Wicked Mafia Boss (Red Letter Syndicate #2)

Chapter 1

One

Katriana

Another thing I can't afford to replace.

I pour what little made it into the carafe, the liquid thin and bitter, more water than caffeine.

The kitchen smells like burnt grounds and the faint mustiness of an apartment that never gets enough sunlight.

Water stains bloom across the ceiling above the stove, brown and spreading, a slow decay I've learned to ignore along with everything else that's falling apart.

It doesn't matter. I'll grab something stronger at work. One of the few perks of working at a bookstore with a coffee bar is unlimited caffeine, even if the espresso machine is temperamental and the tips barely cover my bus fare.

My phone buzzes on the counter, vibrating against the chipped laminate, and despite everything, my lips curve.

Gemma: you awake yet or still pretending the world doesn't exist

Me: Bold words from someone who slept through her 8am class three times last week

Gemma: slander. it was only twice. also mom actually got dressed yesterday. like REAL clothes. not pajamas pretending to be clothes

I stare at the message, something warm and fragile blooming beneath my ribs. Mom got dressed. It’s such a small thing to hear for most, but for us, it is an enormous thing.

Me: That's really good, Gem

Gemma: i know right?? she even talked about maybe visiting aunt carol next month. I think she's turning a corner, Kat

Turning a corner. God, I want to believe that. I want to believe that five years of watching my mother disappear into grief and anxiety and the kind of depression that steals a person inch by inch might finally be loosening its grip.

Me: Don't get your hopes up too high. You know how she cycles

Gemma: wow okay debbie downer, let me have this ONE good thing

Me: You're right. I'm sorry. It IS good. I'm really glad

Gemma: go to work, stop worrying about us, we're FINE

My heart wants to crack open. I know the truth.

They're not fine. None of us have been fine since Dad took a loan from a monster and then had the audacity to die before paying it back.

He left me to pick up the pieces of a debt that multiplies like a virus, feeding on interest and late fees and the particular cruelty of men who enjoy watching hope die slowly.

I set the phone down and catch my reflection in the darkened window above the sink.

Twenty-four years old and I look ten years older.

Shadows hang out under my eyes that no concealer can hide.

I lean forward and get a closer look at the purple-gray crescents that speak of too many sleepless nights spent staring at spreadsheets that never add up.

I step back for an overall view. Rumpled hair that needs a trim I can't afford hangs around my shoulders.

I scootch my glasses up the bridge of my nose. “Ugh. God. I look like a zombie,” I groan at my reflection. My skin is too pale from too many hours spent under fluorescent lights. I have the kind of pallor that makes me look like I'm recovering from something I'll never actually escape.

I used to have dreams. A corner office at a publishing house downtown, the kind with floor-to-ceiling windows and a view of the city I was conquering.

Manuscripts piled on my desk, each one a world waiting to be discovered, stories I would help bring to life.

I was going to make so many dreams come true. I was going to matter.

Now I shelve books other people will read and serve lattes to customers who look through me like I'm furniture, and I tell myself that at least Gemma gets to stay in school. At least Mom has a roof over her head.

The silver lining of my life right now is that at least the debt collectors haven't started calling my workplace again.

At least. At least. At least.

The sad anthem of a life lived in survival mode.

I drain my terrible coffee, the bitterness coating my tongue and doing nothing to shake the exhaustion from my bones. I rinse the mug, watching the water swirl brown against the stained porcelain, and I'm reaching for my work shirt when the knock comes at my front door.

I don’t move.

Another three sharp raps bang out against the cheap wood.

My blood crystallizes in my veins.

No one knocks on my door at six in the morning. No one except the kind of people who don't care about things like appropriate hours or basic human decency. The kind of people who own pieces of other humans and like to remind them of it.

Damn it.

I hold my breath, hoping I imagined it. Hoping the universe will grant me this one small mercy. The refrigerator hums in the silence, and somewhere down the hall a neighbor's television murmurs through thin walls.

Three more knocks. Harder this time. The door rattles in its frame.

"Katriana." The voice is soft, almost gentle. Somehow that makes it worse. "I know you're home. I can see the light under your door."

My body wants to crumple to the floor.

