muscle squatting in a dollhouse.
Lev ducks under the ceiling fan as we step in. Dima shuts the door behind us without a sound.
I flick the light switch near the kitchen. One bulb hums, then pops to life; yellow, tired, flickering like it might give up any second.
“Jesus,” Lev mutters, stepping over a carpet stain that might be blood, might be wine, might be both. He scans the place like it’s a crime scene, which, in fairness, it probably will be by the end of the week. “You pick this dump on purpose, or were all the crawlspaces booked?”
I don’t answer. I head for the sliding door. It sticks. I shove harder, and the rusted track groans in protest.
Desert wind pushes through. Dry. Warm. It carries the scent of dust and fryer grease from the Denny’s half a mile away.
Lev walks deeper in, toeing the edge of a loose tile. “Be honest. Did this place come with a bonus corpse under the floorboards? Or just the mice?”
He wanders toward the couch, presses a hand into the cushion, then drops onto it with a grunt. The springs wheeze like they’re in pain. One boot hooks over the other, elbows spread, casual in that way that’s never actually casual with him.
“Can I ask you something?”
I ignore him. Step out onto the balcony and grip the rail. The rusted iron bites into my palm.
Across the way—first floor, third unit from the right—Mary’s window is still dark.
She’s not home yet.
My stomach twists.
Tight. Irrational. Just enough of a pull to make me shift on my feet and check the street again.
“Alright,” Lev says, somewhere behind me. “Why the hell are you staying in this shithole?”
“It’s quiet,” I say.
Even now, my eyes are moving. Scanning the sidewalk across the lot. Some lights are on in her building; second floor, someone cooking. Faint clang of a pot. Dog barking from a unit further down. Something metallic hits the pavement behind the dumpster; probably a stray cat, or worse.
The street beyond is mostly empty, save for the slow crawl of an old Nissan with one headlight. It turns the corner and disappears.
Still no sign of her.
“It’s moldy. And sad. And there’s a leak in the ceiling.”
“Still quieter than a Bratva suite.”
He stands now. Joins me at the railing. “You do remember you own a building here, right? Full penthouse. Blackout elevator. Triple-layer windows. Panic room with a fridge better stocked than my apartment?”
I stare ahead.
His grin stretches. “Forgot, didn’t you?”
I don’t answer.
“Jesus, Anton. You’ve got a seven-figure hideout and you’re playing motel roulette next to a meth lab and a coyote den.”
“I needed to disappear.”
“You could disappear in Egyptian cotton and a tub with water pressure that strips paint.”
I shake my head, more to myself than to him. But Lev’s not done. Not even close.
He watches me for a beat, then huffs out something close to a laugh. “Of course. The noble act. Go low. Blend in. Remind yourself what dirt tastes like.”
He’s pacing now. Not for effect; he’s wound up.
“You remember what it was like, don’t you? When we had nothing? One burner phone. Sleeping in shifts. Dima stitching you up with kitchen thread because we couldn’t risk a hospital. All of us thinking that if we made it one more month, we’d quit. Start over. Go legit.”
I tap a knuckle once against the railing. Lev notices. Always does.
“We didn’t quit,” he says. “We built it. The shell companies, the casinos, the maid supply front, the fucking logistics firm that moves real freight now. And for what? So you can crawl into a closet and play dead while the rest of us hold the line?”
Still, I say nothing.
He takes one step closer, voice lower now. “You want to be loyal to Igor? Fine. But you know why we’re here. For you. Not Igor. So don’t forget who you are. Not even for him.”
I glance down at the street below. Two kids stand by the corner store’s busted soda machine, passing a bag of chips back and forth, heads on a swivel for whoever might take it from them. Same look I remember wearing once. Hungry but trying not to look it.
I turn back to Lev. He’s waiting. Tired, annoyed, but steady as always.
He’d die for me. So would Dima. Boris too, wherever the hell he’s holed up tonight. We survived too much together to break now. I’d bleed for them the same way, no question. But that’s not what this is about.
“Done?” I ask.
Lev doesn’t smile. Just tilts his head, like he’s weighing whether it’s worth pushing more.
“Tell me honestly,” he says. “Why are we here?”
I look past him, out at the street again. Not because I’m done listening… because I heard every word.
“Why?” he adds.
And before I can answer Lev—
That’s when I see it.
Shadow.
Far end of the complex, just beyond the flickering security light. Movement. Fast, deliberate.
I tense. Then—there she is.
