18. Ruslan
Ruslan
Andrei chose the restaurant carefully. It’s private enough to keep reporters at a distance, though they’re parked outside and get photos of both of us entering separately. Public enough that neither of us can openly kill the other without consequences.
The rooftop lounge overlooks downtown Denver. Wealthy people drift between fire pits and candlelit tables, pretending not to stare at us. They recognize him immediately.
Some recognize me too.
That bothers Andrei more than he wants to admit; I can see it in the tightness of his smile.
I arrive alone. No security visible, no entourage, no Emma. I don’t want her anywhere near him. He doesn’t deserve it.
Andrei watches me cross the terrace with obvious irritation already carved into his face. He stands before I even reach the table, his expensive navy coat sharp against the evening wind.
The resemblance between us still unsettles me after all these years.
Same height. Same jawline. Same dangerous stillness when anger settles in. It must’ve come from our mother’s side, which isn’t surprising; it was her great-uncle who brought me into the Bratva fold after she remarried.
Except Andrei’s restraint was always cleaner than mine. While I learned to survive in the shadows, Andrei learned how to smile through violence and call it leadership.
“You should not have come back,” he says immediately, a smile pasted on his face as we shake hands for those watching out of the corners of their eyes.
I pull out the chair opposite him and sit slowly. “And yet here I am.”
Around us, glasses clink softly. Somewhere near the bar, a woman laughs too loudly at something unfunny. The normalcy of it all feels almost surreal.
Beneath the surface, this has been building for years. If he thought he’d actually gotten rid of me, then he grossly underestimated how much I hate him.
Andrei remains standing for another moment before finally sitting across from me. His eyes sweep over my face carefully, assessing.
“I heard about California,” he says flatly. “You built quite a reputation.”
“So did you.”
His mouth hardens slightly. “Mine is legal.”
That almost earns a laugh. “Is it? You became predictable, Andrei. You know how dangerous that is.”
“And you became exactly what everyone feared.”
An interesting choice of words, as if we aren’t both criminals. Not hated—feared. He knows better than to insinuate that our mother didn’t love me. Maybe she moved on quickly, too quickly, after my father’s death. But she loved me.
The server approaches nervously, sensing the atmosphere immediately. Andrei dismisses him before either of us orders.
The second we’re alone again, his expression darkens further.
“Why are you here?”
The question hangs between us.
I could lie. Could tell him this is business; an expansion of territory back into a city I know. But he’s not worth lying to.
So instead I say, “You took everything.”
Something uncertain flickers behind his eyes. Then it disappears.
“You lost everything because you were unstable.”
“No,” I say quietly. “I lost everything because you were scared of what I could show the world about who you really are.”
Memory rises before I can stop it.
Flowers. Dirt beneath rough hands.
My father standing over arrangements in our tiny shop while teaching me how color mattered. Texture mattered. Beauty mattered. My mother laughing as he danced with her. He had been broad-shouldered and rough around the edges, a man people underestimated because he loved delicate things openly.
He never hid softness. That had been his strength.
Then he died, and everything afterward became confusion.
My mother crying behind locked bathroom doors, bills piling higher, men circling like wolves scenting weakness.
Through the eyes of a grieving boy, she seemed to move on too quickly. At the time, it all felt unbearable. Like betrayal stacked on top of grief.
I understand it differently now, sometimes, especially with Kate waiting for me back in California. A widow with a son and no money, trying desperately to survive in a city that devours weakness. But the damage stayed anyway.
Love became temporary after that. People leave, a dark voice whispered to me on nights when she laughed with a new husband. People are replaced.
Andrei watches me carefully from across the table. “You always blamed everyone else for your problems.”
“No,” I say softly. “Mostly I blamed you.”
That finally breaks through his polished exterior. His expression sharpens immediately. “You think I forced you out? You were dangerous.”
“I was grieving. It was only months after Mama died.”
“You were volatile.”
“Because my family collapsed.” The last word comes out rougher than intended.
Andrei leans back slowly, studying me with cold calculation. “Father spent years trying to clean this family up. Then you turned yourself into a stereotype.”
“Funny,” I murmur. “Coming from a politician.”
His eyes flash. The tension between us tightens steadily, drawing attention now despite the restaurant trying desperately to pretend otherwise. I notice people glancing over more frequently, phones subtly appearing.
They can feel something coming, like the air shifting just before a storm.
Andrei folds his hands carefully on top of the table. “You are embarrassing this family again. You should’ve stayed where you belong.”
The old anger rises instantly, every insult hiding the same implication: not good enough.
Not clean enough.
Too emotional. Too violent. Too much like my mother after my father died.
“She moved on quickly enough,” he continues. “Almost makes you wonder how devastated she really was. Everyone said it, you know.”
Whore.
He still refuses to say it directly, but the smirk on his face is enough—he never respected our mother, even after everything. Even after bringing him into this world.
I stand abruptly enough that the chair scrapes across the stone. Nearby conversations falter.
Andrei rises too, slower this time. More cautious.
“There you are,” he says softly. “I was wondering how long the leash would hold.”
I hit him hard enough to send him crashing backward into another table.
Glass explodes across the terrace. People scream.
The restaurant erupts instantly into chaos as Andrei recovers and lunges back at me with years of hatred behind the movement. But he’s unpracticed, messy; I do this for a living. Beat men to death.
We slam into each other brutally, fists colliding, security shouting somewhere nearby while phones rise eagerly around us.
This will be a scandal, a political disaster.
Good.
Andrei drives me into the railing overlooking downtown, fury finally stripped bare from his face. “You unstable piece of shit—”
I slam my fist into his ribs hard enough to cut the sentence off. Camera flashes burst around us now. Somehow, a few reports have managed to make it to the terrace. Security wedges between us unsuccessfully as we continue trying to tear each other apart like animals dragged back to old instincts.
Then Andrei grabs my collar sharply and leans close enough that only I hear him.
“Emma works for the FBI.”
The world narrows instantly. Not because I fully believe him, but because something clicks into place.
Something suddenly makes sense.
The awareness. The lies. The insistence that I don’t look into her past.
For one brutal second, it feels like the ground disappears beneath me.
Andrei sees the hesitation immediately and smiles through blood.
“You didn’t know. I didn’t think so; why would a criminal choose to court the FBI? Looking to get yourself put away, Ruslan?”
Rage detonates so violently inside me I nearly kill him right there. Security drags harder between us while voices shout about police. Somewhere nearby, someone is already talking to the reporters.
I stare at my brother for one long moment. Then I smile.
“You should have finished the job years ago.”
For the first time this evening, Andrei looks genuinely uneasy. I straighten my coat slowly before turning away from him. Denver glows beneath the darkening sky beyond the rooftop.
My city.
Not his.
Before this ends, Colorado will belong to me again.