Page 30 of The Mistake

Once the car was back in traffic, I made my way back into the casino, and this time, I went straight toward the elevator, which would take me up to the main office. I didn’t have any other business to conduct, so I needed to get to my desk. The moment I did, I sat down, and Vlad knocked on my door. I called for him to enter.

“Everything is taken care of?”

“The women are currently being processed and will be returned totheir homes. I also made sure to include some compensation for their troubles.”

I leaned backin my chair. “And their … health?”

“Most of them were scared. They’d been drugged but it didn’t look like they’d been beaten or hurt. A rather sloppy and amateur setup.”

“Like it was last minute?” I asked.

“Exactly.”

I frowned.

“What are you thinking?”

“I’m wondering if our good friends Hank and Benjamin are being controlled by someone else, someone bigger?”

“How is that possible? They’re two nobodies.”

“Risingthe ranks of power, and easy puppets to use as no one would suspect.”

Vlad frowned as I stared at him. It would make sense as to why they were stepping up theiroperations, but also how they’d been able to set up such a sloppy trafficking gig.

Professionals had men in place. They had private places not easy to locate. They moved quickly, swiftly. Drugging girls took a lot of time, a lot of movement, as they were unable to move quickly. There was a lot happening now, and I didn’t want to take anything for granted.

“I can look into it,” Vlad said.

Benjamin and Hank were two rival city drug pins.They were low level, sneaky, but stupid at the same time. I’d dealt with them a couple of times over the years, and they’d been easy to squash.

Tapping my fingerson the desk, I thought about how hard it was to go from drug running, to creating a new drug that inhibited women, and then stealing them away. It wasn’t as simple as it sounded. Shit like that was easy to detect.

“I want you to get the information on the clubs where these women were last known to be.”

“In one of our clubs.”

“We have more than one, Vlad. If Hank or Benjamin had stepped foot into one of our nightclubs, I’d have been alerted to it.”

“Do you think they’ve got someone else?” Vlad asked.

“Theyeither have someone else working for them, or they paid off one of my men to keep quiet. Either way, I need answers, so I can deal with each part accordingly.”

If my men could be easily bought off, then they had to go. I didn’t accept disloyalty. I wouldn’t even tolerate a bad word said about Ivan. If I ever heard of discord with the Volkov Bratva, I took care of it personally.

“I’m on it.”

I didn’t stop Vlad as he left my office.

Sitting back, I brought up the security screens of my casino, and checkedto make sure everything was running smoothly. In the last twenty-four hours, I’d attacked Hank and Benjamin’s places and burned them to the ground, as well as removed their potential business avenue with the girls. There would be retaliation, I just had to wait for it to happen.

The text came through seconds later to say Charlotte was at the penthouse suiteand Hubert would be taking care of her. The reminder of my wife brought with it a question of why she’d been fucking crying. I don’t even know why I cared so much. Women cried. It was part of their DNA.

Putting my cell phone down, I thought over this morning. I’d taken her shopping, dealtwith the rudeness directed at her. Swiftly nipping it in the bud, because it was unacceptable. I didn’t like any of this.

Something didn’t feel right. I understood the cheekiness of Hank and Benjamin. They wereamateurs, but even they knew their limitations, which once again told me someone else was pulling the strings, but who? Why? Where? I didn’t like not having answers to my questions. I needed to find them and soon.

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