Page 146 of For a Price

“I’m not going anywhere with you! Go ahead and press the button. Call your backup. I’ll blast you right now. You’ll be dead before they get here.”

“No wonder he likes you. I see it now. Come.”

My arms dip slightly, no longer holding the Glock so high. Uncertainty flits across my face the same way it twinges my insides.

He’s… serious? He expects me to go with him?

When I take too long responding to his request, he makes an impatient, throaty sound and shakes his head.

“You want to kill him, da? You want to help Zver? Come with me. We will do it.”

“But you and the pakhan?—”

“It is not as you think,” he interrupts. “Come or you will lose. And so will Zver.”

I’ve spent my whole life on the streets being on guard about who I can and can’t trust. Most people usually fell into the latter category. They couldn’t be trusted even for a second, always looking to take, take, take.

A select few people like Rosita and JC (back when I thought he was my friend) were worth trusting.

I never thought there would come a moment where Roman’s father would be one of those people. Seconds go by and I’m peering at the same sapphire-blue eyes that belong to his son, realizing that he’s telling the truth.

This isn’t an attempt to hurt me. This isn’t some scam he’s pulling.

He really intends on helping in some way.

I holster my Glock, the expression on my face hardening. “If you try something, anything, I willshankyou.”

He smirks. “Typically, when you are going to stab someone, you do not give them forewarning. You just do it.”

I step onto the elevator, resisting the urge to indulge in any banter or pleasant talk. This man has never loved his son the way he should’ve. He’s never been a real father to Roman, and up until a few minutes ago, seemed to be backing the man trying to destroy his son.

I may be trusting him in this moment, but there are no warm feelings between us, and there never will be.

The elevator doors close and we ride in silence up two more floors. When we arrive and the doors glide apart again, he gestures for me to go first. I remain where I am, my left brow arched. He takes the hint and steps out in front of me.

“You have had it wrong all this time,” he wheezes. “Both of you. You have believed that I am in an alliance with the pakhan. But that is not true. It has never been true.”

“You backed Leonid. You sided with him against Roman.”

“Leonid was my brother. Roman is my son. I wanted for them to set their differences aside?—”

“When Roman came to you, you refused to tell him what you knew.”

“And what do you know, devochka?” he asks. “Some girl like you who was never meant to be here. You know nothing.”

“I know the man who calls himself Roman’s father should’ve done more to help his son!”

He holds out his arm to stop me midway down the hall. He’s pausing long enough to listen. The Midnight Society festivities are going on downstairs on the second floor, some of the sounds making their way up to the third.

When no other noises stand out to him and he deems it safe to proceed, he hobbles forward on his cane. I’m half a pace behind him, my insides twisted into too many knots to count.

“I do not owe you explanations for how I have treated my son,” he says plainly. “You will never understand our world or the family. Insolence is not rewarded. Neither are sons coddled or treated as fragile. But rest assured, if I truly wanted to damage my son, I would have. The divide in our family is very much real. The pakhan seeks to make it that way.”

“He’s been pushing for it,” I mutter. “He intentionally created division?”

“I am old. My time is over. But my son? Vladimir knew that was a different story.”

We’ve reached the end of the hall, where he produces a key and uses it to unlock a door. We enter what’s some kind of parlor with cushiony chairs and a minibar.

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