Page 34 of Kingmakers, Graduation

I take an enormous bite out of the bread, chewing hard.

Adrik holds his in his hand, eyes fixed on my face.

“In three years’ time, I’ll own half of Moscow. The time to get in is on the ground floor. Like a start-up.” He smiles, enjoying his comparison. “That’s the American dream, isn’t it? It’s no good buying Apple stock now—you want to be Jobs and Wozniak, building circuit boards in a garage.”

I swallow my mouthful, only half-chewed. The bread scrapes its way down my throat.

“I don’t need to work in a garage. I’m an heir, in case you forgot. I’ve got an empire waiting for me, already built.”

“Sure,” Adrik says carelessly. “If you want to be a realtor.”

I’d like to throw my drink in his face. He’s being deliberately insulting, trying to goad me.

That’s what he wants—to make me lose my temper.

So I keep an iron grip on my calm.

“I think you know better than that.”

Adrik sets his bread on his plate and leans forward, eyes burning into mine.

“I know exactly what your father is up to. He bought dozens of distressed retail spaces in the so-called ‘Magnificent Mile’ in the aftermath of the pandemic. Now he’s buying up property along the 1-80 and 1-55 corridors, building warehouses, filling the need for supply-chain distribution. In another five years, he’ll be the single largest holder of commercial real estate in all of Chicago.”

My mouth is open, no words coming out. Adrik is describing my father’s operations as accurately as I could myself.

“Your uncle Callum is gearing up for another run at the governor’s mansion, Dante lives in Paris with his wife and children, and your uncle Sebastian handles the less-legal side of the Gallo empire.” Adrik ticks off my relatives on his fingers. “Your younger brother is only sixteen, and technically not your father’s heir, but by all accounts, he’s more deeply involved in the family business than you’ve ever been.”

Now my face is flaming, because that’s also true—Damien may appear quiet and reserved, but he has a brilliant criminal mind. He’s been running my father’s books since his twelfth birthday. They spend hours together analyzing potential acquisitions, running the numbers on the properties for which my father negotiates with ruthless aggression.

I’m always invited to these meetings but they don’t interest me the same way they do Damien.

Truth be told, I’d rather work with Uncle Seb. But even there, the Gallos have been divesting our most egregious illegal activities. Each year that passes we clean up our books, a larger percentage of our income coming from legitimate sources.

“What’s your point?” I snap.

“My point is this,” Adrik says patiently, “I don’t think you want to be Nero’s heir. I think you want to be a fucking gangster. You don’t want to inherit an empire—you want to build one.”

I lift my brandy, taking several swift swallows.

Even though the sun is sinking, the stone walls of Old Town still reflect the heat of the day. The air is still and muggy, no breeze off the ocean.

I’m hot and flustered. I feel cornered by Adrik, attacked by him.

But also … flattered.

He came a long way to make this pitch. He pulled out all the stops. It feels good to be courted—professionally, not just sexually.

I set down my glass.

“If I was going to build an empire, it would be for me, not you.”

“No one builds an empire alone,” Adrik says. “Not even you or me.”

I’m not exactly a team player—I barely get along with my own family.

They think they know my strengths and weaknesses better than I do. They think I need their caution and their advice.

I don’t.

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