Chapter 2 - Anton
Six Months Later
Anemic sunlight spills in through the dining room windows. Despite a winter chill encroaching on an idyllic New England fall, the frigid morning thaws for a moment of warmth. The light turns the bone-white china a buttery yellow.
Eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen…
“Anton.”
The sharp, haughty summons for my attention successfully splinters my focus.
My attention snaps to my mother’s face, away from the paisley pattern edging the plate in front of me.
It sits beneath a bowl loaded with the same mannaya kasha it is most mornings, with a side of sweet-sour cherry preserves. I diligently spoon a mouthful.
The green eyes I’ve inherited gleam with amusement from across the table.
“Forgive me, mama.”
She waves it off with the swish of a lily-white hand. “What were you thinking about?”
“Nothing.”
It isn’t a lie. This is not the same as it being the truth.
At the forefront of my mind, however, I’d simply been zoning out.
Morning time is the first and only chance my mind has to meander—before my day is in full swing.
But I already know that, were I foolish enough to say as much to my mother, she’d instantly demand to know what’s wrong. She can’t help it. She worries.
Yet no answer would satisfy her. Least of all, the one that is the truest: it is always everything and nothing that is wrong. That’s the nature of the gig. Heavy is the head that wears the crown, as they say.
“I never know whether to believe you when you say that,” she sighs, picking up her cup to sip from it. Its contents are the same fragrant and unblemished black tea that fills my cup.
The things the inimitable Galina Zakharov and I share are endless.
Lifeblood. The color of our hair and eyes, though her locks are mostly chemically-colored to match nowadays, or so I’d assume, given her age of sixty-two years old.
Our stoicism, certainly. Impassivity as a defense mechanism.
Principles, because I am who she has raised me to be.
An affinity for a perfect cup of black tea to start our respective days with.
Those days just unfold in different worlds.
“You have nothing to lose by believing me,” I point out.
“On that, we disagree, rodnoy.”
I shoot her a solemn smile. “As is your right.”
It’s a right plenty of people exercise. These days, more and more often. That’s why—even if I were willing to be impudent and argue with my mother—I’ve got no energy to do it. I have to save it for whatever fresh hell awaits me today.
The thought may as well be the fucking Bat-Signal to the universe.
No sooner had I thought it than a swift, familiar tread thuds down the hallway, making a beeline for us.
I look over my shoulder just in time for Anastasia to enter the room.
The dour look on her face tells me that she hasn’t come down to breakfast in her capacity as my cousin and dearest friend; this is Brigadier Zakharov walking towards me, carrying bad news.
I’d hoped her general absence over the past few days was due to her finally allowing herself some personal fun and letting loose a little. Within a minute, it is clear to me that that’s not the case.
I start to stand. Anastasia stops me with a raised hand and drops into the seat by my side first. She pours herself a cup of tea, swirling in a splash of milk. She greets Galina. They engage in some mindless pleasantries. I wait, setting down my spoon. Anastasia serves herself a helping of kasha.
My patience dwindles within minutes.
“Stasi.”
“It’s a big fire, Anton,” she says.
I remain undaunted. My whole life is a series of fires to put out. I gesture for her to carry on. “Just tell me.”
Oh yeah? The raise of her brows challenges.
Resolutely, I nod. “Tell me.”
“There’s been a series of leaks over the past two weeks. To rival gangs. Several rumors were swirling around town. Personally, I think that’s a smokescreen, and it’s one specific gang the mole’s selling intel to,” she says.
Every nerve in my body grows numb from the chill that courses through it. “Is it—?”
Not only is my cousin my best friend, but she’s also my oldest. Our history organically lends itself to a shorthand that often comes in clutch.
She doesn’t need me to finish the question that permeates the room with thick, suffocating tension.
Nor does she require any explanation of any attached implications. She knows the name I can’t spit out.
She utters it for me.
“Not the Yuris.” She gives a single, firm shake of her head. “Information is spreading from their camp, too. Trade routes, contacts, shipment schedules. I’ve been mining through this shit all week. I considered that could be a red herring to cover tracks, but it just doesn’t check out.”
Okay. So it isn’t the Yuris—just maybe someone beneath their fucking banner.
It has to be. Something deep within me objects to the idea that it could be someone beneath my tutelage.
