Chapter 2

• Marek
• “Chto?” [What?] I growled into the line.
• “Sorry, boss, but we didn’t know quite what to do.”
• I let out a drag. “I don’t need your apologies, Laslo. You can't handle such tiny thing?”
• “Yes, boss. Sorry, boss.” I had to force myself not to roll my eyes. “We ran into a situation tonight. There was someone on our territory. Specifically near the strip club on the West side. We put them in the cellars but before they passed out, they were requesting…help.”
• My eyes narrowed. “They specifically asked help from our guys? Or they were asking help from anyone on the street?”
• He was silent for a moment. “They knew our boys, boss. They didn’t ask anyone else. Specifically, after they asked for help…” Laslo took a moment to finish his sentence. “…they asked to be killed.”
• My eyes widened and my hand dropped a bit, the cigarette forgotten between my fingers. “Asked to be killed? How the fuck did they know to come to you?”
• He hummed over the line. “I don’t know. But…the reason why we even took them was because the very last word before they passed out was Morozov.”
• I stood up from my lean. Morozov was my mothers maiden name. Someone definitely had to know about our family if they knew her maiden name. My father kept that close at hand and made sure that after he changed her name to Baranov that all record of her before that disappeared. The Baranov Bravta was one of the largest and most feared throughout the mafia territories. We extended our reach all over the world, the biggest territories being here in New York and Moscow.
• “Well, der’mo.” [Well, shit.] I pitched the bridge of my nose for a moment. “I’m two hours outside of the city. I need to finish up here before I head over though. Don’t touch them until I get there.”
• “Yes, boss.”
• I didn’t wait for anything else, I hung up on him. Walking back to the warehouse after I stamped out the cigarette, I eyed Aleksei speaking with Columbia’s second, Paulo. It didn’t look like it's going so well. We were in the middle of an arms deal with the Colombians.
• I glared at my second. Aleksei was a bit of a jokester and more often than not he had a smile on his face no matter the situation. It balanced my perpetual frown that was etched onto my face for years. For once though, he wasn’t smiling.
• Seeing my arrival, Aleksei walked towards me and briefly reported the situation.
• “Why are you telling me this and not contacting my brothers?”
• Aleksei rubbed his palms against his pants. “Juri is in Russia right now, Kazmer is in Florida handling a different deal with the new port opening up, and Lev is arms deep in baby shit since the twins came home. It’s up to you, pakhan [Pakhan/Vor – is the Boss of Russian mafia].”
• My lip curled. Aleksei knew better than to call me that. I was not our Pakhan or Vor as my brother preferred. I was the youngest male in our family. Not to mention the only significant talent I brought to the table was reliability. ‘And loyalty’ echoed in my head that my father drilled into me.
• Being unremarkable in the Bratva [Russian Mafia Organization]was nearly death wish on its own. My two sisters, one younger and one older inherited our mothers looks. They had been married off years ago. Juri was currently our Vor, head of our family, after our father passed. Kazmer was his second, a master at numbers and with a photographic memory, he was an asset all on his own. Lev was the computer genius and hacker extraordinaire. Though, he had swapped out his computer for diapers since his 4th and 5th child were born a week ago.
• "Lead the way, if you don’t want to start a war. You should know, Miguel, your boss’s daughter was already slated to marry Juri’s eldest son. " My hand itched as I grabbed the gun beside me, aimed at Paul’s head, and coldly threatened him.
• One of the guys came up suddenly, whispered into Paulo’s ear, and he replied in quick Spanish. He turned to us and smiled wide.
• Then, he led us to follow him.
• I followed after him, Aleksei at my heels, as I looked through some of the crates that were being unloaded. Everything looked good this time.
• “Well, gentleman. It seems everything is unloaded. Miguel did want you to take a look at one specific crate and see if you were interested in adding a little extra. We procured these and it wasn’t really on the planned manifest.”
• My eyes narrowed. The last time someone said that to me, they opened up a shipping crate full of women they had drugged and trafficked internationally. That was one thing we put our foot down on; human trafficking. We didn’t stop anyone else from doing it, that was a black mark on their souls, but we sure as hell didn’t touch that side of the business. Paulo walked over to a smaller crate that was closer to where they had been unloading the guns. Flipping the lid open, Paulo stepped aside and motioned inside.
• Looking down, I eyed the two rocket launchers that were nestled in the crate among the wood shavings. “How much ammunition?”
• “Twelve. Six for each or however you want to even it out.”
• Nodding, I leaned down to see the side of it. “Numbers?”
• “None. Never had any to begin with.”
• “What does Miguel want for them?”
• Paulo smirked. “Ten thousand for the two of them.”
• I snorted and gave him an eyebrow. “I’ll give you the five thousand Miguel already spoke to me about before getting here. It’s been added to the total and already wired. Add it with the rest of the crates. Pleasure doing business with you, Paulo.”
• Turning, I walked away for the asshole and Aleksei followed right behind. Motioning one of our guys over, I jerked my head back at the Columbian crew.
• “Finish up here. I want every single Columbian out of here before anyone leaves. I need to handle some business in the city. Anything goes wrong, shoot them all.”
• After making sure everything was in order, Aleksei and I set off for the strip club.
• The bouncer out front opened the door for us as we walked into the club. The music was loud, smoke hung from the ceiling like cloudy day, and the smell of booze had turned sour. I stayed out of these shitholes. I preferred the business side, our larger corporations than the seedy bars, clubs, diners, and other places that were dotted around our territory. Sure, I still managed them but I didn’t need to do that in person.
• “Boss.” Laslo stepped forward and nodded to me. “You were faster than I expected. The Columbian’s behave?”
• “No, but what else is new? How’s our gost’? [How’s our guest?]”
• He opened up the door that lead down to the lower levels. Not all our properties had basements, but the ones that did were turned into jail cells. Some more equipped for torture than others. You never knew when one of the enemies decided to sneak into your territory and you needed to make them sing like a canary.
• “Still out cold.”
• This basement was particularly small. There were only four cells in the whole place and two rooms. One that was set up for a few of our guys on break to sit, the other was an interrogation room.
• “The last one…here…” Laslo pointed to the far cell and I could see a body curled up on the floor in the fetal position.
• Going over to the cell, my eyes widened. “You didn’t say it was a fucking child! A girl at that! I told you not to fucking touch her!”
• She was covered in blood. You could easily see parts of her face were bruised and swelling. Her shirt was torn and blood completely covered it to the point where I had no idea what the original color was. There was also remnants of pants on her legs, but they were so torn up that you could see her skin. It was probably white, but there were so many scratches and bruises that there was no way to tell the color anymore. The worst were her wrists and right ankle. They were bent in a weird way, signifying they were definitely broken. My anger spike to rage as I looked at Laslo. His hands flew up as he stepped back.
• “We didn’t…boss…we didn’t touch her. She came in like that. Hobbling out of the alley. She passed out and Boris caught her before she hit the ground.”
• I stared at the body. She didn’t look alive. She was pencil thin, easily a sign of malnutrition. This was what you saw in third world countries, not New York City. Hell, even the homeless looked better than she did. This was abuse or someone wanted to kill her.
• “You said she asked for help?”
• “Specifically she said ‘please help or please kill me’.” Laslo was looking at her, sadness in his eyes. “I’ve never seen anything like this. She’s just a rebenok.” [She’s just a child.]