Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
Kazimir
I wasn’t used to female drama by any standard, but I knew damn well when someone was avoiding me. I had thought her distance was a result of Svet’s visit, but when I thought further, I’d realized it started way before.
Genevieve only appeared when she was needed, hardly spent time in her office, and disappeared almost immediately.
And it wasn’t because she was taking time to get to know her coworkers and make friends.
If it was one of those stupid games women played when they wanted attention, then she was in luck because she finally had mine.
However, she was going to find out having my attention is not always a positive event.
My door flew open to reveal Nikolai storming in, his nose flaring like a Chinese dragon.
“There’s no way I’m working with that asshole.”
“Do you knock?”
“Are you deaf?”
I leaned back, watching as he paced the length of the room giving all the reasons why working with Vasily would be a terrible idea.
“I’ll kill him,” he said. “Alliance be damned, I’ll watch the life drain out of his eyes and I’ll hang his head for crows to devour.”
“Thanks for the detailed description, Nico, but we have more than your feelings to cater to.”
He began walking to the mini-bar. “We are supposed to get down to Moscow, investigate and make sure everything is fine. Why the fuck do we need to be divided into teams?”
“Covering grounds would take a lot of time, and neither side trusts the other enough to let them handle business completely, hence the division. Men from each side make a team and send them out.”
He reached for a glass and began pouring. “And you couldn’t find a different team for me?”
“I have better things to do with my life than to divide grown men into teams.”
Nikolai’s hand paused mid-air. “Fucking bitch.”
He swallowed the half-filled glass in one gulp and brought down the glass with a bang. “What’s with her and pushing into everything?”
“It’s her family too,” I replied, eyeing Nikolai as he poured a second glass.
I was aware of his struggles in my world, and while I deeply appreciated his loyalty, sometimes I could never understand why he stuck around.
“And none of the men in there have the balls to take over and do something reasonable?”
“Would you vote Vasily?”
He hissed, draining his second glass. He held the bottle, debating if another glass was a wise decision. “Vasily is a fool.”
I smiled. “We agree on that.”
“Why do we even bother with them? The father is sick and it’s been proven he was the one who ran the entire business. Why don’t we take over and make a clean wipeout?”
“Svet’s family is the next most feared family in Russia for a reason. Granted, they may not have the best brains, but they had brute idiots who only lived for bloodthirst and didn’t care about one another. They live for wars.”
I could see the wheels in his head moving from my seat.
I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought of wiping out the family, especially after Svetlana’s recent stunt, but if there was one thing I’d learned from my father despite his brutalities, it was to protect your clan and not put them through unnecessary wars.
The feud has been on for a while and the death toll has been massive on both ends. I needed Svetlana’s men for fights where I couldn’t risk one of my own, and she needed me for the influence.
It was symbiotic and the more efficient way without a bloodbath, but I had my ulterior motives. I just needed to give the illusion of peace. I would never forgive anyone who shed clan blood.
Nikolai lifted his head, his features relaxed and calm. “When are we leaving?”
“The day after tomorrow.”
His brow furrowed. “I thought it was tomorrow.”
“Genevieve needs time to get ready.”
He lowered his glass. “Genevieve? Why is she coming?”
“Because she’s my assistant,” I answered with a tone of finality, but it must’ve flown over his head or he simply didn’t care enough.
“She’s your assistant at work; this is hardly a work meeting.”
Nikolai was right; however, my mind was made up.
She wanted to ignore me and I was going to see how she intended to do that in a close space.
“She can’t be in the meetings and she certainly can’t follow us anywhere. What exactly are you planning?”
“I have work she has to do.”
“Other than catering to your dick?”
My jaw tightened. I’d never given Nikolai the details of my relationship with Genevieve, but he wasn’t naive. He knew something was definitely up, but it didn’t give him the right to speak freely.
“She does not solely cater to my dick.”
“Then what is she coming to do in Russia? Because the way I see it, you’ll only be heaping problems for yourself by bringing her around Svetlana’s brothers after what happened.”
My mind shot back to Svet’s unwelcome visit to the office the other day. She had almost nothing to say and ended up disrupting my meeting for nothing, and left without touching the coffee she made Genevieve run around for.
Her message was loud and clear. She wanted me to know she was onto me and she wanted to show Genevieve her place.
Too bad I wasn’t the kind of man anyone pushed around. I sent her out when I found out she had nothing tangible to say, but it was already too late.
Genevieve had already escalated it into a freezing cold war and only acknowledged me with a few words and monosyllabic replies.
“Svet and her brothers will have to get used to the fact that I have an assistant and she’ll be coming along.”
Nikolai sighed, leaving the bar with a glass of amber liquid. “So you’re just gonna bring her along and leave her the whole time like last time?”
“She knew what she signed up for when she took this job.”
“Or you just really want her around you.”
I threw him a funny look. “Since when does an assistant traveling with her boss translate to such?”
“Since the meeting in question has absolutely nothing to do with work and said boss is putting her in the same room as him.”
My eyes flashed. “You looked through my itinerary?”
“Unfortunately, part of my job includes knowing where you are, who you are with, and when you’ll be there.”
I swallowed my anger, holding back the urge to tell him to stop checking in.
“And there’s Svet too.”
“What about Svet?”
“Come on, man, we both know that her last visit was hardly a courtesy one. She came to make her presence known.”
Heat flashed behind my eyes as the memory of Svet’s unwelcome intrusion triggered old anger. “She won’t be trying such foolishness again.”
