Chapter 40
CHAPTER
FORTY
KIRILL
My study feels crowded with five people, though maybe it’s less about the space and more about the weight of our discussion.
Dinara sits across from my desk, back straight, wearing one of my hoodies over leggings, hair pulled back and glasses perched on her nose.
Matvey’s by the window with coffee instead of whiskey thanks to the early hour. Dem’s across from him, scrolling on his phone. Miron stands by the bookshelf, hands clasped behind his back, the same quiet intensity as always.
“Dinara, this is Miron,” I say. “Best investigator I have. He’s the reason I found you at Spider’s apartment that night.”
Her lips purse. “So you’re the one who crashed my party. I’ll have to send you a thank-you card.”
Amusement flickers in Miron’s eyes. “Just doing my job, Mrs. Baronova.”
She flushes at the use of her new surname.
“He’s going to lead the search for your mother,” I continue. “He has contacts all over Russia, including the government. But he needs to know everything. Every detail, no matter how small.”
Dinara nods, measuring the man we’re trusting with something so important. In his mid-forties with a solid build and graying temples, he has a way of receding into the background even when he’s the most dangerous person in the room.
Miron pulls a notebook from his jacket, clicks a pen. “What was your mother’s name?”
Her hands tighten in her lap. “My whole life, I knew my mother as Sonya Potapova. She rarely mentioned her family. Told us her wealthy parents disowned her.”
The room goes still, all attention on her. This can’t be easy, recounting every painful detail.
“Recently, I remembered something. It came to me in a dream. The men with the Kupola Network tattoos who took her. They called her Marina Voronina.”
There’s a beat as everyone processes that name.
Dem runs a hand through his hair. “Voronina. I’ve heard that name before.”
Miron looks up from the paper. “Daughter of Aleksandr Voronin, the St. Petersburg pakhan?”
“That’s right.” Her voice drops. “Officially, Marina died when she was nineteen. I found a picture of her in old FSB files. The pakhan’s daughter was my mother. There’s no question.”
Matvey whistles low under his breath. “You think she faked her own death?”
“Yes. Either on her own or with her family’s help, I don’t know, but Marina Voronina is dead, at least on paper.” Dinara shakes her head. “I pulled everything I could from archives and government databases but came up with almost nothing.”
Miron leans forward, focused on her. “What did Spider tell you?”
She hesitates, biting her lower lip. Reluctance tightens her expression. This next part won’t land well.
“Spider said the Voronins would never traffic their own daughter. The Voronins and Baronovs were partners in the Kupola Network.” She meets my stare, apologetic. “My grandfather supplied women from Russia. Your father handled distribution here. They built it together.”
No one speaks, absorbing the weight of what she revealed.
We already know about the Voronin-Baronov partnership. It’s an ugly piece of our history. But Dinara being Aleksandr Voronin’s granddaughter is a bombshell.
Dem leans forward, elbows on his knees. “The men with the Network tattoos who came for her, maybe her parents sent them? Her family found her in hiding and brought her home?”
“By that time my grandparents were wiped out by a rival gang. At least that’s the official word.” Her mouth curls in distaste. “Spider suggested the partnership had soured. And that your father had a hand in their deaths.”
“Fuck,” Matvey breathes, expressing what we’re all thinking. “Soured how?”
“He didn’t get into detail. Maybe a financial disagreement. Either way, he didn’t have proof. It was only a theory.”
A mocking huff spills from my lips. “Wouldn’t put it past him. If he wanted full control of the Network, removing his partners would make sense.”
Dem jerks his chin. “By then the infrastructure existed. The routes, the contacts, the buyers. Once it was up and running, Ruslan wouldn’t need them anymore. He could operate solo, keep all the profits, answer to no one.”
“Anything else?” Miron asks.
She shakes her head. “That’s everything I know. I can send you the files I gathered.”
“Good.” Miron closes the notebook, slides it back into his jacket.
