Chapter 51 Lukas
LUKAS
VOICEMAIL TRANSCRIPT
Recipient: L. Lazarev (Private Line)
Caller: Harrison Miles, Esq. (Miles & Kagan LLP)
Date: 14 December 2025 | 01:29
Duration: 0:02:14
"Lukas. It's Harrison. I wouldn't be calling at this hour unless it was an emergency, so here it is..."
I’m deep in the Brooklyn industrial district, not far off the waterfront. Neutral ground, supposedly, though that term means nothing when you’re surrounded by men who’d slit your throat for the right price.
Or for any price at all.
A single bare bulb swings overhead. Every time it moves, the outlaw bikers assembled in front of me look less like men and more like Satan’s rejects that crawled up from hell.
Across from me, Mason “Reaper” Cole sprawls in a folding chair.
He’s the president of this motorcycle club, the Iron Kings.
He’s a big man—not as big as me, but close—with a braided black beard that reaches his chest and tattoos spider-walking up his neck.
The crowned skull club patch on his cut is faded from years of sweat and road dust.
Behind me, Afon stands closest, his hand resting on the gun beneath his jacket. Two more of my vors flank the perimeter.
“Times are changin’, brother,” Reaper remarks.
I arch a brow. “That’s news to me.”
“Fifteen percent,” he says, lacing his fingers over his belly. “That’s the new number. My boys are taking real heat out there, Lazarev. DEA is sneakin’ all over the ports, those fuckin’ roaches. Every shipment we move is a federal case waiting to happen.”
I say nothing.
Reaper waits, but when it becomes apparent that I’m not answering, he glances over his shoulder at his boys.
This is how it works. You let men like Reaper talk themselves into circles while you sit there like a statue. Most men can’t handle the quiet.
In his defense, Reaper’s argument isn’t unreasonable. Port surveillance has increased in recent years. His men are taking more risk. Twelve percent is where we’ll land, and he probably knows it, but he has to start high so his soldiers think he fought for them.
I’m doing the math myself. Twelve percent of projected quarterly volume, minus overhead, factored against the cost of finding alternative distribution if this deal falls apart…
But even as I calculate, something I’ve done effortlessly a thousand times before, my mind loses the thread and ends up somewhere else entirely.
Brown eyes. Swollen lips. Tears on flushed cheeks.
Blyat’.
“… You with me, Lazarev?”
I blink. I haven’t heard the last thirty seconds of negotiation.
That’s a dangerous mistake on my part.
In a room full of men who respect only ruthlessness, showing weakness, even for a moment, can fuck you over completely.
I clear my throat. “Eleven percent. And the Iron Kings absorb the cost of any seized shipments.”
Reaper’s eyes narrow. Behind him, his sergeant-at-arms scowls and spits on the floor to show what he thinks of that counteroffer.
“You want us to eat the losses?” Reaper strokes his beard. “That’s a lot to swallow, considering we’re the ones with our necks on the chopping block.”
I can feel the tension ratcheting up, thick as smoke in this shithole warehouse. My hand remains perfectly still on the table, but I’m acutely aware of the Makarov holstered at the small of my back.
“Risk and reward meets margin, my friend,” I tell him. “We’ve both got to get our piece. Eleven percent is my final offer.”
“Hm.” Reaper drums his fingers on the table. Then he grins, showing a gold tooth that glints in the dim light. “Heard you got yourself a new girl,” he drawls.
I freeze.
“Pretty little thing, from what I hear. Young, too. You dirty dog you.” He scratches his brow. “Works for your boy, right?”
The bare bulb swings. Shadows snake across the concrete.
“Maybe we should talk about fourteen percent, eh?” Reaper’s grin widens. He thinks he’s found leverage, something to squeeze. “I’d hate for word to get around about where she lives, what route she takes to work every morning. You know how it is: Little birdies talk.”
Perhaps I was wrong—Reaper isn’t as smart as I thought he was. Because he’s still grinning, gold tooth shining, thinking he’s got the upper hand now.
He has no fucking idea what he just did.
“Say her name,” I tell him quietly. “I’d like you to.”
He pauses. I’ll never know if he’s noticing his mistake or not, though, because before he has the chance to take it back, shit starts to happen.
The violence erupts from me so suddenly that even Afon is unprepared. I’m vaulting over the table and snaring Reaper by the throat. He goes tumbling backwards and cracks his skull on the concrete floor. I land heavily on his chest.
The Iron Kings reach for their weapons, but Afon and my other vors already have guns drawn. Everyone freezes in place. Red dots dance across leather cuts. Hammers cock back. Nobody breathes.
I’m too busy filleting a man to give a fuck.
I’m straddling Reaper’s chest, one hand crushing the man’s windpipe, the other wielding a knife that’s begun to separate his jaw from his cheek.
“Say her name,” I hiss down at him again. “Say it, so I have a good excuse to carve your tongue out and feed it to you.”
Reaper gurgles beneath my grip. His gold tooth doesn’t flash anymore—there’s too much blood filling up his mouth for that.
As big as he is, he might as well be a child in my hands.
I abandon the jagged smile I’m carving into his mouth and press the knife instead against his cheek, just below his left eye.
Slowly, I draw it down. Fresh blood wells in the blade’s wake, a thin red line as the flesh parts.
Oh, it will scar beautifully. So fucking beautifully.
“You think you can threaten what’s mine?” I whisper. “You think I won’t burn your entire fucking club to the ground?”
The cartilage of his throat is buckling beneath my grip. It would be so easy to crush it completely. A fitting punishment for his crime.
Reaper’s legs scrabble against the concrete. A few more pounds of pressure and he’ll never breathe again. Just a few more. Just a few…
“Boss.” Afon’s voice cuts through the red haze. “His boys are getting twitchy.”
It’s enough to get through to me. Barely.
I look up and see half a dozen bikers bristling. My own men are ready to turn this place into a slaughterhouse. One wrong twitch and we’ll be hosing brain matter off the walls for weeks.
The smart play is to de-escalate. I don’t fucking want to… but I know I must.
I lean down until my lips are inches from Reaper’s ear.
Blood bubbles at the corners of his mouth.
“You get eight percent now,” I whisper. “And if I ever hear you’ve so much as thought about her again, I’ll kill every man in your club, torch their bodies, and piss on the ashes.
” I let that sink in. “Then I’ll find their families and do the same. ”
I release his throat and stand.
“We’re done here.”
I’m halfway to the warehouse door, Afon and my men forming a protective triangle around me, when my phone rings.
The ringtone stops me cold.
It’s the one assigned to Harrison Miles, my attorney. The man doesn’t call to chat or deliver good news. He calls only when something has gone catastrophically, irreversibly wrong.
I pull the phone from my pocket and answer in a monotone. “What.”
“Mr. Lazarev…” He gulps. I don’t like the sound of that one bit. “The Lazarev Global board has called an emergency session. Tomorrow morning, nine o’clock.”
“On what grounds?”
He hesitates again, which I like even less. “Sir… Mr. Kir has demanded a vote of no confidence in your leadership. He’s trying to oust you.”
I step out into the night and lean against the wall.
Fucking hell… my son has finally made his move.
I should have seen it coming. He’s been building toward something, and I was too distracted to notice.
Well, here come the consequences.
“Get the car,” I tell Afon. “And call everyone. If my son wants war, I’ll give him one he’ll never forget.”