Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 65593 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 328(@200wpm)___ 262(@250wpm)___ 219(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 65593 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 328(@200wpm)___ 262(@250wpm)___ 219(@300wpm)
“You and Story should move into the apartment next door,” I suggest to Oleg, who stands perfectly still, watching me. The guy can be creepy like that. He’s not just silent because his tongue was cut out. He makes his whole presence silent. As if a guy as big as the Hulk could ever fade into the background.
Surprise flickers over his face, like he hadn’t considered it. I mean, it’s not like Ravil offered this floor up to us. Who knows why he’d been saving it—all three of the luxury apartments below the penthouse were empty before I moved down here. I was just crawling out of my skin up there, so I asked if there was somewhere else I could live.
“It’s getting cramped up there, don’t you think?” I ask.
Oleg shrugs and makes a see-saw motion with his hands in the air—the sign for maybe. Then he signs something else. I have to pay attention to try to decipher. I may have mastered English, but I’m still learning American Sign Language. “Ravil already gave you an apartment?” I ask. Then I realize what he’s saying. “Oh, Story’s music studio. Right. Well, you can afford the rent if he charges you. I remember the giant duffel of cash you left behind when you tried to leave us.”
I’m ribbing him. He hadn’t tried to leave, he’d been trying to save his girlfriend from his villainous ex-boss. But the point is, he’d left Story a huge bag of cash when he went to kill or be killed by his boss.
Oleg looks thoughtful and gives me the maybe sign again.
I stand back and survey the room.
“Happy yet?” Adrian asks me in Russian.
“English,” I murmur because even though Ravil’s not here, we follow his rules. He wants us all to speak English because he says language is power. We use our mother tongue when we need to talk behind someone’s back; otherwise, we practice our English. Adrian—our cleaner—has only been here a year and still chafes against the rule. He lives with his sister, Nadia, downstairs, and I seriously doubt they practice English at home. Nadia’s PTSD from being sex trafficked makes it hard for her to stretch.
“It’s good?” Adrian tries again.
“It will do,” I concede. “Come on, you two, we have some debts to call in before the game.”
No rest for the wicked, so they say. Being the bookie for the bratva definitely makes me one of the wicked.
Chelle
Shit, shit shit shit!
I bang my palm against the safe at work. It’s eight on a Friday night, and I’m still in the office after a long day brainstorming advertising campaign ideas for a client’s luxury ring line. Janette left me to clean up the team’s mess, including putting the very expensive, one-of-a-kind designer ring back in the safe, but I can’t get the damn thing open.
I try Janette’s cell but it goes straight to voicemail. Of course it does. I totally remember her silencing it during the meeting. Crap. She may not turn it back on until tomorrow morning!
What am I supposed to do? I don’t feel comfortable leaving the ring here. I mean, I could hide it in my desk or something, but the janitor’s here, and if something happened to it, it would be on me.
No, it’s better to take it home. I’ll bring it back Monday and explain the situation to Janette then. She will probably shit a brick, but at least she’ll know how seriously I took the job, and by then, the ring will be locked back in the safe, and she’ll have nothing to worry about.
To cover my ass, I text her the situation and my solution then bury the ring at the bottom of my purse and leave the building.
As soon as I’m free from the office, my thoughts go to the events of last Friday night. From what I understand, the Russian’s poker game is every Friday, and Zane is expected to show up and make a payment or suffer the consequences. Not my problem, I try to tell myself. Zane needs to solve this. I’m actually trying to take the advice of his loan shark.
But my stomach knots up in a tight ball. I pull out my phone and call Zane.
“Hey, Chelle, what’s up?” Zane’s voice is tight and threaded with worry, which kicks my protective instincts into overdrive.
“Hey, what’s the deal with the Russians?”
“Yeah, I’m working on it.”
Pretty sure that’s code for he has no plan.
“What does that mean?”
“I have a plan, but it’s gonna take a few weeks to execute.”
“What’s the plan?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
Shit. That’s gotta be code for something illegal.
“I am worried, Zane. Aren’t you supposed to make some kind of payment to Nikolai every week, or he comes and busts your kneecaps?”
Zane’s silent for a beat. “Nikolai?”
I hadn’t mentioned my visit to the game last week. He’d been passed out on my couch on pain pills, and after Nikolai served me up a dish of therapy about letting him solve his own problems, I didn’t think telling him I’d gone running to offer up my car would be useful.