“I’m going to Russia. I still have contacts at the FSB who can pull physical files Dinara couldn’t access.
The Voronins and their senior men were wiped out, but there will be other witnesses.
Household staff who worked for the family.
Rivals or street operators who might remember Marina Voronina. ”
I stand, shaking his hand. “Keep us updated.”
After Miron leaves, Dem arches a brow mischievously. “Speaking of updates, I have something you’ll want to hear.”
My attention sharpens. “And what would that be?”
“I’ve been watching Abram since the disastrous poker game. Just a hunch. Every Friday night, he visits the Irish mafia’s private sex club in Tribeca.”
I’ve heard of it. Hell, we all have.
“Abram’s a regular and he goes alone, no security.” Dem shrugs. “He has certain kinks, like being tied up. Makes it convenient for anyone who might want to ask him some questions.”
Matvey lets out a low whistle. “Look at that. Tomorrow’s Friday and we’ll know exactly where to find fuck-face.”
“Very convenient,” I agree, an idea forming. “You know, I’ve always had it out for that mudak. He and I are overdue for a conversation.”
A crease appears between Dinara’s brows. “The Ghost tried to kill you two days ago. Shouldn’t you lay low?”
I turn to my brothers. “Give us a minute.”
The door closes, and I pull her onto my lap, needing her close. She tucks herself against my chest, a feeling I’m fast getting addicted to.
“We’ll be careful but I’m not passing up the chance to get Abram alone in a place where he won’t have guards. If he knows anything about your mother, we can’t afford to wait.”
She’s quiet for a beat, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip. “Can I come with you?”
“Hell yeah, I need you there. This plan only works with your help.”
A devious smile forms on her lips. “Can I hurt him?”
“He might like that.” She punches my shoulder playfully. “You can do whatever you want, whatever’s needed,” I assure her.
“Thank you.” She swallows hard. “I know you were young when your father was trafficking and all that, but did you know about it?”
The memory surfaces unwanted, vivid and sickening after all these years.
“I knew,” I admit, shame coating every word. “I knew.”
She looks at me expectantly and I realize I can’t hold back anymore.
“I was thirteen when my father started bringing me to Velour regularly. Against my mother’s wishes, but he told me she babied me, that it was time I learned what being a Baronov meant.
” I pause, words scraping their way up my throat like broken glass.
“He’d bring me once a week, show me around like I was already the pakhan-in-waiting.
I felt proud walking through that club with him, watching men step aside and nod respect.
This empire was going to be mine someday, and that made me feel important. Powerful.”
Dinara’s hand tightens on mine but she doesn’t interrupt.
“While he conducted business, I was supposed to wait in his office. I never did. I’d wander the back hallways, the storage areas, places most people didn’t go. One night, crying came from a supply closet near the basement stairs. I opened the door and found her.
“A girl my age. Thirteen, maybe fourteen.
Skinny, pale, with huge dark eyes red from crying.
She sat on the concrete floor, wrists zip-tied to a pipe, wearing clothes too big for her.
I asked her in Russian what was wrong, and she said she was hungry.
That they only fed her once a day because she kept causing problems.
“Problems?” Dinara bites her inner cheek, waiting for me to go on.
“She wouldn’t cooperate, wouldn’t do what they told her, kept trying to escape, so they isolated her from the others, locked her in that closet to teach her a lesson.
” Bitterness coats my words. “I didn’t understand why she’d do that.
My father told me we were helping these Russian women come to America, finding them good homes with families who could take care of them.
Like it was a service we provided. And I fucking believed him.
“Anyhow, I started bringing Tasha food when I came. That was her name. Candy bars or whatever I could pocket from the kitchen at home. Then I figured out she missed Russian food, so I’d bring blini with jam, or pirozhki my mother made.
She’d smile when she saw me coming, making me believe I was doing good. That it mattered.”
To this day, the memory of her smile makes my chest ache.
“She taught me Russian phrases, I taught her English words. We couldn’t communicate perfectly, but enough.
