Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
VIKTOR
The ocean air in L.A. is a big change from the arid air of Nevada right now. I lean against the SUV, arms folded over my chest, as we wait in the darkness for the cargo ship to pull in.
My earpiece crackles as my team of men checks in with me like clockwork. This is how it’s supposed to be. Organized and well-oiled.
Beats being at the house right now. Geliy and Leon have disrupted my entire routine. When the kid cries, it’s way too loud. And Geliy, the idiot, does nothing effective to soothe him.
I shake my head, focusing on the task at hand as the dock workers wave the ship in. Fourteen shipping containers. Two are ours, and I intend to make sure we get the goods we’ve promised the Russian government.
Grigory was smart to strike the deal. They’re always looking for top-of-the-line weapons. The kind that we seem to have a knack for procuring from our contacts in South America.
“Viktor,” one of my men, Yuri, says to me. He jerks his head toward one of our shipping containers.
I push from the side of the SUV as I stalk forward toward the crates. “It’s all there?” I keep my gaze on the dock worker with the shipping list as he sweats under pressure.
“Y-yes,” he stutters.
I give the signal for the guys to crack the crates open with crowbars.
One by one, they give me the okay before moving on to the next crates to check them too.
“Good.” My eyes flick back to the worker with the list before I push past him to get a better look. Each crate is filled with ammunition and rifles. Good rifles. The kind that Russian military brass salivates to get.
I nod to my men who cover the crates once more and begin to lug them to our SUVs and trucks. There, I’ll take a closer look without the prying eyes of the dock workers who are no doubt keen to see what a bunch of burly men in black and with inked skin could want from them at eleven at night.
“We’re all good, boss?” another one of my guys, Igor, asks.
I lift a gun, inspecting it closer. It looks clean, sleek, and well put together.
No serial number. I tumble the piece in my hands, feeling the weight of it.
It’s light but not too light to feel wrong in my hands.
The scope is precise too. I study it, making a note to talk with Grigory and Matvey about getting some for our own men.
“All good,” I clip. I lower the gun back into the crate and step away from the men as they start to pack up the crates. Then…
Boom!
A flash. A thunderous blast splits the night wide open. Smoke hisses from a shipping container twenty feet away. And a wave rocks the ground beneath me. My ears ring. Crates splinter. And then gunfire.
My hand moves automatically to my gun.
I hear shouts over the earpiece from my men getting into formation.
Then we move.
I dive behind a steel drum just as bullets tear through the air where I stood a second ago. Sparks fly as rounds ricochet off metal. Yuri swears and drops beside me, pulling his weapon.
“Seven of them,” he growls, eyes narrowed. “Maybe more.”
“Then we make it six,” I snap.
I rise just enough to fire, squeezing off two sharp shots.
One body drops near the forklift, twitching. The others scatter for cover, yelling as they go.
My heart pounds, cold and focused. I move low, weaving between crates, flanking right. I catch one in a blind spot and don’t hesitate. One clean shot to the chest. Then he’s down.
Yuri lays down and covers me as I sprint to another container.
More gunfire. Igor curses over comms. “One of ours took a hit, but he’s okay.”
Good. We need every hand right now. I spot a third man circling behind. I fire once. He spins and crumples.
Three down.
I reload behind cover, counting the seconds as I go. “Push forward,” I bark into the comms. “Don’t let them box us in!”
We fan out again. Smoke curls around us like ghosts.
A fourth charges me, screaming like he wants to die. I oblige him. Two shots to the chest. Just to be sure.
The fifth tries to run. Smart, but not smart enough. Yuri drops him with a single shot to the back.
I catch a sixth climbing a stack of crates, trying to get to a better position to take aim from. I take him down mid-movement. He crashes hard, lifeless within a split second.
Only one left.
Silence now. My men hold position. Scanning. Waiting.
Then movement near the edge of the dock. The last one tries to blend with the shadows.
I don’t give warnings. I don’t ask questions.
My bullet finds him.
And just like that, it’s over.
I stand in the smoke, chest rising and falling, the stink of blood and salt thick in the air. I struggle with the sensory overload—but over the years, I learned how to mask and keep a lid on my stress until later when I’m alone and can decompress.
Seven bodies. None of ours. They lie at our feet as the smoke dissipates into the darkness. I bend down over them, shoving up their black sleeves and searching for clues. Nothing. Not on their necks, their backs, their faces. Nothing to tell me who ordered the hit. My eyes narrow a little more.