Having been blind to everything Viktor’s done over the past three years already felt like a near-fatal blow to the Zakharov Bratva.
Not executing him is adding another failure to my tally.
More than one person is keeping count. What the fuck will this do to an already tenuous alliance, holding onto legacy by a thin, precarious thread?
“Any leads?” I demand.
This needs to be nipped in the bud. It needed to be nipped in the bud yesterday.
The tension is rife enough for my mother to scoot back her chair and excuse herself.
It isn’t surprising. If anything, it’s interesting that she didn’t bolt at the first sight of the severe expression on Stasi’s face.
Galina loathes being privy to the Bratva world.
It doesn’t matter that she was born into it, then married into it, or that her son—and her husband’s bastard child, for that matter—lives and will probably die within it. She doesn’t like to hear about it.
Anastasia kindly waits out her departure with an expectant pause.
Only once Mama’s footsteps recede does she answer. “Not one. I’m keeping a close eye, but you should probably touch base with our new pals. You have to.”
Through grit teeth, I agree. I’ve got my pest of a half-brother to thank for this.
Tenuous or not, this alliance is in play.
It’s known and has been established from Boston to fucking Moscow.
Whether anyone likes it or not—and, given a fucking mole, the answer is obviously ‘not’—it is an alliance that requires tending.
That means goodwill is for me to drum up, or something awry to decipher, while that son of a bitch gallivants around New York City with his better half, Nadya Yuri, by his side. I shove back my seat and rise. “Are you coming with?”
Anastasia makes a noise of dissent deep in her throat, then drowns it in a swallow of tea. “I’ve got to debrief Papa about this, too.”
I wince. “Should I—?”
“No,” she laughs. “I can handle my father just fine, Tosha.”
The diminutive of my name is a thing I’d only ever allow Anastasia Zakharov.
Nevertheless, I roll my eyes at it. I’ll still let her have it, especially since she’s got the impetuous task of informing Boris.
If anyone can, it’s likely Anastasia. That doesn’t negate that Boris is a tough man.
It’s what makes him an irreplaceable asset to the Zakharov Bratva.
That’s also what makes my uncle—my father’s brother—double as my Advisor, too.
I hold his opinion in great regard. Thus, we are fucked.
He’s always been wildly against this alliance.
There’s no chance of keeping this rupture in it from him. In fact, it would be stupid to.
With a resigned grimace, I empty the rest of my cup. “Ask him to wait in my office. I’ll be back.” In front of her, I pointedly switched my phone to Do Not Disturb. I pause only to refill her cup.
With a parting glance at the paisleys dotting the plate, I take my leave.
***
By design, the Yuri estate is a way away from the Zakharov manor. The twenty-minute drive from Dover to Weston is endless. At the end of a sprawling driveway, past the heavily armed gate, is the Yuri mansion. My associates have already conferred with theirs; there’s no holdup.
Trifon Yuri himself awaits in the parlor for me. He doesn’t mince his words. I appreciate that about him. His hands in his pockets, he outright asks, “To what do I owe the pleasure, Anton?”
I dismiss the guards flanking my every side with a flick of a gaze.
“Not the word I’d use,” I admit. “Let’s discuss this somewhere private. Summon whichever brothers you can.” I can never decipher how many of them actually live here. Every sibling has their own residence, yet they intermittently prefer to be here. It baffles me.
Meanwhile, Trifon’s brow creases, but he doesn’t ask another question.
Instead, he urges me on, steering me towards his study.
I’ve been here before. It’s a moderately comforting balm to the wound that none of the Yuris gleaned any pleasure from this impromptu alliance we’ve been coerced into, either.
On both sides of the line, it’s no less than the lesser evil and no more than convenient.
It’s progressed from a rivalry to a grudging mutual respect, even if our compulsions differ considerably.
They adore the littlest Yuri, my new sister-in-law, Nadya. I... simply couldn’t stomach snuffing out Viktor’s life. My conscience vehemently rejected the idea, the obvious solution that it had been.
Why I spared him, I still have no answer for. I suppose I had no desire for fratricide to be one more thing that happens to me.
Still, I’ve thought about it. I think about it. Anyone who’s ever crossed paths with Viktor couldn’t blame me—and they haven’t had the displeasure of the poison he’s been prone to spewing since he was a goddamn toddler.