6. Tate #2
Yegor’s aim is disturbingly accurate.
I shout as one bullet hits the guy in his temple, and the next at the center of his head, right in the same spot he got the other man. Roman is still holding the guy’s legs down, just a few inches away from where Yegor was shooting.
Too close.
Way too fucking close.
“You are impulsive, Yegor,” Roman says. “We could have waited at least five minutes more.”
Blood is spilling from the guy out onto the gravel.
Roman stands up, dusting off his hands, and steps away, immediately running over to find me beside the car.
“Tate. Are you okay?” he asks me.
“What the fuck?” I whisper, my throat dry as I try to speak. “What… the… fuck?”
“I will explain later. These were bad men, Tate. I promise you. You aren’t in danger, and you aren’t going to get in trouble. Just get in the car.”
Some of the adrenaline wears off, but as it does, my hands start to shake.
I get back into the passenger seat of the car, feeling like I just stepped into a dream.
This can’t be real.
But it is, without a doubt.
“Clean up your mess,” I overhear Roman’s other cousin saying to Yegor. “We need to get out of here.”
“Just leave. I’ll handle it,” Yegor says. “Come on, you boring fucks. It was a little fun, no?”
“You are so stupid.”
“Ready, Maks?” Roman says.
“Let’s go.”
Maks loops around to the car. He’s tall and built and kind of looks like Roman, but with lighter brown hair.
Roman gets in on the driver’s side and throws the car into reverse as Maks gets in behind him, sliding into the back seat.
Roman makes no introduction, and no effort to explain what I just saw.
“Jesus Christ, what is going on?” I ask Roman.
“Just breathe, Tate. ”
“Bullshit. Tell me.”
His palm immediately lands on my thigh.
He strokes me, his touch firm and steady, clearly trying to help me relax in the way he’s good at.
He glances over at me, then finally relents, hitting the brake in the car just before the exit of the gravel driveway. “It was just my cousin being stupid. Very stupid. You don’t need to worry, Tate.”
“Whatever,” I mutter, anger rising in me. I turn to stare back into the seat behind me and reach out my hand. “Hi. I’m Tate.”
If there’s one thing that being in a famous family teaches you, it’s how to always make a friendly introduction, even when you feel like your world is on fire.
He gives me a short, firm handshake. “I’m Maks.”
Roman nods. “My cousin who isn’t stupid.”
“And you and your cousins all go around with guns, shooting people?”
“I told you, it was Yegor’s mistake, not ours,” Roman says. “And that’s all the information you are getting, so it would be best if you shut up now, Tate.”
“Fuck you,” I puff out in a bitter breath.
“Excuse me?”
“I said fuck you,” I repeat louder, turning toward him. “You take me around like I’m a puppy on your little errands, and you can’t tell me why I just saw two murders happen and you guys are acting like it’s no big deal?”
“Because it’s not your business.”
“It is now, if you’re dragging me along like this.”
“You weren’t supposed to see or hear any of that. It wasn’t supposed to happen that way.”
I hear a little sound from Maks in the back seat.
I realize he’s suppressing laughter.
Roman pulls out onto the road. I think the conversation is over until he finally speaks.
“If Yegor did not kill those men, they would have killed us, minutes later. I know it may be hard to believe this, but it was self-defense, Tate.”
“How do you know they were going to kill you?”
“They want something from us.”
“What?”
“Information.”
As he takes the car back out onto the main road, my perception of Roman shifts, yet again.
I knew he wasn’t an ordinary college student, but this…
This crosses a thick, fat fucking red line into something I don’t want to contemplate.
I’m afraid of asking more questions. But I’m also afraid of not knowing.
“Why were you making a stop at this guy’s house in the first place?”
“Giving Maks a ride. They were having lunch. Yegor is stupid, but he is family.”
A thousand questions bubble up in my mind, but part of me doesn’t want to know the answers to many of them.
I stay silent.
Roman and Maks start to speak to each other in Russian. I wish like hell I could understand what they’re saying. They speak the language fast and beautifully.
An idea sparks in my mind.
Earlier this week, in my French class, a student showed me an app on his phone. An app that can pick up spoken words and translate them, in real time.
I slide out my phone and navigate to the translator app, hitting the “live record” button and hiding my screen.
Roman and Maks’s conversation starts to transcribe onto the screen, fully translated.
“...a fucking problem. He wants to kill more Malettis, you know,” Maks says.
“Yegor will restart the war,” Roman replies.
“He does not care if he does.”
“I’ll fucking kill him before he does. The idiot.”
“You couldn’t kill Yegor. You still see him as a child,” Maks replies.
Roman lets out a long, slow sigh. “I know I couldn’t. But you would.”
They pause for a few beats. My heart is racing in my chest as I see what they’re actually talking about, and I glance over, making sure Roman’s peripheral vision is nowhere near my phone screen. But his gaze is fully on the road ahead.
As they start to talk again, I look back down at my screen.
“You like?” Maks asks. “Blond boy has big attitude.”
“No.”
They’re talking about me.
I keep my eyes glued to my phone.
“You don’t hate him, though,” Maks replies.
“I respect him. But I don’t like him.”
I hear Maks laugh softly. “He annoys you?”
“Flirts too much. He wants my cock.”
“Everyone does. That gigantic fucking snake under your pants, Roman—”
Both of them laugh softly at that, and Roman nods. I see a slight, faint smile on his lips that disappears quickly.