“Anything?” I ask my men.
“This one has a couple of tattoos. He’s ex-army by the look of it,” Yuri replies.
“This one too,” Igor adds.
I rise from the ground, keeping my weapon in my hand as I step over the dead bodies. Ex-military. Freelancers for hire.
“Get this cleaned up,” I command. “And let Gabriel Santino and the Societa know there was an incident, so we don’t step on their toes.” Peace between us and the Italian mafia is tentative at best, so I’m not about to go make a wrong move with them. “When you’re done, get back to base.”
The men nod and get straight to work.
I slide into the SUV’s driver’s seat. “Call Nikolai,” I growl.
The speakers ring through Bluetooth. “What happened?” Nikolai barks without any greeting.
“Can’t I call to say I have good news?”
“You rarely do, Viktor, especially when it’s almost midnight. What’s wrong.”
I drag a hand down my face. “Someone hit us.”
“How many of our men did we lose?”
“None. Everyone’s accounted for. But we got seven of their guys.”
“Whose are they?”
“I don’t know yet. But they seem to be freelancers. Ex-military.”
“That’s not good,” he huffs.
“No shit.”
“Well, do you have any good news?” Nikolai asks.
“The ocean views are nice in LA.”
Nikolai lets out a laugh, and I know he’s itching to flip me off. “Anything else we can go on, Viktor?”
“No.” And that’s the worst part. There’s nothing. No leads. No information.
“Come back to the Kremlin.”
“Now you give the orders?”
“Fuck off. Grigory is going to want a debrief as soon as possible.”
“I’ll be there in a few hours.” And I hang up. Because there’s nothing left to talk about. I like everything to be short, sweet, and to the point.
I lean my head back against the seat. There are many variables and unknowns that created this situation.
I hate it. No, I loath it. The unknown in equations.
And in this world, those mean that it’s only a matter of time until things come to a head.
And it’s never with a whimper but a bang.
An explosion that’s messy, bloody, and deadly. “Fuck!”
I start the car and let out a deep breath. I’m at a ten right now. Too stimulated to be any good to anyone else. I pull out my phone and let the familiar melody from Tinkerbell’s video fill the car.
Once I’ve watched it and calmed down, then I’ll start the journey back to Vegas.
But then and only then.
Because whoever ordered this shitshow is likely to have hired freelancers so that they could keep their identity secret. And the one thing I’m sure about right now is that secrets mean danger.
The wailing starts early. Four days. Geliy has been here for four fucking days, and it’s the same every single morning.
I wish Babulya wasn’t visiting one of her friends right now.
My grandmother would definitely know how to keep the baby happy, but she’s been away since before Geliy arrived, and she won’t be returning for another couple of days.
I groan, putting my hands to my ears to try and block out the sound. But it doesn’t work. It never does.
After a few minutes of the noise, I toss the blankets from my legs and storm toward the door. Two long strides and I’m pounding on Geliy’s door. He needs to get the hell up and feed or change the baby or something.
But there’s no answer to my pounding.
Nothing.
Nothing but the wailing.
I creak open the door a fraction. And freeze.
The room isn’t big. A queen-size bed, two end tables, a lamp, and a dresser. But that’s not what I’m staring at. It’s the lack of an adult anywhere.
Leon wriggles in the center of the bed, wailing. The smell of a soiled diaper fills the room, and a new rush of anger floods me.
“Geliy?” I bark out.
But still, there’s nothing. What’d he do? Jump out the fucking window?
“Alright, alright,” I sigh, moving toward the kid to comfort him before he wakes the whole fucking Kremlin. But from the sound of stomping feet down the hallway, he’s already done it.
I reach out to him, but I suddenly still.
I don’t know the first thing about babies or comfort.
Panic constricts my chest as I take a sudden step back.
The baby’s little arms are flailing around.
And if I pick him up, his tiny grabby hands are sure to touch me.
And I can’t let that happen. Because I can’t stand the touch of others.
Already my skin crawls with the phantom sensation.
“What’s with all the noise?” Igor grumbles from the doorway.
“Come pick him up.”
Igor, still bleary-eyed with sleep, looks at me and then at the kid. “What?”
I gesture toward the baby. “Pick him up.”
“But—”
His words cut off as whatever expression he sees on my face has him snapping into action and grabbing the kid. It’s an order, not an option.
“Um, now what?” he asks in confusion.
“Take him downstairs for breakfast. He’s probably hungry…or something.”