Chapter Six #2
“She said it because she knew it would irritate me enough to call you.”
That time, I did smile.
Galina Sorin had never needed a gun to move men into position.
“The Kasks will claim I broke the auction settlement,” I said.
“The Kasks will claim whatever keeps their throats intact.”
“Gennady paid the auctioneer, moved Nadia’s lot, inflated Petya Yelchin’s debt after the auction, sent a photo from a guarded location, and demanded compensation for loss of Nadia.”
Silence held for two breaths.
Mikhail’s voice changed when it returned. It lost the rasp of illness and found the man who had built my childhood from blood, ledgers, and rules no one survived breaking twice.
“He used a debt marker to pressure a woman into the auction, then used the auction to claim the woman against your house after you took her.”
“Yes.”
“And you intend to name her wife.”
“I intend to make sure no man in this city forgets it.”
“You understand what that means.”
“Yes.”
“Say it.”
I looked through the glass at Manhattan burning pale under late-afternoon clouds.
“It means Nadia’s insult becomes mine. Petya’s debt becomes mine to erase or punish.
Gennady’s claim becomes an insult against the Sorin name.
If the Kasks defend him, they defend the use of bought auctioneers and inflated debts against Sorin-protected family. ”
“And if they call the girl temporary?”
“They can come to our wedding and correct themselves.”
My father was quiet again.
Then he said, “You sound like your mother.”
“I’ll accept that as praise.”
“It wasn’t offered as comfort.” Fabric rustled on his end of the call. He was moving, probably pushing away help he needed. “Bring the Kask men to the club. Use my room.”
“You should stay home.”
“I’m not dead.”
“No, and I need you that way.”
His breath sharpened. I heard pain in it before he buried it. “You need the room to know I’m still Pakhan long enough for you to make the next truth clear.”
“I can do that without you standing.”
“You’ll do it with me sitting.”
There was no use arguing once his voice settled there. Mikhail Sorin could be half-broken by his own bones and still turn stubbornness into command.
“Fine,” I said. “You sit. You don’t stand. You let the doctor ride in the car behind you.”
“I don’t take instructions from my son.”
“You do when your son is the one keeping the city from smelling blood in the water.”
Another silence.
Then my father said, “There he is.”
I ended the call before the words could take root.
Lev entered a minute later with two of my men and the gambling-room contact between them.
The contact was in his thirties, narrow-faced, sweating through a cheap gray shirt under a black jacket that didn’t fit. His eyes found the glass wall first, then the door, then me. Men like him always measured exits too late.
He tried to speak before I sat. “Mr. Sorin, I didn’t know Petya was yours.”
I rested my hand on the back of the desk chair. “Petya Yelchin is under my protection.”
“I didn’t know that part.”
“You knew he was being guarded.”
He swallowed. “I knew someone had him.”
“You took a photograph.”
“Kask told me to prove location. He told me the kid owed. I didn’t touch him. I only watched the street.”
“Who gave you the address?”
His eyes flicked toward Lev.
Lev stared back without expression.
The contact looked at me again. “A man from the old room sent it. Kask wanted the sister scared.”
“Say her name.”
His throat moved. “Nadia Yelchin.”
“Again.”
“Nadia Yelchin.”
“You’ll remember it when you tell me who carried Kask’s payment to the auctioneer.”
His mouth opened.
I waited.
The room pressed around him until sweat slid from his temple to his jaw.
“I don’t know the auctioneer,” he said.
“That wasn’t my question.”
“No, I know. I know.” His hands lifted, then dropped when one of my men shifted behind him.
“The money didn’t go direct. It went through the same old room.
Kask used a driver and a sealed envelope.
I saw the envelope go out before the auction, and I saw Kask’s man take a call after. He said the lot order was fixed.”
Lev set a phone on my desk. “The messages are here. We also have the auctioneer on his way to the club.”
The contact’s knees almost gave.
I looked at Lev.
“He’s alive,” Lev said. “He’s ready to answer questions.”
Gennady had built his leverage from dirty pieces and assumed shame would hold them together. He’d used the debt marker, the photograph, the bribed auctioneer, and a demand written like Nadia had been property damaged in transport.
All of it worked only in the dark.
“Take him downstairs,” I said.
The contact’s head jerked up. “Please, Mr. Sorin. I told you what I know.”
“You started telling me what I already knew. Keep going, and you may continue disappointing me from a distance.”
My men took him out.
Lev remained. “Kask agreed to the meeting.”
“Of course he did.”
“He wants two Kask witnesses.”
“He can bring them.”
