Page 42 of Beautiful Rush
He flashed me a smile, some of his humor restored. “Are you offering to be my chauffeur, Kosta?”
“Fuck no. Buy yourself a Prius.”
“A Prius.” Dmitri snorted with disgust. “Not in this lifetime.”
He focused his gaze on the river. A ferry passed, churning up the water and three passengers on the upper deck, elderly women wearing visors and sunglasses with cameras slung around their necks, waved their arms at us.
Dmitri gave them a big wave and a cheesy politician’s grin that made me laugh. This guy. He thought he was a celebrity.
“One more big job and I’m getting out,” he said.
I raised my brows. Pay dirt. This was what we’d been waiting for, expecting for months, although I had no idea he was planning to get out. I didn’t give his words much credence though. Criminals talked about getting out all the time, but it was usually just talk. It was hard to walk away from a criminal lifestyle.
“I’m gonna buy that house in the Hamptons. Maybe a boat. Build my harem. Live the good life.”
Hate to break it to you, buddy, but that ain’t happening.
“Sounds like I need to find myself a new employer.”
“Not just yet.”
“So, what’s your plan?”
“You’ll find out when I’m ready to share. In the meantime, I have a job for you. I need you to move some product tonight.”
I nodded, a loyal soldier ready to be of service. “Whatever you need, you can count on me.”
“Can I?”
“Have I ever given you a reason to doubt me?”
He took off his sunglasses, his ice blue eyes holding my gaze. I didn’t falter. Not for an instant. My face betrayed zero emotion. My eyes didn’t dart to the left or right. In my years of law enforcement, I’d encountered all types of suspects. The ones who caved immediately, running their mouths and spilling their secrets. The ones who acted tough, all bravado, only to crack like a nut a few minutes into the interrogation. The ones who remained silent, wiping the sweat off their brows, and refusing to talk without a lawyer present.
I could usually tell when a person was lying or had something to hide. Most people had tell-signs. They fidgeted or shifted their eyes or bobbed their leg up and down. But there were some who could lie to your face without breaking a sweat. Without doing or saying anything that would give them away.
The best liars make the best criminals. You stick to the truth as closely as possible and commit every detail of your story to memory, so you don’t trip yourself up. You say what you need to, no more and no less, and then you shut your mouth and you wait for the other person to accept your lie as truth. Which was what happened two seconds later.
Dmitri clapped his hand on my shoulder. “Take Sergei with you tonight. Just because he’s my cousin doesn’t mean I have to put up with his shit. If he doesn’t get his head screwed on straight, he’s out. Use your diplomatic skills and talk some sense into him.”
With that, he turned on his heel and strode away with Leon by his side. I roughed my hand through my sweaty hair. Fucking Sergei. He was a weak link and a liability. He rode on Dmitri’s coattails and bitched and moaned about it all the time. Sergei wanted to get rich quick and resented Dmitri for being the ringleader and taking the lion’s share of the profits. The only reason Dmitri kept him around was because he felt a sense of family duty. Sergei had been given a hell of a lot more chances to get it right than the other guys in the crew. Dmitri flooded my city with drugs and arms and treated women worse than second class citizens, but he had a sliver of decency in him. He was good to his family and to the small circle of people he trusted.
This world wasn’t black and white. The good guys weren’t always good, and the bad guys weren’t always bad.
Which reminded me that I needed to see Keira before tonight’s job. I had a feeling that despite knowing her father would go to prison, the news would have still come as a shock. Despite what that bastard had done, I knew that a part of Keira still loved him, and I also knew that her own guilt weighed heavy on her.
* * *
Keira promisedto meet me after work. Allegedly, she wanted empanadas from a place in Bushwick that Ava and Connor frequented so here I was in the parking lot. I sat in my SUV for twenty minutes and with each passing minute, my suspicions were confirmed. She wasn’t coming. I called her again. It went straight to voicemail. My text messages went unanswered.
On my way to pick up Sergei, I swung by her apartment building and checked the parking garage. I knew her car wouldn’t be there. It wasn’t.
Fuck.
14
Keira
Ineeded to pee.Badly. I eyed the McDonald’s. A strip of scrubby grass and ahighcurb separated it from the parking lot behind the mallwhere I was parked. All the storeswere alreadyclosed for the night, soMcDonald’s was my best bet. It wasquicker to walk there thandrive around themall to theexitand then get on the road to turn into McDonald’s.I was overthinking this.Iscanned the parking lot.Tylerwas sitting onthetrunkof hisCamaro,talking totwo guys, one of which wasthesmall, wiryguy who had bet on me in June.Heknew Deacon asKosta,buthehadn’t spoken to me tonight or even acknowledgedme. I didn’t think he suspected that Deacon and I knew each other. Chances were good that he wouldn’t rat me out to Deacon or mention that he saw me here. He had no reason to do that. Tyler hadn’t hassled me at all tonight.I’d been keeping to myself, plugged into my music, waiting for my turn to race.
