Chapter 4 #2
"Same terms." I hand over a thick fold of bills. Harlon takes the money, tucks it into his coat without counting, and keeps walking. Fifteen years of clean payments and accurate counts bought that kind of shorthand between us.
We walk the length of the corridor in silence. I know when a man is deep in thought and I’m not the only one with problems. Harlon and his men are elbows deep in their own war. Mine is with an unknown face, but my friend here knows the demon he is fighting.
Society 69.
A collective of the wealthiest, most corrupt buyers in the underground. Enzo Marchetti supplied the human cargo and Society 69 auctioned them off to the filthiest bidders money can buy.
We reach the elevator and Harlon presses the call button. The machinery groans somewhere above us, old hydraulics protesting the late hour.
"I'll work on him." Harlon's voice drops low enough that the guard at the end of the corridor can't catch it. "We both know Enzo has more than he's giving you.”
I nod. “Men like him ration information. He's feeding me enough to stay useful but holding back enough to stay alive.”
Harlon clamps a hand on my shoulder. “I know how to adjust that calculation."
I don't ask how. Harlon's methods are his own and they produce results. That's all I need to know.
“Da, moy brat.” Yes, my brother. “Whatever you can help with. You know me and my brothers are good for the favor.”
Harlon tightens his hold on my shoulder a fraction and I stop.
"One more thing." He turns to face me and slips his hands into his pockets. His posture shifts from relaxed control to tense frustration. It’s noticeable in the bunching of his neck muscles and the tightness of his jaw. He’s about to ask a favor.
“Maybe I can cash in that favor a little early.”
“Name it.”
Harlon runs a hand through the lengths of his dark hair. He’s grayed more over the years and the creases at the corners of his eyes look deeper than usual. Stress ages a man and I know my friend is chin deep in it.
"Your shipping channels. The Eastern European routes, the port contacts, the men who move cargo through your corridors." He pauses and I get the impression what he’s about to ask isn’t something he’s comfortable with.
“What we talk about stays between us until you say otherwise,” I reassure him.
Keen dark eyes lift to meet mine. Doubt clears from his expression. "Have you, or your people, come across the name Tomas Montera?"
The name registers. The elevator arrives. The doors grind open and Harlon reached out, holding them open.
“Santi's brother?” I ask to confirm.
Harlon nods. "That’s the one."
I thumb the ring on my finger. "What's he into?" Santi Montera is Harlon’s partner in Club Genesis along with Cassius. They are connected at the hip and word is they once shared a wife. But that was a few years back. I’m not sure what happened that keeps their wedding bands on but no wife to be seen. There are, however, more rumors about a new love interest they share. And that is where my knowledge ends. I don’t go digging into other people’s lives unless I have a reason.
"Illegal cargo. Moving product through channels he shouldn't have access to." Harlon's jaw works once before he locks it down. "He's gone to ground. Three months, no contact. I need to find him before whatever he's running catches up to people I care about."
The weight of that last sentence lands between us. I’ve been in his position and it’s not fun. He’s talking about his partners and I get the feeling the new love interest is involved.
"Up until now, I haven’t heard anything. Let me put feelers out through my port networks. If Tomas is moving cargo through my Eastern European channels, I’ll find out."
"Appreciate it." I nod and take the hand he offers in a tight grip and he returns it in kind. Solid, strong and unafraid of another strong man. I like that.
"Volkov." Harlon's voice catches me before I step in. "Keep this between us. Santi doesn't know I’m looking for his brother. This shit could get ugly."
“And Cassius?” His other business partner is just as close to this.
You mention the Men of Genesis and everyone knows you speak of the three most powerful men in Chicago.
I say that with respect knowing where I stand in the line of power.
Money is not an issue for me. Status is also something else I have.
But the Red Letter Syndicate pays Genesis to do business in Chicago.
And we do so out of respect and mutual understanding of where we sit.
“If he starts asking me questions, how honest do you want me?”
“Only between us. We good with that?”
"Da." I step into the elevator. "Between us."
I ride up alone, the hum of the machinery filling the small space, and by the time the doors open at street level, my mind has already shifted from the interrogation to the calculation. Harlon’s problem takes a back seat for now.
