Chapter 12 Yuri
YURI
Mikhail Kozlov arrives at seven in the evening, when the compound settles into its nightly routine.
I watch him through the security feeds as Oleg escorts him to the private meeting room—a scarred man with a shaved head and shoulders broad enough to scare weaker men.
His broken nose sits crooked on his face, never properly set after whatever beating left it that way.
I keep him waiting twenty minutes.
Respect isn't given in our world.
It's extracted through power, timing, and the careful application of pressure.
When I finally enter the room, Kozlov sits at the oak table with his hands folded, studying the maps of shipping routes that cover the walls.
"You're late," he says without turning.
"You're early."
He faces me, and I notice things Kirill's intelligence reports missed—the puckered scar running from his left ear to his jaw, the thick gold ring on his right hand engraved with Cyrillic letters, the way his pale eyes move constantly, like a weasel looking for an escape route.
"We have business to discuss," he grumbles while he folds his fingers neatly on the table in front of him.
I pour myself vodka from the bottle on the side table.
"We have nothing to discuss."
"Your son thought differently."
I flick a glance up at him.
More than a week after his death and it still hasn’t hit me yet.
I'm sure it'll catch up to me soon, and the rage I've bottled up will unleash on some unsuspecting victim.
But for now, all I can manage is, "My son is gone."
"But his agreements remain."
Kozlov reaches into his jacket and takes out a slip of paper which I'm sure has some sort of notoriety, but I have no intention of honoring it.
I don't touch the paper.
I barely look at it.
"I didn't authorize any agreements."
"Dominic had authority to act for your family."
"Dominic had authority to breathe. That ended when someone put a bullet in his head."
The vodka burns going down, and I pour another glass before turning to face him fully.
Kozlov's mouth curves into a sinister smile on a face incapable of soft expression.
"Then you're prepared to honor his commitments."
"I'm prepared to discuss why you think burning down my wife's warehouses will motivate me to complete deals I never approved."
The temperature in the room drops.
Kozlov's pale eyes narrow, and for a moment I see the predator beneath the businessman's facade.
"Your wife's business interests are unfortunate casualties of a larger conflict."
"My wife's business interests are mine now. Attack them again, and you'll discover how unfortunate your own interests become."
The second glass joins the first, and once empty, I set it aside, then lean over my desk.
"You're refusing to fulfill contracts your son made in good faith?"
"I'm refusing to honor agreements made by a dead man who exceeded his authority."
Kozlov stands and hides the bulk of his rotund gut behind his suit jacket.
"Then we have a problem."
"We have nothing. You have a problem with inventory you'll need to source elsewhere."
My eyebrows tick up, and he narrows his gaze on me.
"I have buyers expecting delivery. Buyers who don't accept disappointment gracefully."
He steps closer, and I smell the cigarettes and cheap cologne clinging to his clothes.
"Perhaps I should explain the consequences of broken promises."
"Perhaps you should explain why you think threatening me will change my position."
I hate repeating myself, and I realize I've just done that.
This man is trying my last fucking nerve.
He's going to bleed before this conversation is said and done.
"Because your wife's little fashion empire makes a convenient target. Warehouses burn so easily. Accidents happen to employees who work late. Showrooms can be vandalized beyond repair."
His scarred face twists into a satisfied smirk.
"How long before she has nothing left to protect?"
I reach for the glass, thinking I may refill it, but it shatters in my hand because I don't realize how angry I am.
Blood runs between my fingers, mixing with the alcohol pooling on the table as the last few drops of my last drink spill out.
But I don't feel the cuts, don't register the pain.
There's only the roaring in my ears and the sudden, overwhelming need to show this scarred bastard what happens to people who threaten what belongs to me.
"Say that again."
Kozlov takes a step back, finally recognizing the danger he's walked into.
"Business is business, Yuri. Nothing personal."
"Everything about my wife is personal."
I barely hold back the slur of insults this man deserves, but they're coming, rising up my throat as my hands ball to fists and I feel the prick of glass shards in my palm.
I move around the table, and he retreats until his back hits the wall.
"The warehouses were warnings. Gentle reminders of what cooperation looks like."
He's whimpering now, hands extended—palms out—in defense.
"Gentle reminders?"
"Your son understood the stakes. He knew what refusal would cost."
"My son was a fool who made promises he couldn't keep."
I grab Kozlov by the throat and slam him against the wall hard enough to rattle the maps and make a few pins come loose.
"But he never threatened what was mine."
Kozlov's hands claw at my wrist, but I've spent thirty years building the strength to crush windpipes. "The contracts—"
"Are void."
"My buyers—"
"Can find another supplier."
He grunts, unable to fully speak.
I tighten my grip, feeling his pulse flutter against my palm.
His face turns red, then purple, his pale eyes bulging with panic and rage.
"Last warning,"
I whisper against his ear. "Touch anything that belongs to me again, and I'll send you back to your buyers in pieces."
