Page 36 of Claimed By the Bratva Brothers

“We’re not going to say yes,” Artur chimes in. “Right?”

I shake my head. “I’d rather die, but she doesn’t need to know that yet.”

“What if we have to?” Ivan mutters, as he slides down onto the sofa. He runs a hand through his short hair, his breath heavy and faltering. “What if there’s no other way?”

“There’s always another way,” Artur says. “We just haven’t found it yet.”

“Why did we expect better results?” I ask, leaning back into my chair. “Ivan said it well before Polina even walked in. We knew this was coming.”

We were hoping for better results. That’s where the dismay stems from. From the hope that maybe Polina would do the decent thing for once and set our record straight with her father. Of course, she couldn’t do that without implicating herself, without soiling her own image in front of daddy dearest. Her ego is too big. Polina would rather burn alive than stop being his perfect princess.

Either way, it’s a ginormous fuckery. We need to figure out what to do with it.

We need to transfer White Plains into the Sokolov consortium sooner rather than later, for a multitude of reasons, some of them legal. Our accountants insisted upon it, since it is key in keeping all of our businesses clean and clear of any additional federal interference. Had I known that going legit would be so fucking tedious, I would’ve stayed in the Navy.

But then we never would’ve crossed paths with Lyric. I can almost smell her hair. Taste her lips. A sweet reminder that despite everything that we’ve been struggling with, Lyric has been a wonderful, soul-rejuvenating constant. And I intend to keep her around.

“Obviously, not a word of this to Lyric,” I say after a heavy pause.

“Obviously,” Artur replies. “How would it even sound?”

Awful. It would sound awful.

A few hours later, Ivan and I are visiting one of our northside offices. There have been some logistical irregularities reported where the transportation department is concerned. We need to make sure everything is in accordance with the most recent regulations, since this particular building is smack in the middle of Matthew Phelps’s council district. He’s been sending inspectors to bother our employees on a weekly basis, slapping us with fine after fine.

This time, however, one of our administrators caught whiff of an issue before another inspector’s visit and called us.

“We’re missing several documents, including the last three manifests for July,” our eager logistics administrator, Trent, says as we walk back into his office.

“What do you mean we’re missing transport manifests for July?” Ivan asks Trent, his brow furrowed with genuine concern. “That’s a fifty-thousand-dollar fine right there.”

“I’m well aware, Mr. Sokolov, but I swear I don’t know how it happened. We usually keep everything right here in this office. The manifests, the travel logs, the passes, everything. And my assistant is good at labeling it.”

“When did you notice they were missing?” I ask.

Trent sighs heavily. “That’s the thing. I don’t think they were ever submitted. Not on paper, anyway. But we need them to explain some discrepancies in fuel consumption for that period, otherwise the inspectors from the city council will have a field day with this. Like you said, sir, fifty grand.”

“Fucking hell,” Ivan mutters. “Let me see the ledgers.”

Trent is a good guy. He’s been under our employ for a few years now. He’s a fair man with a good work ethic. His father worked for our father, and Trent inherited his position, though he did start out in the loading bay, first.

I don’t trust anyone fully, except Ivan and Artur, but I do know that Trent wouldn’t allow such issues to arise, especially during such a stressful time. If anybody hates city inspections more than us, it’s him. Without hesitation, he unlocks one of the file cabinets and takes out a heap of ledgers for Ivan to sift through.

“We need to figure out what happened to that missing fuel,” my brother says.

“One of our employees could intentionally be responsible,” I add.

Voices boom beyond the wall of glass. I look out and see a familiar, yet disturbing sight—a river of FBI windbreakers spilling into the bay, manhandling our employees while waving a search warrant for everyone to see. “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I scoff and leave the office, running down the metal steps to get ahead of the situation. “What the hell are you doing here?” I ask the agent waving the warrant.

“Search warrant for your premises,” he replies with a dry tone.

“Yeah, I figured that part out. For what?”

“Suspicion of trafficking and other illicit activities.”

I snatch the warrant from his hand to read it. The legal jargon is all there. Nothing but circumstantial garbage at first glance, which tells me that this is just another attempt from Smith and his cohorts to bully us.

“My lawyers will need to verify the validity of this warrant before we let you search anything,” I try my luck.

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