An older brother was supposed to be a protector. He was supposed to shield his younger siblings from the world’s evil. He wasn’t supposed to be the one to put them in danger.
I must have been the unlucky one.
William “Billy” Scott was three years older than my twenty-seven years. He was the reason I was in Brooklyn, parking my van a street away from a building. A building that housed the bratva’s many illegal gambling operations.
I made good money as a mob cleaner, but not when my clients were the Russians.
Billy liked to brag in underworld circles that he was a friend of the New York bratva. He couldn’t brag to me because he frequently went into debt with them, and it was I who bailed him out. And how did I bail him out? By working for the Russians for free.
Last year, I had a windfall cleaning for the Italians, and that was why I could resume nursing school, which I had to put on hold several times. Since our deadbeat dad left us, Billy had been to rehab twice. I paid for his stays both times.
Every time I was catching up financially, the Russians came calling because Billy had fucked up again.
Like tonight.
Saying no wasn’t an option because my brother was the whipping boy of Grigori Petrov—one of the brigadiers who made up the bratva’s Triumvirate leadership under their pakhan. From what I gathered, he was the most ruthless and usually did the dirty work for their organization to give the other two plausible deniability.
I’d become so pissed that Grigori was the one contacting me directly now instead of going through Billy. I couldn’t say no without repercussions to my brother. The last time I balked, Billy came home barely breathing.
In the van, I changed into coveralls and made sure I patted concealer on my lips to make it blend with the rest of my face. The problem when you were pretty and poor was that men like Grigori thought you were good for only one thing. He’d already asked me once if I could be a server in one of his clubs, but I knew if I said yes, it wouldn’t stop at simply waiting tables. I turned him down with no backlash to Billy, but I sensed the clock ticking and my luck was about to run out.
I discussed leaving New York with Billy, but my brother was doubtful that Grigori wouldn’t find and kill us. I’d debated asking for help from the Rossi crime family, but I didn’t want them ending up owing Grigori favors.
I just wanted to graduate from nursing school, dammit.
After I’d put on my work face and uniform, I slid back into the driver’s seat and headed to the building.
A soldier waved me through the cargo bay. I preferred it when a job didn’t have a cargo bay like this. When I could park a street away, hauling my cleaning supplies in a cart, looking like a bag lady pushing her belongings down the street. I didn’t care if it was more work. Because each time they shut the gate behind me, a claustrophobic itch crawled over my skin. But I didn’t have a choice here. The Russians always wanted me to park inside their building.
Anton appeared at the driver’s side. His hair was shaved close to his skull and his brawny tattooed arms strained against his muscle tee. As if I wasn’t on guard enough. Because of his six-six frame, he had to duck his head a bit. “What took you so long?”
“Traffic.” I returned his glare.
His scowl deepened before saying, “Hurry up.” Anton was Grigori’s top soldier who led the rest of his crew.
The desire to shove open the van door and hit this fucker’s face was overwhelming, but self-preservation won out. The first time I had to work for free, I could barely contain my rage, and Billy took the brunt for my fury of words. Anton delivered that beating, and it set the tone for our mutual contempt.
I exited the van and headed to its rear, unfolded the utility cart, and loaded it up with what I needed.
Anton waited for me at the crisscross elevators, his mouth in a flat line. It was an awkward and painstaking ride to the top floor—the high-stakes floor. According to Billy, it wasn’t unusual for oligarchs, businessmen, and kleptocrats to bet their properties or even companies.
When the elevators jarred open, the floor was relatively empty, save for a few people.
“Sis.” Billy met me at the door. My brother was more pretty than handsome. He had an oval face with high cheekbones. Unlike my red hair, his was black. His eyes were more hazel than my green ones.
I glared at him. “What did you do this time?”
He had the gall to grin. “Explain later.” Which meant never. My brother ran errands for the bratva. He usually did their collections and also managed a few of their poker games. It baffled me because Billy had a gambling problem, yet Grigori gave him those jobs. Although I wondered if they were toying with us because I always ended up paying for Billy’s debts and it was a way to keep me on the hook.
“Gotta go.” He waved at a distinguished gentleman sitting at one table shuffling cards. To his right sat another more sinister character I knew was the enforcer of the bratva.
Both men observed my approach with soulless eyes.
The first man who appeared to be playing solitaire was Grigori Petrov, a man in his fifties with salt-and-pepper hair. He had pale blue eyes and ashen-hued skin. The combination almost looked unnatural. Sickly. He was wearing a tailored gray suit and a white dress shirt with an open collar. Gold chains hung around his neck. He epitomized the Russian brigadier. I had not met the bratva’s pakhan yet, nor the other brigadiers.
The dangerous man beside him was his cousin, Nikolai Petrov: “Kolya the killer.” Jet-black hair, angular features. I could see the blue of his irises from where I stood, ten feet away. It didn’t bode well that he was here. That meant someone was dead, and he had to take care of the mess.
See, I never did body disposal. Although I knew the mechanics on how to do it, I didn’t have the stomach to dismember a human being and dispose of their remains expediently. When Grigori asked me one time if that was a service I provided, I unequivocally said no and I didn’t care if he shot Billy or me right then and there. I would never open that door. When would it end? I definitely didn’t want to end up like Kolya, who looked like the grim reaper with the way he was garbed in all black.
“You know, I could get rid of him for you,” Grigori said, a smirk forming at the corner of his mouth.
“What?”
“Your worthless brother,” he replied.
