Page 81 of British Bratva: A Russian Mafia Romance

Maxim tucked a strand of my hair behind my ear as he looked down at me. We were across the street from the bank, waiting for the hands on my clock to tick around. The building was all pale stone and architectural detailing around the windows and doors that nodded, discreetly, towards how skilled the stonemasons must have been, and how costly the building had been to erect when it had gone up over a hundred and fifty years before. The bank’s modern sign was one of the only nods towards a more modern financial era. It was nothing like the marbe, glass and steel that was steadily encroaching on all of London’s financial district, the square mile of The City. Only the most conservative institutions kept more than the facades of the old buildings back home.

I wouldn’t know what I was walking into until I got a sense of how traditional they were. Max seemed less distracted by the architecture, set on giving me the final pep talk.

“You’ll be fine. Better than fine, you’ll be perfect. You sit down and tell him exactly how it is. Tell him he’s fucked off the KGB. No one ever knows who the fuck the FSB are. Ask if he really wants Russian enemies. Tell him you have friends who would make whatever the Swiss authorities would do to him for selling information sound like a holiday.”

I pressed one finger to Maxim’s lips, stopping him from talking. “Max. I’ve got this. I need to do it my way.”

At exactly four o’clock I walked in through the tall wooden door of the bank, into a marble-clad reception area. A staircase sweeping down from the floor above had brass stair rods holding down the carpet on each tread and it felt like walking into a period drama rather than visiting a bank. I was half expecting a butler to waltz in holding a silver tray and ask to take my calling card.

Then I saw the CCTV camera mounted in the corner, and the computer screen tucked neatly behind the traditional wood reception desk and the security gate that was positioned for you to walk through before you had any further access, and I felt more at ease. This was all sheen, all veneer. Beneath the surface, this was just another bank.

My heels clicked on the shiny hard floor tiles and I kept my head held high, a vaguely bored smile on my face as I walked up to the desk. Even if no one was out to get me here, I was glad for the large sunglasses Maxim had talked me into getting. Back in London, my face had been all over the news following our escapade getting the data stick off Sandra, and I didn’t know how international the reports had gone.

I was offered coffee and shown straight through to a private meeting room, where I set my folder down on the table, and sat down to wait, one leg crossed over the other at the knee.

Jean Alaman was older than I had thought he might be. Definitively middle aged, with something of a paunch, and his receding hairline reminded me distinctly of Sutherland. His suit was far more expensive than he made it look and he had a weary, worn-down kind of look that made me think of my science teacher while he’d been going through his divorce.

It made sense that Sutherland had managed to get the man to talk to him. No doubt they were of the same school of thinking, that the world owed them some grand favor and it was high time they got what was coming to him.

This was not the kind of man who would put his findings up for all to see on the internet. At least, not by my reckoning. And I wasn’t convinced he was the kind of man who was going to take kindly to being on the Bratva payroll either.

“Ms Toropova,” Alaman greeted, and I stood up, reaching out to shake his hand primly. His grip was far too limp, and the slight clamminess of his hand made my skin crawl. “I understand you arranged to speak to me in particular.”

I smiled, resisting the urge to wipe my hand on my skirt. “That’s right Mr Alaman.”

The man looked a little confused, a little nervy. “May I ask why?”

Perhaps my surname carried more weight than I’d perceived it would. I hadn’t thought about it before I walked in here, but to him I was Russian and for the first time, I felt like I could be too.

“I think you know. I believe we have an acquaintance in common. Mr Pierce Sutherland.”

Alaman visibly blanched. All the color drained from his face and he stepped back as though I’d physically shocked him.

“I don’t know that name.”

I tilted my head, feeling a surging thrill go through me as I realised that he knew exactly where the power lay in the room, and it wasn’t with him. For the first time in such a long time, I was the one a hundred percent in control rather than doing my best, rolling with the punches, reacting to whatever came my way, and it felt amazing.

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