Chapter Fourteen
Dmitri
Nikolai called me down to one of the secured offices beneath the casino complex the following afternoon. And from the moment I walked in, I understood this wasn’t going to be a conversation about routine security updates.
The room was colder than usual, even accounting for Nikolai’s general preference for temperature settings that made most people reach for a jacket.
He sat behind the desk with his tablet already open, no drink poured, no small talk offered, which told me everything about how seriously he was taking whatever he’d found before I’d said a single word.
“The raid on the poker operation wasn’t random,” he said, without preamble. He never wasted time easing into bad news because he believed that delay didn’t soften anything for the person receiving it.
“I assumed as much.”
“It was orchestrated.” I sat, and he shifted the tablet toward me, showing me a web of financial irregularities and timing overlaps laid out in his methodical style.
“Communication trails, external contacts, timing that lines up too precisely with our own internal schedule to be coincidence. Someone planned this months in advance, coordinated the federal pressure with the raid itself, and built in enough redundancy that even losing the initial attempt wouldn’t have set them back significantly. ”
“Who?”
“Adrian Vale.”
The name landed with some weight. It was familiar enough that I didn’t need Nikolai to explain who he was, though the recognition sharpened into something colder the longer I sat there.
Vale ran a rival operation two territories over, old money dressed up as new money, the kind of man who’d spent a decade quietly building alliances with anyone who had a grievance against our family without ever making his own hostility obvious enough to act against directly.
I didn’t react the way Nikolai seemed to expect. I showed no surprise, no anger flaring up visibly. Just an unsettling calm as the pieces I’d already half assembled clicked into place with the rest of what he was showing me.
“Vale isn’t acting alone,” Nikolai continued, watching me carefully.
“The scale of this required people inside our own operation feeding him information. But he’s the one directing the movement.
The breach in your systems, the raid itself, likely whatever’s still coming, all of it traces back to him. ”
“I already knew.”
Nikolai’s eyebrow rose slightly, the closest he ever came to open surprise. “You didn’t mention that.”
“He’s never made a direct move against us before. Not once, in ten years of circling. I made the mistake of assuming that meant he lacked either the resources or the appetite for it.” I closed the file on the tablet, handing it back to him. “Clearly I was wrong on both counts.”
“What are you planning to do with this?”
“Talk to him directly.”
“That’s not a plan, Dmitri, that’s an escalation disguised as conversation.”
“It’s both.” I stood, already feeling the focused clarity that came right before I moved on something instead of simply gathering information about it. “He needs to understand I know. Whatever comes after that depends entirely on how he responds.”
Nikolai didn’t argue further.
“One more thing,” he said, as I reached the door.
I turned back.
“Whoever fed Vale this level of detail is still inside our operation. Finding Vale doesn’t close that hole. It only tells you where the water’s been flowing.”
“I’m aware.”
“Then make sure the conversation with Vale doesn’t consume so much of your attention that you forget the leak is still open behind you. Handle him. Then come back and help me close the actual wound.”
“I intend to do both.”
“See that you do.”
*****
Hours later, I found Vale at one of his private clubs. It was a sleek, modern space on the opposite end of the Strip that had none of the old-world excess our family favored—all clean lines and cold lighting that felt more like a corporate headquarters than a place built for pleasure.
He was already expecting me by the time I arrived, seated at a corner table with a drink, watching the door like a man who’d known this conversation was coming and couldn’t look surprised by it.
I’d met Vale exactly three times before this, always at industry gatherings neither of us could avoid without drawing more attention than either of us wanted.
Each time, he had struck me as a man who measured every word before speaking.
I’d underestimated him. I understood that clearly now, walking into a club he’d chosen specifically because it put me on his ground rather than mine.
“Dmitri.” He gestured to the seat across from him like we were old associates catching up rather than two men circling the edges of something considerably more dangerous. “I wondered how long it would take you.”
“You already know why I’m here.”
“I have a guess.” He finally lifted his glass, taking a slow sip before setting it back down. “Though I’d be curious to hear you say it out loud, rather than assume we’re both operating from the same set of facts.”
“Someone’s been extracting information from our systems for weeks, months actually.
Financial routing, meeting schedules, personnel files.
Careful, patient, precisely targeted. The kind of extraction that requires real institutional knowledge, not guesswork.
” I kept my voice even, watching him closely for any flicker that might tell me more than his words would.
“And the raid on my poker operation wasn’t opportunistic federal timing.
It was coordinated with someone who understood exactly when and where to apply pressure for damage. ”
“That’s an interesting theory.”
“It’s not a theory.”
Something flickered behind his eyes, quick, controlled, and gone before I could name it. “I’m not sure what you’re implying, Dmitri.”
“I think you understand exactly what I’m implying.
” I leaned back slightly, letting the silence stretch a bit.
“I’m not here to accuse you in a room full of your own men, Vale.