If he was worthless, why keep him? But I knew the answer to that. My stomach turned.
“What do I clean?” I asked.
“Changing the subject?” Grigori’s amused tone held a hint of a Russian accent.
“There’s no subject to change. I came here to sanitize the scene.” With each of Billy’s succeeding screw-ups, I wondered if they were hoping I had reached my breaking point and I’d say yes to having my brother whacked. But that would mean I would forever owe them. Well, fuck that.
I nodded to the spray of blood in the room. “Looks like someone was a sore loser.”
Grigori gave a low chuckle and stood, walking over to meet me. “See, I like you, Sloane. You’re smart.” He reached out a hand and pulled a red curl from under my hat. “You keep hiding your looks under drab clothes, but we could make you real money with the bonus of getting rid of Billy.”
His eyes roamed over my body, setting off a sensation of marching ants over my skin. Was he bluffing? I never doubted he knew I was downplaying my looks. But I’d been hoping every time I did a job, I’d become more like background clutter to him. I didn’t know how long my value as a cleaner would outweigh my value to his nefarious plans for me. Billy had mentioned before how hard it was to find a natural redhead for one of Grigori’s favorite clients and repeatedly told me to lie low. At least my brother wasn’t thinking of pimping me out.
I was not a virgin. Hopefully, I was way above the ideal age requirement of their sex-trafficking business. Another rumor was the sex parties they organized in Europe.
I believed my defiance was what was fueling his interest in me, so I frequently reined in my feistiness. I lowered my eyes and stared at his shoes. “Please don’t hurt Billy.” The less I said, the better. My husky voice was another inconvenience in this job. I’d been propositioned more than once to work the sex hotlines. That was another reason I didn’t do small talk when I was on the job with these guys.
“You deserve a better life.” Grigori sighed. “Go on, then. Clean this shit up.”
He and Kolya left me under the watchful eye of Anton. Depending on the job, I had to surrender the rags and vacuum bag to my minder for burning later. They didn’t want any traceable DNA like hair follicles or particles of flesh and skin. My own special mix of cleaning agent was used to lift the stains left by blood. Its effectivity was thorough enough not to be revived by luminol. Most crime families had their own cleaners for mass casualty incidents where I didn’t go in to do the initial cleanup. I was the in-between. For smaller jobs like this with only one or two bodies, I did both initial and main cleanup. Kolya, I was sure, was going to double-check my work later.
I worked briskly and efficiently. I wasn’t an expert in blood spatter forensics, but I could tell this might have involved one or two people. Three at the most. The penthouse had wooden floors, and a carpet was already rolled up in one corner with a map of blood that could only have come from arterial bleeding. The wall near the table, which I figured was ground zero, had a blood spatter that might have come from a knife swipe.
It took me three hours to comb through the area and I had to use a UV light to make sure.
“Smells like bleach,” Anton muttered when I turned over the trash bags for him to dispose of. It was a cocktail of sodium peroxide and other chemicals but I never elaborated.
“Remind Kolya to open the windows,” I said.
“Tell him yourself.”
My throat closed up, and it wasn’t from the cleaning chemicals I inhaled but knowing I had to face the bratva’s enforcer who had returned with Grigori.
They weren’t looking at me but at the room.
I resisted the urge to fidget. The crawling-ants sensation returned and I silently cursed Billy for getting me into his fuckups. I was going to have a serious talk with him this weekend.
Grigori didn’t seem concerned with my work and deferred to Kolya for final inspection. What took three minutes felt like ten, but Kolya muttered his findings in Russian to Grigori, who fixed his stare on me.
The corners of his mouth twitched. The asshole knew how uncomfortable I was, especially after he propositioned me earlier.
“Everything is satisfactory, I hope?” I asked, anxious to get this over with.
“Yes. You may go.”
I gave them a brief nod and pushed my cart into the awaiting elevators. The pounding of my heart escalated and I realized I might be having a delayed panic attack. It always happened whenever I encountered Grigori. My reaction to the Russians differed immensely from the Italians. They seemed more brutal. Cold. I wondered if it was because of their harsh Gulag origins.
Shaking off the piercing dead stares of Grigori and Kolya, I packed my cart into the van, not bothering to disassemble it. I didn’t want to spend another second on this property. Someone else lifted the garage gates, and I did my best not to screech out of the parking space.
The utility cart banged around in the back of the van, adding to my aggravation. I gripped the steering wheel until my knuckles turned white in an attempt to control the tremors shaking my body. Even when I was two blocks away from their building, I felt like I was still trapped in there. I needed fresh air and calm nerves before I ended up in a wreck.
I parked the van in front of a three-story building that had a butcher shop and coffee shop fronting the avenue. Streetlights illuminated the pavement. A drunk was singing near a twenty-four-hour bodega. I cut the engine and got out. I rounded to the side facing the sidewalk, slid the side door open, and climbed back into the van to unload the cleaning supplies from the cart and rerack the now bagless vacuum on the side rails. OCD had a lot of sway in my urge to get things back in order rather than quickly getting home. At least I could control that part of my life.
Remembering my empty fridge waiting for me in the apartment, I decided to grab food at the bodega.
When I jumped out of the van, a figure cast a long shadow over me.
My fight-or-flight was still engaged. I gripped the metal pipe that I always kept by the side door and swung, striking a man too close for comfort.
He fell back and growled, “Fuck!”
I blinked my eyes to make sure I wasn’t imagining him.
No. Those dark eyes only belonged to one person.
“Dom?”
