Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 107079 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 535(@200wpm)___ 428(@250wpm)___ 357(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 107079 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 535(@200wpm)___ 428(@250wpm)___ 357(@300wpm)
He leaned down and kissed me, soft and tender, and I felt myself melt at the revelation that he could be so gentle. But I also recognized it for what it was: a way of changing the subject.
He broke the kiss and headed for the door. “I have to go. There’s some problem with a gun shipment. But I’ll try to look into Grushin’s phone number, too. There’s a hacker I know—”
I put my hand up: stop. “You have enough to do. Let me take this. I know a hacker, too.” I sighed, thinking. “Plus, I really need to check in with her boyfriend.”
43
GENNADIY
Before I left, I found Valentin and asked him to start surveillance on Grushin’s front business, the medical clinic. Then I headed across town, but almost immediately, I got stuck in traffic. Crawling along was even more frustrating than usual because, with my car totaled, I was having to drive Radimir’s big Mercedes. None of the controls were where I expected them to be, and I felt clumsy and useless. I missed my BMW.
I glared at the bumper of the car in front. I don’t have time for this! I felt like I was trying to keep about a hundred plates spinning. We had to find out what the hell Grushin was up to and stop him. But I still had the casino to run and countless other operations to manage, and they all seemed to be hitting problems at the same time.
And then there was Alison.
Just thinking of her made my whole chest lift. After months of watching her flit around in my rear-view mirror and the edges of my vision, she was finally mine. I was almost drunk on it: I wanted to spend all day, every day, with the warmth of her body against mine, breathing in the scent of her hair.
And yet...we’d been together one day, and already, I was fucking it up. As soon as she’d asked about the anger, I’d shut down. This is what I get for falling for an FBI agent. She’d figured out that there was something broken in my soul. And now she knew she was onto something, she’d never let it go. Those cop instincts ran bone-deep in her, and she was at least as stubborn as me.
She was right. The anger was driving me, and it demanded more violence, more territory, a bigger empire, every day. I was pushing too hard: muscling in on the cartel’s supply lines last month was probably why they tried to kill me at the jazz club. I knew this path only ended one way, with me lying dead. But…
I couldn’t stop. Stopping meant letting the anger slow and fade, and I couldn’t do that, for the same reason I couldn’t talk to Alison about it. I didn’t want to face what was underneath the anger.
I shook my head and cursed. The traffic still wasn’t moving. I was burned out and cranky from lack of sleep, my head was throbbing...I need coffee. And I was right beside the entrance to the Conroy Mall. I could go in and get a caffeine hit, walk around in the air-conditioned coolness for a few minutes, and maybe clear my head. It wasn’t like I was getting anything done sitting here.
Five minutes later, I was wandering through the mall, coffee in hand. I’d asked for a triple shot, and the caffeine was roughly massaging my brain awake. Maybe that’s why I had the revelation. I looked around at the people, and I finally knew why I’d always liked the place.
It was the normality. People with regular lives, with wives and husbands and kids. Guys buying lingerie for their girlfriends. Fathers buying toys for their kids.
I wanted a taste of that. Maybe, unconsciously, I always had. The Bratva, building the Aristov empire, everything I’d poured my soul into for years...it wasn’t enough anymore. I wanted more. I wanted her.
But, God, how was that going to work?! She was a cop, at heart. A good person. Becoming part of our world would taint her, corrupt her...and even if she was willing to go through that change, I wasn’t sure I wanted her to. Her goodness was one of the things I adored about her. Blyat’, I just wanted to lock her in a room in my mansion, away from all harm...except she’d karate kick me in the balls, if I tried it. I closed my tired eyes for a second and rubbed at them. This relationship stuff was complicated.
Time to get going. I took a sip of my coffee, steeling myself, opened my eyes and—
On the other side of the food court was a face I recognized. It was impossible. But it was him.
“Hello, Gennadiy,” said Viktor Grushin.
44
ALISON
I figured the FBI would be tapping my phone by now, so I used a burner phone to call Calahan. That meant that I must have come up as Unknown Caller on his screen, but he still answered with a frantic, “Alison?!“