Mary.
That familiar walk. Hood up. Legs bare. Bag cross-slung over her chest as she hurries past the broken pool and toward the stairs.
The second I recognize her, I step back. Fast. Shift into the shadow of the doorframe like I’ve been burned. Six-four, trained to kill, and I’m ducking like a fucking teenager in a closet.
Lev doesn’t move.
“Unbelievable.” He hums under his breath. “That’s… new.”
“Shut up.”
“You’re hiding.” He flicks his eyes toward the stairwell, catches where mine keep drifting.
Chert.
“I said shut up.”
I look again, eyes narrowing.
Behind us, the door creaks. Dima steps out, silent as ever, but his gaze flicks to Lev, then to me, then to the parking lot.
He follows my line of sight. Lev elbows him once, half-grinning. Now both of them are standing there; two big men pressed up near a tiny, rusted railing like they’re trying to spot a celebrity across the street.
All six eyes are staring now.
She’s moving too fast. Head down. Keys in hand. No headphones, thank fuck, but no awareness either. Just a woman walking home near midnight like the world doesn’t notice. Like men like me don’t exist.
She walks past the dumpster. A cat hisses from behind it. The dog starts up again.
One light above her flickers. The other’s completely out.
Does she even think?
What if someone’s watching her?
Someone else?
I grip the sliding door frame harder.
If someone jumped her right now, she wouldn’t hear them coming. Wouldn’t even know what direction to run.
And, why the fuck do I even care?
“Tell me something,” Lev drawls, “You hiding because you’re embarrassed… or because your dick twitched and now you don’t know what to do about it?”
I ignore him, because my eyes are still on her.
Mary crosses the lot, her shape lit in flashes: broken light, window reflection, the blue hue from a TV screen upstairs. Her skin catches the glow in parts. She reaches her door. Keys in. Looks over her shoulder once.
Nothing.
The door shuts behind her.
And just like that, the building swallows her whole.
I stare at the dark window. It stays dark.
My jaw ticks.
Lev’s still hanging out at the balcony rail, like he’s on vacation. Elbows braced. Grinning like this is the most fun he’s had in weeks.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” he says. “Anton Malikov. The cold bastard with more confirmed kills than words in his last psychological eval. The one who everyone pisses themselves over when you walk into a room.” He gestures toward the building across the way with his chin. “Hiding from that?”
He snorts. “That’s not Viktor Kozlov.”
“Shut the fuck up,” I warn, voice low.
He doesn’t back down. Just stays there, planted against the railing, eyes locked on mine like he’s waiting for me to crack.
He laughs. “You looked like you were about to dive behind the fridge, brat. Is this what we’re doing now?”
Then he jerks his chin toward the building. “Tell me, what the fuck’s got you flinching like you’re waiting for someone to crawl out of the walls?”
I step forward.
He doesn’t move. Still leaning against the railing.
That’s when the light in her unit clicks on.
A warm amber glow spills out across her kitchen window.
I move before I think. Out onto the balcony, fast, the old metal groaning under me. I grab Lev’s arm.
“Get the fuck—”
But I stop. Too late.
The streetlight below—the one that’s been dead since earlier—buzzes to life.
Bright. Unforgiving.
It’s just close enough, just high enough, to light our third-floor balcony like a fucking stage.
The glow hits her unit, too.
And then—
Mary steps out.
She looks… Christ. She looks like trouble I’d walk into twice.
Her hair shifts a little when the breeze cuts through, catches on her cheek, lifts off her collar. Her white blouse is untucked, loose at the waist. A line of skin shows when she moves.
She leans forward, bracing on the railing. Something moves by her foot. The cat squeezes out from behind a patio chair, rubs against her ankle like it owns her.
She looks down, strokes its head once. Then lifts her chin.
Right toward us.
I freeze.
Why do I freeze? I’ve faced men with knives, guns, bombs rigged under their ribs. Never froze once. But I see her—bare collarbone, wind in her hair, that stupid cat curling at her feet—and I stop cold.
Lev stands there, tall, relaxed, totally unbothered. Then lifts one hand and waves.
He fucking waves.
She blinks. Pauses.
Then she lifts her hand too.
A small, polite wave in return. Eyes still moving.
From Lev. Dima.
To me.
And then she doesn’t wave again.
My fingers dig into Lev’s arm like I might shove him off this fucking building.
Lev turns his head, a grin pulling slowly across his teeth. “You gonna tell me who she is, or do I guess?”