She told me about the village she was from.
About her little brother, the cat they had.
I told her about my brothers, about school, stupid thirteen-year-old shit.
Every week I’d ask her why she didn’t cooperate so they’d let her out.
She’d look at me like I was an idiot, but she never explained.
Maybe she tried and I didn’t understand.
Maybe she realized I was too young to help her escape and the food was the best I could offer. ”
I pause, the next part sitting like acid in my stomach.
“One night, I brought her pirozhki our cook had made that afternoon—they were Tasha’s favorite. I was excited to give them to her, imagining the way her face would light up. I reached the hallway outside the supply closet. Her screams echoed through the heavy door.”
Dinara’s breathing goes shallow, her face paling.
“Two guards dragged her out of the closet. She fought like hell, kicking and thrashing, one of them clamping his hand over her mouth to muffle her. The other warned her about a buyer waiting to inspect her. If she didn’t behave, she’d regret it. This was a big deal and she was ruining it.”
Self-loathing burns through me, but I force the words out.
“I walked in thinking there was a misunderstanding. I needed to explain she was only scared and hungry. I thought I could broker a deal between them, as if I had any power in that room. I begged them to wait, promised she’d calm down if they gave me a minute with her.
“When Tasha saw me, she screamed, begging me to help her, saying they were going to sell her to a bad man, that she’d rather die than let them touch her. That’s when I understood what this was all about.”
My hands shake and Dinara covers them with hers.
“I tried to pull the men off her but I was too small. It didn’t do shit. One of them shoved me against the wall hard enough to knock the wind out of me, told me to get lost. But I didn’t. I kept trying to get to her, and she tried her best but the bigger one wrapped his hands around her throat.”
The words spill forward—I need to get them out before they choke me. The bigger guard was Abram, but I don’t bother mentioning it now.
“I screamed at him to stop, struggling to get free from the other soldier holding me back. Her gaze locked with mine and then her eyes went blank. The light snuffed out. He dropped her on the concrete like garbage.”
A raw sound escapes Dinara, and I rub circles on her back. This story is harrowing, I know.
“His men dragged me upstairs to my father. I thought he’d be horrified.
Thought he’d punish them for killing her, or for doing it in front of me, or for any fucking reason.
” My laugh comes out broken. “Instead, he sat me down in his office, poured himself a drink, and said, ‘Kirill, you’re a man now. This is our business, to tame these women before we find them new homes. If they don’t behave the way we need them to, they’re worthless to us.
Merchandise that won’t sell.’ He told me one day I’d understand. ”
The hero worship I’d carried for years shattered in that office. Everything I thought I knew about my father, my family, my legacy, came crashing down.
I threw up in his office trash can. He didn’t react. He kept drinking his whiskey, telling me this was the world I’d inherit. That I needed to grow up and accept it.
Dinara pulls me into her and I bury my face in her neck.
“I went back to the supply closet after he dismissed me. I don’t know why. Maybe I thought it was a nightmare and she’d still be there, alive, waiting for her food. But she was gone. Cleaned up like she’d never existed.
“So yes, to answer your question, I knew. And I did nothing.”
“Kirill.” She frames my face, forcing me to look at her. The compassion in her eyes nearly breaks me.
“You were a child yourself.”
“I carry it with me every day. It went on for another five years of misery because I didn’t have the balls to put an end to it.”
“Stop,” she says, fiercer this time. “You didn’t do this. You didn’t traffic those women. You didn’t brutalize them. You didn’t profit off their suffering. It’s not your burden to carry anymore.”
Something snaps in my chest, years of shame and guilt cracking under the weight of her words.
She weaves her fingers into my hair. “Who tipped off the Feds?”
I smile to myself. “No one knows, but it forced my father to close the Network down. He paid off authorities to drop all charges.”
“The past is the past,” she says with absolute conviction. “You will lead differently.”
I pull her closer, pressing a kiss to her temple. “Yeah. I will.”