Sandir echoed everyone’s thoughts, judging by the looks on their faces. Perhaps starting off by bending our road a little would be enough for them, except bending wasn’t what I wanted to do. All out, and nothing short of all out, was for me, but I understood I had to tread carefully and do it slowly.
“My end goal is out, just to make it clear. I’m not leaving you guys behind, just the organisation. I’ve had enough.” These men would understand better than anyone why. “First things first though. We need to clean up the runners. Those fuckers dipping are a liability and I want them gone. We make personal visits this next week, show a little muscle if needed, then figure out where we take that line of business, if anywhere. I have a feeling Lev isn’t going to let that slide, the drugs make him too much money, so we need to think smart. We’ve been at it too long and it’s getting riskier than ever.”
“What the fuck does he need money for? The old git has to be hanging onto death’s door by now, the bloke is ancient.” As ever, Greg’s animated discussions made me smile. He had such an eloquent way with words at times, especially when he was trying to portray indignation.
“Best place to start though. The loans are doing all right, easy to take legit if you want. Bloke we hire is decent, knows what he’s doing,” Andrey said.
“He might consider a buyout?”
“For him or us?” I asked, because it was a decent option and one less thing to worry about. “Put it on the list.”
“What else? The booze and the fags?” Greg cut a glare at Sandir, who held his hands up. “Apologies. Cigarettes.”
“Irina deals with those, leave be for now. The Yard and the shipments with the drugs needs looking at. Tayte, see if there’s a demand for more beans cos I’d ideally like to get the fuck out of that. If anything’s going to send one of us to jail, it’s fucking smuggling drugs from Colombia.”
“Those clubs around ours,” Andrey mentioned. “Shaking down the other owners for protection and having our bouncers work the doors, no problem there, we can deal out. I doubt they’re going to grumble paying a lump sum to get us fuckers off their backs. They can still hire the muscle, right? They’re on the company books.”
“Yeah.” I thought for a minute, it was a good idea. I didn’t want to threaten business owners any more than Sandir and Tayte wanted to rough the owners up or trash their property. Several had tried to form an alliance once before to push back and we’d beat them down, but this wasn’t the nineteen twenties, we weren’t Al Capone, and it was time to do it differently. “I want that done as soon as. It’s easy, offer an out with a guarantee to use our bouncers. Grand scheme of things, it’s very little money to lose, hustling them was always more about the name and the turf than anything else.”
“What’s going on here, Yan? Are you looking to shake down Lev?” It was Tayte asking, and I figured he already knew the answer. He watched, more than the others, often seeing beyond the words. “This is all shit we could have done already. I don’t believe this is just because your fifteen years is up, there’s more to it than taking life a bit easier. Did you grow a conscience or something?”
Snarling, I bared my teeth at him, insulted. “I’ve always had a fucking conscience, Tayte. If you never saw it, then you’re not the friend I thought you were, and you don’t know me at all.”
“Sorry,” he apologised. “Of course, I know that. This just feels…”
“Sandir said it.” I pointed toward my best friend. “I don’t want to end up with a bullet in my back. Slowing down’s appealing and fuck knows I’d like to have a life outside of the fucking mob.” I sighed and stood up, pacing the small space in the living room between the chair and the window. “I never meant for this to be my life. You all know the sorry story. I think…” I paused, wondering if I should just say the words. Because once I did, I was admitting it, and there was no turning back. Fuck it. Feet first. “I want Lev to feel it before I walk. That fucker has been screwing us all over for years and it’s time we took it back, made it our own, whatever that looks like. I can do that before I jump ship.”
Silence ensued. I couldn’t blame them for not having too many words to communicate with what I’d just put to them. I stood in the middle of the room, watching, waiting.
“You don’t get to turn your back on the mob, Yannick,” Sandir said, solemnly. “Even walking away might not be enough to keep the wolves from your back, you’d still be a threat. There’s always someone else clamouring for top dog, regardless.”
Andrey snorted. “Not in our organisation, if you take Irina out of the picture.”
I didn’t believe him, someone like me always had some power-hungry arsehole at their feet, vying for the position, even if they weren’t being obvious about it. Somebody, somewhere, wanted to be me and have what I had, they just hadn’t shown themselves yet.
“You can’t leave Irina to fend for herself,” Tayte spoke up, ever the voice of reason. It’s not like I hadn’t thought the same. Was Tayte the one, I wondered?
Greg burst out laughing. “You’ve met Irina, right? She’s not exactly a damsel in distress, Tayte. Come the fuck on, mate.”
“No. But most people think she’s the weaker of the two. If Yan