I release him, and he collapses against the wall, gasping and clutching his throat.
Blood from my cut hand left streaks on his shirt collar.
"You're making a mistake."
His voice comes out as a croak.
"I'm making a statement."
He pushes away from the wall, straightening his jacket with shaking hands.
"This isn't over," he snarls.
"Yes, it is." I walk to the door and pull it open.
Oleg waits in the hallway, blocking any escape route.
"Mr. Kozlov is leaving. Escort him to the gate."
Oleg nods and steps aside to let Kozlov pass.
The arms broker moves carefully, one hand still pressed to his throat, his pale eyes promising retribution.
"Your wife's business will burn," he says from the doorway.
"All of it. Until there's nothing left but ashes and regret."
"Then I'll build her a new one from your bones."
Oleg escorts him away, leaving me alone in the meeting room with blood on my hands and the taste of violence in my mouth.
I pour another vodka and wash the cuts clean with a few drops of the alcohol and the end of my tie.
Dominic's mistakes continue to multiply, even in death.
Arms deals with psychotic brokers, promises he couldn't keep, contracts that should never have been signed.
Each revelation peels back another layer of his reckless stupidity.
But it's the threat against Inessa that burns in my chest.
The casual way Kozlov described attacking her warehouses, hurting her employees, destroying everything she built.
As if she were nothing more than a pressure point to be exploited.
My phone buzzes with a call from an unknown number, and while I'd rather not deal with any more bullshit, I answer it.
I need to get my mind off that fucker before I go after him and make this worse.
"Yuri Gravitch?"
The voice is honey-sweet, cultured, familiar.
"This is Viktoria Mirova."
Inessa's mother.
The woman who abandoned her daughter and betrayed her husband, now crawling back from whatever rock she's hidden under.
"What do you want?"
"To discuss my daughter's future. And her inheritance."
"She has no inheritance from you."
This woman is playing games I don’t wish to play, but I stay on the line just to find out if she's up to something.
"Actually, I believe she does. I've been reviewing dear Semyon's business documents, and I've discovered some… irregularities."
Yes, she's definitely up to something.
I set down the vodka glass and give Viktoria my full attention.
"What irregularities?"
"Oh, the usual oversights. Forged signatures, falsified dates, documents that strip a legal wife of her rightful claims."
Her laugh is soft and poisonous.
"Semyon was thorough, I'll give him that. But not thorough enough."
My jaw tightens.
"What are you after?"
"A meeting. A civilized conversation between family members about rectifying past mistakes."
"You're not family, woman," I growl, rubbing my forehead.
"I'm Inessa's mother. That makes me your mother-in-law. How delightfully modern we've become."
"The documents you're referring to are legal and binding."
My chest is tight as I think five steps ahead, to how I'm going to authenticate those documents and how I can fix any mistakes Semyon may have made.
"Are they? I have handwriting experts who disagree. Forensic analysts who can prove the signatures were forged. Lawyers who specialize in exposing fraud."
Her voice turns cold.
"Would you like to test those documents in court?"
The threat is clear.
If Viktoria can prove Semyon forged the papers that stripped her of her claims to his business, she can challenge Inessa's inheritance.
Tie up the company in legal battles that could last years and destroy the empire Inessa built from nothing.
"What do you want?"
"A meeting. Tomorrow afternoon. I'm sure we can reach an understanding that benefits everyone."
"And if I refuse?"
"Then you'll discover how expensive litigation can become. How thoroughly the courts can dissect a dead man's business practices. How long it takes to resolve inheritance disputes when the documentation is… questionable."
She ends the call before I can respond, and I stare at the phone, feeling the walls closing in from multiple directions.
Kozlov threatening to burn down Inessa's remaining businesses. Viktoria preparing to challenge her legal right to inherit what she's spent her life building.
Two fronts in a war I didn't start but will have to finish.
I call Oleg on the radio and start speaking before he's fully responded.
"Double security around the compound. Full perimeter sweeps every hour. No one approaches the house without clearance."
"Copy that. Threat level?"
"Maximum."
I pour another vodka and walk to the window overlooking the garden.
Inessa's light is on in her room, and I can see her silhouette moving behind the curtains.
She's probably sketching, losing herself in designs for collections that may never exist if I can't neutralize the threats circling us.
Kozlov will escalate.
Men who make their living through violence don't accept refusal gracefully.
He'll target her businesses again, probably more violently than before.
And Viktoria will use the courts to attack from a different angle, questioning the very foundation of Inessa's inheritance.
Both of them see her as a weakness to exploit, a pressure point that will make me compliant.
They don't understand that threatening her doesn't make me more reasonable.
It makes me lethal.
But control is an illusion when enemies gather at your gates.
And I have enemies now who think my wife's pain will purchase my cooperation.
They're about to learn otherwise.