Someone is building a parallel structure to our international operations.
Patient, well-funded, deeply knowledgeable about the old Bratva networks that predate my move to Chicago.
Enzo confirmed what I already suspected.
Someone is rerouting our cargo, flipping our operatives, and feeding our shipping details to authorities.
I know what they're doing. I know how deep they've dug. I don't know who's signing the checks.
I don't have a name.
But I will.
The night air hits my lungs when I push through the front doors. Cold enough to strip the basement staleness from my lungs. I pull my keys from my pocket and the ring on my finger catches the streetlight as I walk toward my car.
A reminder of the cost of death. I turn the warm metal around on my finger. There’s always a price for the harm you do to others. I know because it’s all I used to live for. But that wrath, rage and violence cost me and so did being Pakhan to the old guard.
But those are years gone by.
Using Ilona against Enzo leaves a taste in my mouth I can't rinse out. A man's love for his daughter turned into a crowbar is effective, but ugly. I know because my own son has been used against me and the heartache never fades.
My son has been in Chicago for a few months now.
Nikolai. Thirty years old and I still can't say his name without the guilt arriving like a punch to my gut.
Twenty years ago I put him on a plane to boarding school back in Russia at ten because I told myself Chicago's underworld was no place for a boy.
The truth is simpler and uglier than that.
I didn't know how to be a father without becoming my own father, and the fear of repeating that cycle was stronger than the shame of sending him away.
But that was all for nothing.
Three months ago I sat across from my son for the first time in over a decade.
The boy I put on a plane at ten years old walked into that restaurant as a man I barely recognized.
He moved through the room like he owned the floor beneath his shoes.
He held his chin high, shoulders squared, and scanned every face with the cold efficiency of a man raised by wolves.
My wolves. The old guard Bratva I tried to keep him away from had carved him into their image and dressed him in a suit to hide the monster they created.
I’ve heard the rumors. He’s been busy building his own empire and a few bodies left here and there are his work.
I keep tapped into the information running through my connections, but even I have blind spots.
That night the boy I fathered didn't embrace me. He pulled out his chair, sat down, and looked at me the way you look at a business meeting you're forced to attend.
But the woman on his arm made me pause. She had no business being in that room. White hair spilled down her elegant back. Her pale eyes shifted in the candlelight, but what really caught my attention was the sprig of tiny white flowers tucked behind one ear.
She belonged curled up on a couch with a mug of tea and a book, not sitting in a five-star restaurant on the arm of a man bred for the Bratva.
Everything about her was soft where everything about my son was sharp.
The contrast made my stomach tighten because I've seen what men like us do to women like her.
Dinner lasted forty minutes that night. Long enough to see that whatever softness my son carried at ten had been burned out of him and replaced with my father’s cruel handiwork. And I only have myself to blame.
The woman beside him sat with her elbows tucked close, her laughter timed to match his, and her gaze dropping to his hands every time they moved off the table.
We had almost made it to the end of the second course when the real demons revealed themselves.
I didn’t witness it happen, only the aftermath of my son shooting to his feet after the waitress spilled the wine. Had I been fast enough I could have prevented him from lashing the back of his hand across the waitress's left cheek. But I couldn’t take my eyes off his date.
Violet eyes met mine and then silence filled the entire restaurant.
With fifty sets of eyes on me, I slowly stood, helped the waitress to her feet and pressed folded bills into her trembling hand.
When I turned back, the woman with the white hair was across the restaurant on her way out.
She turned, looked back and I swear to everything I hold true she changed something in me. I don’t know what the fuck she did to me, but I followed her out and I haven’t spoken to my son since.
“Cora Vale.” I test her name on my tongue. A beautiful name for a beautiful creature I’ll never see again.
My car sits low against the curb, and I fold myself into the driver's seat, swiftly pulling into traffic.
There’s a reason I’m alone. If there’s no one at my side, no one can get hurt. It’s better that way. But not everyone thinks like I do. My brothers don't and that’s okay. But neither does my son. Men like Nikolai don’t care for anyone but themselves.