Page 57 of Cinder
Hammer is a foreboding presence. Wide as he is tall. His hair long, his beard longer.
“You boys have got perfect timing,” Hammer says, as we pass through the bar inside the clubhouse. “We’ve got a patch-over party tonight. A small club from the Keys are patching over. You boys should stick around. Taste some local cuisine.”
“You don’t need to ask me twice,” Axe says, already making eyes at one of the club girls hanging around the old jukebox.
Only Beast and I follow Hammer into his office. The others are here for backup. Not to take part in any conversations.
Not that they mind. They’d rather drink a cold beer after a long ride in the Florida heat.
“Thanks for meeting with us,” Beast says as we take a seat.
“You know how much I like a visit from our comrades from up north,” Hammer says, sitting behind his desk. Behind him on the wall is a massive black and red Devil’s Rattlers emblem, a coiled rattlesnake wrapped around a piston.
“Like I said on the phone, your information about the warehouse panned out,” Beast says. “But it ended up being an ambush. Someone knew we were coming.”
Hammer leans back in his chair. “I was sorry to hear the Knights ran into trouble from a tip-off I gave them.”
“Wanna bring me up to speed on how you knew about the warehouse?” I ask.
“An ATF agent I owe a favor to warned me of a shipment of contraband passing into Florida. Told me to steer clear. To let it pass. Said it was coming from a warehouse in Knights territory. Said the owners aren’t the kind to ask twice.”
“Did the agent say who the owners were?” Beast asks.
“I get a feeling it’s Bratva.”
“Why?”
“When I asked about it, he warned me not to piss off this Russian asshole.”
Bratva.
Fuck.
It means one thing.
“Oli-fucking-checkoff,” I mutter with disgust.
I sit back in my chair.
Viktor Olicheckoff.
Bratva pakhan.
Underworld kingpin.
Ruthless businessman.
And one giant asshole.
He has fingers in every underworld honeypot. Gun running. Drugs. Women. He’s a racketeering fuck who tried to align himself with the Knights in the past. But Beast told him to go fuck himself. We don’t need to be associated with anunpredictable asshole like him. He stands for all the things we don’t.
Beast opens his phone. “Bram, get me a location for Viktor Olicheckoff. Yeah, the Bratva asshole.”
When he hangs up, Beast and I share a look.
If the Olicheckoff Bratva are behind this, then we need to act fast.
“It was a matter of courtesy to let you know,” Hammer says. “I figured if the Olicheckoff were running contraband out of the counties surrounding St. Boniface, the Knights would want to know.”