“He asked whether Nadia will be present.”
I looked toward the closed office door. Beyond it, Nadia was dressing in clothes chosen for movement, with Irina between her and the world like a domestic gatekeeper with a spine made of wire.
“What did you tell him?” I asked.
“I told him Nadia Yelchin will stand where she chooses, and if he looks at her too long, you’ll remove his eyes before the meeting starts.”
I looked at Lev.
He didn’t blink.
“That sentence is accurate,” I said.
“It also irritated him.”
“Good.”
Lev almost smiled. “Petya will be brought to the club and held in the east room until you call for him. He won’t be touched unless he tries to bolt.”
“If he’s bruised from our handling, someone answers to me.”
Lev’s face hardened. “Your men haven’t put hands on him beyond transport.”
“Keep it that way.”
“Yes.”
When I returned to the bedroom, Nadia stood in front of the mirror with Irina adjusting the fall of the black coat over her shoulders.
The ivory sweater softened her throat. The trousers fit close through her hips and thighs without restricting movement.
The low boots made her look steadier than the auction room had allowed her to look.
Her dark hair had been brushed and left down in loose waves, and her brown eyes found mine in the mirror before she turned.
Men had dressed her for display once.
I had dressed her to stand beside me.
Irina stepped back. “The coat has an inner pocket. I put your phone there. Mr. Sorin had it replaced this morning, but your old number is mirrored for family calls.”
Nadia touched the pocket. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
Irina collected the garment bag and left us alone.
Nadia waited until the door closed. “You corrected Lev.”
I walked toward her. “You heard that?”
“I heard enough.”
“The penthouse carries sound when people are angry.”
“You weren’t shouting.”
“I don’t need to shout to be angry.”
“No,” she said. “You get quieter. It’s worse.”
I stopped in front of her and fixed the left side of her coat where it folded near her waist. “Lev works for me. My men protect what I order protected. No one gives the impression that your safety is a courtesy from anyone beneath me.”
“Possessive.”
“Yes.”
“I wasn’t complaining.” Her fingers caught my wrist. “I meant the other part. You corrected him because of me.”
“I corrected him because you’re not an object I permit into rooms.”
Her fingers tightened.
“You’re coming because you choose to come,” I said. “You’ll leave if you choose to leave. You’ll speak if you choose to speak. I will control the danger around you, not the woman inside it.”
Nadia’s lips quivered before she pressed them together.
“Don’t make me cry before I have to face Gennady,” she said.
“I’d rather make you come before you face Gennady, but timing is against us.”
Her breath caught, and color rushed into her face so beautifully I wanted to cancel the city for an hour.
“Vadim.”
“There is my name.” I bent and kissed the corner of her mouth, careful of the softness I’d left there earlier. “Hold it in your mouth when you look at him. He doesn’t have your fear anymore. I do.”
Her eyes lifted to mine.
“No,” she said. “You don’t have my fear either.”
I went still.
She pressed her palm to my chest, over the slow, heavy beat there. “You have me.”
The words hit deep enough to steal my next breath.
I covered her fingers with mine. “Then I’ll keep what you gave me.”
“You’re already trouble.”
“Yes.”
“I said keep.”
I kissed her then because the room had narrowed to the shape of her mouth and the impossible fact that she’d walked through terror and still found a way to challenge me inside it.
She kissed me back hard. No yielding. No shrinking. Her fingers gripped my shirt, and her body came against mine with enough trust to make my control ache.
When I lifted my head, her lips were parted.
“We have to go,” she said.
“I know.”
“You don’t look like you’re moving.”
“I’m considering whether Gennady needs both hands.”
Her smile was small and sharp. “He’ll need at least one to sign whatever makes this over.”
“That’s practical.”
“I’m a practical woman.”
“You’re my practical woman.”
“I’m still myself.”
“Yes,” I said. “That’s the part I’m obsessed with.”
Her eyes softened.
Then she stepped back first.
I let her.
The Sorin club sat behind a private frontage in Manhattan with no public sign and a doorman who had worked for my father since I was sixteen.
Black stone steps led up from the curb. Late-autumn wind moved hard between the buildings, cutting beneath coats and carrying the metallic smell of rain that hadn’t started yet.
My car stopped beneath the awning. Another car idled behind us with Lev inside. Two more waited at the curb. My men moved before the doors opened, not rushing, not drawing attention, just putting bodies between Nadia and any angle I hadn’t approved.
Nadia looked through the tinted window at the entrance. “This place is yours?”
“My father’s.”
“That wasn’t an answer.”
“It will be mine.”