I mostly never bothered with Svet’s excesses till now, and I’ve discovered it was probably because she never brought them close.
She never batted an eye when she saw me with another woman or heard about me and another.
Our agreement was clean-cut and definite, but now it seemed my indulgence had created room for comfort.
On the other hand, it was almost funny to watch her high and mighty aura crumble over Genevieve.
But she had her fun and my office wasn’t a circus. I made it clear that next time she tried such, agreement be damned, I’ll personally fling her through the window.
Nikolai pressed further. “Maybe to your face or in the office, but have you thought about when she meets Genevieve somewhere else?”
“Svet is not that stupid. She’s met a couple of women I’ve been with in the past and didn’t cause a ruckus.”
“Because neither of them worked in your office as your assistant and you never bother to keep them long enough.” He paused as though a thought just struck his head. “What’s the deal with her, though? Genevieve, why keep her this long?”
I shifted in my seat. If there was one thing I hated more than a public display of foolishness and sluggish people, it was being questioned.
Had it been another person, I would’ve easily put a bullet through their head.
“She’s close, she’s convenient,” I answered. “It’s like pussy on the go without the drama of securing one.”
The words tasted like charred coal on my tongue, but I kept my expression to myself.
“There’s hardly anything convenient about this. First, it’s the office; next, Gen can easily become a target by the mere presence of you in her life. She’s no match for Svetlana.”
“I’ve told you Svet won’t sink that low,” I said through gritted teeth.
Nikolai rolled his eyes. “Of course she won’t, but the interviewer who called her lashes a cheap clusterfuck is yet to be found. You underestimate her.”
“You underestimate me.”
While I understood Svetlana being a potential harm to Genevieve, I had been very clear in our last conversation and I knew she wasn’t foolish.
The agreement only stated the terms, nothing about the specifics.
It was also an ironclad one and even though it was amendable, a breach would be tantamount to a bloodbath, and that was the only thing that held me from sending her back in a body bag.
“And this has nothing to do with you being scared to leave her in the office by herself?”
“Why would I—” The words died down when I recalled the bathroom event. “Genevieve is an adult and she can take care of herself.”
Nikolai lowered himself into the seat across from me. “You don’t see it, do you?”
I raised a brow.
“You created an office that did not exist with a huge salary, arrived at a gala with Svet and left with Genevieve, beat up an employee and stormed out with her. She barely does any work except managing your calendar, and you never take your eyes off her.”
My throat tightened, a strand of tension running along the expanse of my chest, but I didn’t say anything.
“I don’t know if her pussy is encrusted with gold, but this is not going to end well for her if you keep exposing her to the public and potential harm.”
“She will not be coming to the meeting,” I repeated.
“But she will be around and I know Svet will have her eyes on you. What happens when we leave for the meeting? She’ll be mad after the last one and probably throw a tantrum.”
I gave him a quizzical look. I couldn’t understand his angle anymore. “Whose side are you on?”
“I’m trying to explore the options and show you how this is a terrible idea since you think with your dick where Genevieve is concerned. She will rebel if you keep her in again.”
“And you know this because you’re the Genevieve whisperer?”
His lips tilted by a fraction. “She’s different from the women you’re used to.”
“And what’s that supposed to mean?”
“She might be calm and sweet, but she’s not docile. She doesn’t sit when you command and she doesn’t hesitate to give you a piece of her mind. She won’t sit in a hotel simply because you asked her.”
I agreed with him and I had already factored the details in, which is why I picked a hotel I knew she would love.
There were multiple activities to distract her; I lined up a spa visit and multiple beauty treatments to keep her entertained.
She would have a day any woman would trade a kidney for. Besides, I was sure her fight was all part of a grand scheme. They were all the same in the end, women. Which is why it didn’t matter which you ended up with. You just have to pick the most beneficial.
“She won’t this time,” I assured, but Nikolai only smiled harder.
“Finally, something to look forward to beside Vasily’s sour face.”
Thankfully, he dropped the topic of Genevieve and moved to important things like planting spies and gathering information.
I already had that covered. One thing I’d learned was to trust no one regardless of the situation.
I was certain Svet must’ve planted one or two amongst my men, which was why I kept vital information locked between Nikolai and Lev and conducted a clean sweep of the room whenever she left.
The alliance was more a plaster to conceal the hemorrhage and not a treatment. The bleeding was still ongoing; it was only a matter of time and which side would be foolish enough to rip off the Band-Aid first.
“And the loopholes?” Nikolai asked.
“Still searching.” This agreement was struck by my father and he made sure to enforce it even in death.
He was a Pakhan who valued clan life more than ego wars and he feared I would be different, hence the measure he took to enforce the agreement even in death.
I couldn’t blame him. I was one for cutting and shooting, but rising to power had taught me differently; it was a pity he wasn’t here to see it.
Stepping into his shoes, I realized there were better ways to rule and incite fear, and that was the birth of the security business.
Information. If you had the right information, you could control the world, and it had proven right over the years.
Good old blackmail and a little motivation, and you got what you wanted. The arms and drugs were great, they showed who was in charge, but they didn’t offer much leverage.
However, I knew a loophole existed and after the attack, I was better motivated to find one. I didn’t trust that family for shit.
“I’ll dig deeper,” Nikolai said. “Tell Lev to send out his best men and take a couple of gadgets to plant on their cars.”
“Good.” I nodded. I knew Nico was doing his job, but I also knew he had his selfish interests: his hatred for Svetlana.
He rose from the chair. “Let’s get this done and over with.”