I’m here to give you the chance to walk away from whatever this is before it becomes something neither of us can walk back from. ”
He studied me for a long moment, showing the condescension of a man who believed he still held more cards than he’d actually shown. “You sound tense. More tense than I remember you being, even during the worst of your family’s disputes with mine.”
“I have reason to be tense. Someone’s been quietly dismantling the structure of my operation for weeks.”
“Or,” he said, unhurried, “you’ve simply had a great deal happen recently, and you’re looking for somewhere convenient to place the blame.
I heard about your marriage. Sudden, I’m told.
Emotionally charged circumstances, from what people are saying.
It wouldn’t surprise me if a man in your position started seeing conspiracy where there’s simply instability closer to home. ”
“Careful,” I said, my voice dropping lower, losing whatever patience I’d walked in with. I could feel the last of my composure fraying at the edges under his practiced, deliberate provocation.
“I’m simply making an observation.”
“You’re implying my judgment is compromised.”
“Am I?” He spread his hands slightly, giving the picture of wounded innocence. “I’m merely noting that emotionally charged decisions have a way of clouding a man’s judgment. It happens to the best of us, Dmitri. No shame in it.”
“You’ve clearly done your research on my personal life. I’m curious how much of it came from the same sources feeding you information about my systems.”
Something like surprise flickered behind his composure, but did not leave quick enough that I missed it. “I make it my business to understand my competitors. That’s simply good practice.”
“Competitors don’t usually need personnel files and meeting schedules, Vale.
That requires something closer than competition.
My judgment is fine. What isn’t fine is someone using my own credentials to build a picture of my family’s operations methodically enough to plan a coordinated raid, and then sit across from me pretending he doesn’t understand why I’d take that personally. ”
Vale’s easy composure cracked slightly, something colder emerging from underneath the practiced amusement. “You should be careful about the accusations you make, Dmitri.”
“I’m not accusing you of anything you haven’t already confirmed simply by how carefully you’re avoiding a direct denial.”
He held my gaze, and for a moment neither of us spoke, the polite fiction we’d both been maintaining starting to slip away entirely.
“Stay away from my operations,” I told him plainly, no longer bothering with careful diplomacy.
“Stay away from my people. Stay away from anything connected to the poker network, the clubs, or anyone who works for my family. If I find another trace of you anywhere near my systems, I won’t be nearly this polite the next time we speak. ”
“That’s a bold threat for a man whose own house isn’t fully secure yet.”
“My house is considerably more secure than you’re giving me credit for.”
“Is it?” Something sharper slid into his expression now, the mask finally dropping enough to show what had been underneath it the whole time. “Loyalty inside our world is always conditional, Dmitri. You know that better than most.”
“So is survival,” I said simply. “And I’ve survived considerably worse than you circling my family for a decade without the nerve to move directly.”
We stared at each other a moment longer, the tension between us fully exposed now. Neither of us moved to escalate it further, but the message had been delivered clearly enough on both sides.
I stood, buttoning my jacket, and left without another word, feeling his eyes on my back the entire way to the door.
Roman was waiting in the car when I finally emerged, reading my expression correctly before I’d said anything at all.
“That went about as well as I expected.”
“Vale confirmed it without confirming it. Same careful game he’s always played, right up until I mentioned Val, and then he showed exactly how deliberate this whole conversation actually was.”
“He went after her.”
“Implied I was compromised because of her. Implied my judgment couldn’t be trusted anymore now that I had something to lose beyond the family.
” I stared out the window as the car pulled away from the club, the building disappearing behind us into the glow of the Strip.
“He’s wrong about the specifics. He’s not entirely wrong about the stakes, though.
I do have something to lose now that I didn’t have a month ago. ”
“Does that change anything about how you’re handling this?”
“No,” I said it with more certainty than I probably felt. “If anything, it sharpens exactly how far I’m willing to go to make sure he never gets close enough to test that theory properly.”
“What about the person feeding him information from inside our own operation? Vale can’t have built this alone, not with the level of institutional detail Nikolai’s pulled up.”
“I know. That’s the piece I still don’t have, and it worries me more than Vale himself does, honestly. Vale’s an external threat. Dangerous, patient, but external. Whoever’s been feeding him from the inside is someone who’s had access to my life for longer than I’ve been comfortable considering.”
“That’s right.”
“I don’t have proof yet, only instinct.” I rubbed at my eyes, exhaustion finally catching up with the adrenaline that had carried me through the last few hours.
“Roman, I need you to widen the review again. Anyone with contact to Vale’s territory, anyone who’s had reason to travel there in the last year, cross-referenced against the access logs from the breach. ”
“That’s a considerably bigger list than what we started with.”
“I know. Start it anyway.”
Whatever came next, I intended to make certain none of it reached her before I’d already dealt with it myself.
This was no longer internal suspicion; it was war.