18. Alexei #4
“I mean exactly what I fucking said.” I stare him down.
“Every casino. Every gaming room. Every nightclub, strip club, drug pipeline, and arms deal. Every last cop off the payroll, every campaign donation stopped. We shut the Petrovsky bratva down like it never fucking existed. Sell what you can and get rid of the rest. Burn it if you have to, but no insurance claims. Nothing that can expose us. I want our fingers out of every pie in Miami, and I want it done fucking yesterday.”
I pause, but neither of them speaks. They just stare at me like I’ve lost my mind.
“We take our operation off the streets,” I say, “and these bastards are going to have to creep out from whatever keyboards they’re hiding behind to set up another one.
Mak will know how to use that opportunity as bait.
It will make his job easier, and our people safer.
I’ll talk to Mak,” I say. “Tell him I want our entire crew and their families inside our compound, with round-the-clock protection. The best in the business. I don’t give a fuck what it costs.
There’s more than enough rooms and guesthouses to take them.
Any we can’t manage, we can put in one of our hotels, with the same security.
If Mak’s got any issues, I’ll let you know, but I don’t think he will. ”
Now that I’ve made up my mind, I’m actually sure of it.
“It will look like a coup.” Dima’s eyes have narrowed. “Not everyone will want to come in. And not everyone is going to like this.”
“Then they can take the money we offer them.” My mind is racing.
“Get the numbers people to work out offers and send them to me for approval. And I don’t mean next week.
I want this shit signed, sealed, and delivered by close of business.
For those who choose to stay, I have another job.
Construction. I’ll need a whole posse of your tech geeks, though, Lars. ”
He tilts his head. “Can do.”
“I want the underground bunker completely overhauled.” Ideas are coming at me from every direction. “Server storage and an ops room, on the same scale as Mercura.” I glance at Lars. “You know what I’m talking about.”
“Oh, yeah.” I can almost see him rubbing his hands together. “I know, all right.”
“Anyone who wants out doesn’t know anything about the basement overhaul. Anyone who stays signs a fucking watertight confidentiality agreement before they see the first design plans. Copy?”
Dima tilts his chin uneasily. “I can do it, Lex. But they’re going to have questions. Fuck it.” He sits back, glaring at me. “I have fucking questions.”
I tilt my own head. “Ask away, brother.”
“Fine.” He folds his arms. “What am I supposed to tell our people? That you’re cashing out and sailing off into the sunset? That they’re in the construction game now, instead of destruction?”
Lars grins. “Nice one. I see what you did there.”
Dima gives him a dour look.
“Tell them whatever you fucking want.” I grin, adrenaline racing through me. “The more confusion, the better. Let people talk, say that I’ve lost the plot or my stomach for the fight. Feed the rumor mill a hundred stories and spread them far and wide.”
“Well that’s going to be fun.” Dima scowls at me. “Our men are fucking criminals, Lex, not blue-collar grinders or some of your geeks with guns. No offense,” he mutters in Lars’s direction.
Lars shrugs. “None taken.”
“My point is,” Dima goes on tightly, “all those hard bastards got behind you during the Orlov war because they knew you were the hardest fucker in town. Now you’re asking them to haul concrete and build tech shit.
” He shakes his head. “Right now, they’d still follow you anywhere.
You tell them to storm a castle, and they’ll storm a fucking castle.
Tell them to guard your businesses, and they’ll take a hail of bullets rather than stand aside.
” He leans into the camera. “But tell them to sweat balls and watch Miami burn while you sit on a yacht sipping cocktails, and before long, Lex, you won’t need guns outside your gates.
You’ll need them inside the walls, or else there’ll be mutiny. ”
I stare at him for a long moment. Then I reach for the vodka bottle and pour myself a very long shot. I raise the glass wryly at the camera. “I have to give it to you, Dima.” I hold his eyes as I knock back the shot. “You know how to ruin a sunny fucking afternoon.”
For a moment we stare at each other. Then he starts to laugh.
“Christ,” he says, shaking his head. “You’ve always been a mad bastard, Lex, I’ll say that for you.”
“Says the crazy prick who cut my eye out.” I raise my glass to him. “But I take your point.”
Dima snorts, then pours himself a drink on his end and lights another cigarette.
I can read the weight of the swamp in every line on his face, in the way he lights one smoke from another.
I’m suddenly damned glad I granted Mak the favor he asked for.
Dima is a brilliant soldier, the best there is.
But he wasn’t made to carry the entire swamp, and I don’t want him to.
I have no such reservations about Mak. That prick says he’ll see something through, and the only thing that will stop him is an atomic bomb.
“The governor’s race is in November.” I scroll through the calendar. “That’s the time frame I promised Mak, so I want the basement done by then. We disappear until the election is over. In the meantime, tell the boys the basement is part of the new operation.”
Which it is. I just don’t know exactly what that is yet.
“Lars and I will work with Mak and the geek squad to get to the bottom of who’s behind this. Tell the boys we need to make it look like we’ve given up, cashed in, and fucked off.”
“Oh,” Dima says sarcastically, “because that isn’t what’s happening?”
“It’s what I need Hunter and whoever is backing him to believe,” I say evenly. “And I’m going to need everyone on board if we’re going to succeed in selling it. Can you do it?”
He nods reluctantly. “The crew won’t like it,” he says again. “But I can get them on board, so long as there’s an end date. That way some of them can get the fuck out of town, at least. Take the kids to Disneyland or some shit.”
Even I get a laugh at that thought. “A Bratva Vacation,” I say dryly. “Sounds like a really bad movie.”