I push the door open slowly, keeping my body against the wall as I move through the small office. The store is empty, but the computer and cabinets in the back office are all trashed. Files are strewn about, chairs overturned. What the hell were they looking for?
I don’t keep anything sensitive in here. Not when some cop with a hard-on for justice can kick down the door at any point in time. Not when the feds can raid the place if they want, looking for something to pin on Lavrins.
Just as I turn the corner into the main part of the bodega, my shoe squelches. I look down to see a dark puddle. Blood. The metallic scent stings my nose. Someone was here. My gut churns. Who was killed?
Slumped in the candy aisle is one of my men. Dead. Skizzo ran the crew moving drugs out of here. He also kept an eye on things for me. He had the code to the place. He knew I didn’t keep anything of value here.
Shit.
I can hardly stand to look at him. He’s strapped to a chair, his fingers jutting at gross angles and a bloody stump where his tongue once was. The motherfuckers even ruptured his eyeballs. Gino is one sick fuck, I’ll give him that. And ruthless. Blood is sprayed against the rows of candy across from him and spread like a carpet around his feet. It looks like he tried to crawl away while bleeding out. They made him suffer.
I lean against the desk, unable to look at him and unable to look away. Tears form in my eyes, both from sadness for my loyal soldier and from anger at Gino. None of the families are safe from him, yet none of them have stood against the Italian. Instead, they sided with him.
Meanwhile, I’ve made them rich. I’ve kept them safe. But they’re greedy and opportunistic. And they only respond to cruelty. Well, they seem to have forgotten the person I am. The person who seized power and controlled this damn city. They made an enemy out of the one person they should’ve kept happy. Gino might be crazy, but there’s nothing more dangerous than a Lavrin.
It’s time the underworld remembered that fact.
Chapter Twenty
Annie
Nothing is the same anymore.
The things that once entertained me are now lifeless. The things that once seemed routine are now terrifying. If I’m not looking over my shoulder to make sure I’m not being followed, I’m bored out of my mind. I can’t focus enough even to watch something stupid on TV, and I can’t walk to the grocery store without my heartbeat jumping up to two hundred beats per minute and making me break out in hives. I don’t want to go out and I don’t want to stay in. I just want things to be the way they used to be.
But I know damn well that that’s not going to happen anytime soon. Mostly because, every time I close my eyes, I see him.
Nikita.
Staring at me, with those black coal pits for irises. Is it rage that I’m seeing in his face, or lust? I can never tell. Truth be told, I’m not sure I want to know. There’s no telling what lies down the tracks of that particular train of thought, and I have no interest in finding out. I won’t. I shouldn’t. I can’t.
I pull out the stack of papers the professor handed to me to grade. Being a TA is just oh so much fun. But it helps pay the bills as I search for a job. In these last couple of weeks, the majority of lecturers just finish out the senior-heavy classes. They want the semester to end as badly as any of the students do, so unless someone does something to really get on a teacher’s bad side, everyone is graduating.
The TA job is mindless and easy. Mostly, it involves red pen scribbles with a coffee close at hand. But the simplicity is dangerous, because it lets my mind wander. I try to keep it focused on the here and now, and above all, things that are in my control. Things like: what the hell am I going to do with my life? All the dreams I had about being an accountant, working with numbers, and being able to go home at the end of the day—like a normal person, to a normal family—have all mutated into something ugly and repulsive. I don’t want safety or certainty, at least not in the way that I used to crave those things. The monotony is no longer appealing. Maybe it never was. I don’t know. I don’t know much of anything anymore.
I know pretty much this and only this: I have to finish grading or I’ll lose my TA position. And, though so much else has vanished from my life, the bills I need to pay have not.
My phone rings and I glance at the screen before answering. My stomach plummets. It’s Griffin & Sons, Incorporated. I interviewed with them last week. Everything went so well. I knew the job was mine; they more or less told me as much in the interview. But as I walked around the office afterwards, staring at the cubicles and the fluorescent lights and the hideous carpet, I just wasn’t sure I wanted the job anymore. It didn’t feel right.
Even thinking that is crazy. A month ago, I would’ve been jumping with joy in the streets to get this call. Griffin & Sons is a massive, powerful accounting firm with offices nationwide and a roster of clients to die for. Good benefits, lots of opportunity for upward mobility, competitive pay, and ... blah blah blah. I can’t even bear to think about it. The checklist for why I should pick up this call and give an enthusiastic yes to the job offer is a mile long.
Which is why one little voice in my head is screaming bloody murder at
