Page 7 of Reclaimed Crown

“This way,” Kalash says as he turns and walks down a stairwell, allowing me to follow when I’m ready instead of pushing me along.

It seems I’m a kind of half-prisoner here, at least for now. Monitored so I don’t disappear, but not watched too closely since the Bratva and I have a shared interest in revealing the truth. And I imagine Kalash is wise enough to hedge his bets, following Vadim’s orders, but not being an asshole about it because if my claim turns out to be true, he may have just assaulted his new boss.

We reach a door where I’m sure the Bratva are gathered since I can hear music and shouted conversation.

“When you meet Vadim, make sure you smile, yan-KEEEE,” Kalash taunts. He opens the door and I pass inside.

The men are huddled together in the center of a large room, forming a disorganized arc, all with their shirts off. A wall of muscled backs and tattoos faces me, advertising the illicit deeds each man has committed to earn their keep within the Bratva for those who know how to read them. The shirts of all the men lay in a pile on a table behind them. Jokes and laughs are being shouted throughout the room, and from what I can tell, someone is standing in the center of the group of men.

I find the man with the tattooed scalp, staring daggers into me. Kalash picks up on it immediately as well.

“I don’t think Bodhan appreciated you fucking his girl,” he says, as if that wasn’t painfully obvious.

“If she was his girl, she would have fucked him,” I say matter-of-factly.

A flash of jealousy gnaws at me in a way I’ve never felt, and there’s a rise of emotion screaming through me: Tatyana is mine. She’s always been mine.

Kalash chuckles. “You seem determined to leave Russia in a body bag. I respect that.” He breaks away from my side, shouting, “Let’s get this started already!” He tears off his shirt, exposing a back just as tattooed as the rest of the men in the circle, and tosses his shirt in the pile with the rest. A splash of vodka spills from a bottle Kalash swipes from a table he passes on the way to meet the rest of the men.

The group cheers in agreement, and the circle widens a bit to let Kalash join. I hang back and watch whatever it is they’re doing.

The man in the middle isn’t so much a man as a kid who looks to be in his late teenage years. He has the mix of a teenage youth and the wisdom of someone too young to see what he’s seen. An innocent face mixed with a cold, brave stare. He’s gathered quite a few tattoos himself and they form a constellation snaking up his corded arms. His descent into the criminal world has already begun the way I’ve seen with so many other boys verging on adulthood. I wasn’t immune to the draw of the life of crime and money at that age either.

Vadim steps into the circle, noting my presence. He faces me, and the other men notice I’ve come as well. Short of extreme denial, there is no doubt he’s my brother. Our father’s features are woven into our DNA, plain for anyone to see. We both have the same blond hair, angled jaw, the same nose and eye shape. Apart from subtle differences I feel like I’m staring into a mirror.

Judging from the looks of the other men present, they see the resemblance.

Without a word, Vadim turns away from me and faces the kid standing in the center of the group.

“Dima,” he voices solemnly, “Today you join our brotherhood.”

The young kid, Dima bolts up in pride at those words, flexing his chest and tensing his jaw.

Vadim continues his speech, shaking his head with a smile. “As hard as I tried to talk you out of becoming one of the Bratva, you’ve proven to me it’s your destiny to be one of us. I told you to go to school, and you listened. Got top marks in your classes and earned your way into elite schools, all by using this,” he says as he points to the top of Dima’s head.

“You’ve lost so much in your life, and I tried to be as much of a brother to you as I could.”

Dima sniffs back his emotions at that statement.

“You never forgot or betrayed your true nature. You’ve earned your place in our brotherhood with your loyalty. Now you’ll earn it with your blood.”

That last line sticks with me. It’s not the first time I’ve heard it.

Dima’s chest heaves at the close of Vadim’s speech. He lets out a nervous laugh as he readies himself. A moment later, Vadim leans in and punches Dima, splitting his lower lip. Vadim gives Dima a moment to recover. The burgeoning criminal touches the bottom of his lip and examines it, finding a spot of blood. Vadim hooks his arm and lands another shot to Dima’s ripped abs. He’s strong, but so is Vadim and he landed a solid shot.

Dima lurches over, holding his abdomen. “Blyad!” he spits out of his bleeding mouth.

Vadim helps him up, bracing Dima’s head against his while they lock arms in a sort of embrace, part to give him time to steady himself, part to share a moment together.

“The first blows hurt the hardest, brother. The rest isn’t so bad,” Vadim says in a low voice to Dima. Dima nods his head, laughing at what he knows is to follow.

Vadim leaves the circle, heading to the table and throwing his shirt back on. The group tightens around Dima as a clean-cut man walks up and occupies the position Vadim just vacated. From the looks of it, he’s one of the white-collar criminals in the ranks, but the tattoos scattered all over his body tell me he worked his way into his position with blood. He knocks his fist into Dima’s jaw, sending the boy reeling to the side. Nodding in satisfaction with his work, the white-collar criminal returns to the shirts piled on the table and picks his out. It’s a neatly folded suit shirt lying beside the pile of rumpled t-shirts. He checks himself, likely for spots of blood that may have gotten on his clothes, before buttoning his shirt back up and heading to the poker table.

Kalash lines up for his part in Dima’s initiation. “I’ll try not to kill you, boy,” he growls at Dima.

“Likewise,” Dima returns with a smart grin.

Kalash roars in laughter, approaches Dima, and gives him two shots in the ribs. Dima heaves and gasps, but after a moment he gets back up and readies himself for the other men. He reminds me of the young kid who joined my organization in America, Miki. He was just as brave, but in the end it didn’t save his life when we were attacked.

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