Page 53 of Vasily the Hammer

Benedetti actually hops back and nearly loses her balance, her fancy heels snagging on the carpet. She catches herself, though, and quits talking.

“What part did you play in all this?” I ask.

“I didn’t,” she blurts out immediately. Too quickly, perhaps. “You know as well as I do. You too,” she says with a nod to Kostya, “that I only called you because Angie was being such an idiot. If you don’t believe me that I’m not particularly loyal to those assholes even though they did everything they could to ruin my life growing up, at least believe that theonlyinvolvement I have with them is in the 3D printing, same as you. And they know I’m here as much as I am there, so they’re not going to tell me that they’re kidnapping Bratva. Or returning Bratva? I don’t get it.”

I drum my fingers on that armrest as Kostya and I exchange a look. She was already on my hit list before she showed up here, she was just far enough down that list that she wouldn’t have been on my mind until I saw her again. My thoughts have been so discombobulated since Ana left— I might have eaten a stupid amount of a stupid combination of pills over the course of the last twenty-four hours, but I’m not seeing colors, so I’m reasonablysure I’m still sane— that I haven’t considered Benedetti’s involvement in this.

I might actually be able to use her if she answers my questions properly.

“What do you mean, Bratva?”

She gives me another confused look, but this one is definitely pissy in the same way she was just talking about her family. “What doyoumean, what do you mean? Vasily, do you—do you think I don’t know you’re Bratva? What the fuck?” she huffs.

She says it like she has no idea why I just laid waste to my office, like something silly happened and not something that’s going to leave a trail of bodies in its wake. Like my tantrum is over getting tricked by Tony.

Tony’s a jackass. Tony’s perpetually engineering stupid, conniving bullshit. If I got this worked up every time Tony attempted to pull some shit on me, I wouldn’t be thepakhan.

“No, you said my boy is Bratva. Why would you think that?”

Benedetti anchors her fists at her waist, showing off her figure and her power suit, making it clear she’s over shit and ready to take control so she can move on with her day. Sometimes, I think she does it because she hates men, but then I realize that we do a fair bit of dumb shit and need women to keep us in our place.

Ana was good at that.

As much as what happened to Ana’s memory gave me the in I needed and can hopefully still get the upper hand on, I miss the way she tested the waters in Flagstaff, getting braver every time until she confidently and accurately called me out on my shit.

“Vasily. Love. I don’t know if you think I’m running some dog and pony show and have only survived in the black market as long as I have because of my luck and a great set of tits, but I promiseyou, I know way more about you and the Bratva and your old brigade and Flagstaff than you apparently think I do.”

“Oh? What do you know about mine and Tony’s past, then?”

Her eyes widen. Her shoulders sink, almost imperceptibly under the build of her power suit, but I catch the softening. “Why do you think I told you to stay away from Lacey Lombardo?”

I stand up and stalk toward her, padding my time as I contemplate that answer, using that time to study her. As far as lying goes, Benedetti is good at it, but we all have our tells. She has a finger that twitches, so she typically puts her thumb over it or crosses her fingers to hide it. Right now, she has those fists dug into her sides.

But she’s also a jaw clencher, and as I approach her, I see no tension in her jaw. In fact, once I get close enough that she has to tilt her head up, her lips part slightly. “What do you know about me and Analiese Lombardo?”

She shakes her head. She can’t hide the sympathy any more than she can hide her jaw. I wonder if I’m just as obvious as she is.

“I know you used to have seven piercings in your dick, Vasily. And I know you’ve never spit on me, which is weird because that seems like it’s your thing.”

“It wasourthing.” No sense in hiding that card now. We’re way past that. “Where is she? Where is Ana right now, Maria?”

She sucks in a breath. She introduced herself to me as Maria Benedetti, of course, but I’ve never called her by her given name. It’s important to me that I don’t forget who she really is.

I see her shiver. There’s actual fear in her answer when she says, “I can’t tell you that.”

It’s not fear of getting caught lying.

It’s fear of what I might do for refusing to answer the question.

It’s fear over what will happen if I force her to answer my question.

I don’t think she knows what’s happened.

But I think she knows alot.

“Maria, what’s my boy’s name? The one Tony has, that Gino was supposed to sneak back to me?”

Her eyebrows furrow. Her head cocks to the side. “Oh, umm, it’s Alex, right? Alexander Kuz—ohhh.”She completely deflates. She actually folds as though to sit, but there’s no chair beneath her. Kostya, ever the observant one, the one who knows everything, remembers everything, catches everything, manages to slide a coffee table under her in time. Not exactly a chair, but it gets the job done.

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