Victor Kedrov.

I could run to the fire escape. But I tried that last month and his goons were waiting for me at the bottom. I rub at my cheek where the back of Kedrov’s hand landed as a reminder he always gets what he wants.

I have no choice here. “Thanks, Dad,” I murmur into my empty living room.

My hands shake as I move toward the door, and I hate them for their betrayal.

I hate the way fear has become my default setting, the way my body has learned to anticipate pain before it arrives.

My heart pounds against my ribs like a trapped bird, and I can feel the pulse of it in my throat, my wrists, the tips of my trembling fingers.

I could pretend I'm not here. I could stay silent and pray he leaves.

But Victor Kedrov doesn't leave. Nah. The twisted asshole would wait as long as it takes to get what he’s owed.

I mean, he's been waiting for years, circling my family like a patient vulture, and he has made it abundantly clear that he enjoys the waiting almost as much as the collecting. So I know better than to test him.

I open the door an inch at a time.

He looks like someone's grandfather. That's the thing about Victor that makes my skin crawl more than anything else.

The reading glasses perched on his nose, attached to a thin gold chain that glints in the harsh hallway light.

The slightly rumpled suit that suggests academic distraction rather than calculated menace.

The thin gray hair combed neatly to one side, not quite covering the age spots on his scalp.

He looks like a man who does crossword puzzles and worries about his cholesterol and sends birthday cards with crisp twenty-dollar bills inside.

Trust me. This Russian psycho is none of those things.

"There she is." His smile doesn't reach his pale blue eyes. They never blink enough, those eyes. Watery and cold, like something dead floating just beneath the surface. "May I come in?"

Ha. Like I can tell him no. He pushes past me, his shoulder brushing mine.

I make the mistake of breathing and catch a wave of his cologne.

He smells of something cloying and old-fashioned, like funeral flowers left too long in stagnant water.

It coats the back of my throat and makes my stomach turn.

He surveys my tiny apartment with the air of a landlord inspecting a property he's considering condemning.

His gaze moves over the sagging couch I found at a thrift store, the coffee table with the wobbly leg I've propped up with old textbooks, the water stains and the drafty windows and every evidence of a life scraped down to bare survival.

"You've made it cozy," he says, running a finger along my secondhand bookshelf.

The wood is warped from a leak two winters ago, but I've arranged my books carefully, spines aligned, my only luxury in a life stripped of everything else.

"All these books. You know, I've always admired readers.

Such rich inner lives. Such capacity for imagination.

" He pulls out a worn copy of Pride and Prejudice, examines the cracked spine with those unblinking eyes.

"Romantic, too. Always believing in happy endings. "

Once upon a time, yeah. The more naive version of me did.

"What do you want, Victor?" I know the answer, but I hate waiting for the other shoe to drop.

I try to keep my voice steady. I fail.

He sets the book back in the wrong spot, deliberately careless, and turns to face me. "Your payment was due three days ago, Katriana. You know how I feel about tardiness."

Acid sloshes against my stomach.

"I have it." The lie tastes like copper, like blood bitten from the inside of my cheek. "Most of it. I just need a few more days to get the rest together."

"A few more days." He sighs, slipping off his reading glasses to polish them on his tie.

The gesture is so mundane, so ordinary, that it takes me a moment to realize he's moving closer.

Each step measured, unhurried, the walk of a predator who knows his prey has nowhere to run.

"That's what your father used to say. Just a few more days, Victor.

Just a little more time, Victor. The development is almost ready, Victor. "

My back hits the wall. I didn't realize I'd been retreating. The plaster is cold through my thin shirt, and I can feel the ridge of the doorframe pressing into my shoulder blade.

"Your father was a dreamer." Victor's voice drops to barely above a whisper, intimate in a way that makes my skin want to crawl off my body. "Charming man. Wonderful imagination. But dreamers make promises they know they can't keep. And then their daughters inherit those broken promises."

He taps the end of my nose, punctuating his last words. I’ve never wanted to murder someone more.

"I've been paying." My voice cracks, and I hate the sound of it. Hate how small I become in his presence. "Every month. For five years. The original loan was three hundred thousand. I've paid you almost twice that."