Maksim: A Dark Mafia Romance (Akimov Bratva), Nicole Fox [love letters to the dead txt] 📗

“You don’t know what I’m willing to do right now,” I say.

“Yes. I do,” he says. “I’ve seen you cross many, many lines, but you wouldn’t break the Bratva’s rule about children. That doesn’t make you soft, Maksim. It’s just rational.”

“Just call Turgenev. Tell him to stop at Clarke’s house and get inside. Once he’s there, we’ll have Clarke call his wife.”

He finishes his drink. “Of course, Maksim.”

I pour myself a drink as he calls. As the whiskey goes down, I feel how close I am to my revenge. It’s close enough to know that I could still lose it, but I’ll keep going until I’m so far under Gianluigi Balducci’s skin that he’ll tear off his own flesh to be free.

It all comes down to flesh and blood and how fucking far people will go to suture broken ties.

2

Cassandra

Riding on the subway always reminds me of my dad. He used to tell me Greek myths as bedtime stories. Gods on Olympus, always interfering with the lives of the mortals at the foot of the mountain for sheer entertainment—all that jazz. It took me a little longer than I care to admit to realize that he saw himself as Zeus, and that he thought all of us who lived in his orbit were just ants for him to play with.

He’d take me on the subway and talk about the labyrinth, the one with the minotaur lurking at the center, hungry for human flesh. When you’re a little girl like I was back then, the subway tunnels really do seem like they could plausibly contain a monster. The whole city seemed like that back then, actually. Like you might round the wrong corner at the wrong time and accidentally end up gored by the beast.

My father used to comfort me by saying that the brave ones, the warriors, could conquer a city and earn their way to Mt. Olympus. It seemed so certain in those days. Fight for what you want. Earn the happily-ever-after ending you deserve.

I’m not so sure about that anymore.

I let the thoughts of my father cut off as the subway doors swish shut behind me. I stride up the stairs, holding my bag close to me. It’s been six years away at journalism school in Chapel Hill since I last stepped foot into the labyrinth of Manhattan, but I haven’t forgotten that there really are monsters who live in this city. They might not be minotaurs, but they’ll hurt you nonetheless if you give them the chance.

“Hey! Hey!” A man holding a brown bottle of liquor points at me. “Li’l hot mama. Look just like my daughter, don’tcha? Come sit on Papa’s lap, yeah?”

I adjust my headphones, pretending not to hear him. He starts walking toward me. I pick up my pace, slipping between two businessmen. Bounding across the crosswalk at the tail end of the pedestrian signal’s timer, I nearly trip in my short heels. I catch my footing just in time to play it off nonchalantly. Slick move, Cass, I tell myself. One day back in the city and you’re already tripping all over the place.

“Ma’am, could I trouble you for some change?”

I turn to see the old man tottering toward me, but keeping a couple of feet between us. His coat is tattered and one toe is peeking out from the tip of his shoes. His coat is a couple of inches too short, showing his bony wrists and hands weathered by God knows how many winters spent shivering on a park bench.

I reach into my bag. Only tourists give cash to beggars. I’m not a New Yorker anymore, not really, but I’ll still be damned if I give away any money just to see it spent on booze or drugs. I bought a breakfast burrito near my apartment, intending to eat it once I reached my desk at the Fifth Avenue Journal. It’s still warm in the foil as I pass it to the man.

“Here,” I say. He carefully takes it from me, his eyes turning shiny as he unwraps it.

“It’s still warm,” he says. “And it’s all here. You don’t want none of it?”

“I’ll be fine.” I give him a quick smile. “Have a nice day.”

I keep my gaze steady, ignoring the leery glances of the men flowing down the sidewalk. Memories of North Carolina tug at my thoughts—woodsy air, cicadas humming, the blue ridges of mountains on the horizon—but my little personal nature montage ends abruptly as a man in jeans and a baggy white shirt steps in front of me. As I refocus my attention, I see his big, yellowed teeth. Absurdly, I think of the Big Bad Wolf. Another story from dear old Dad. I can only imagine which character he identified with in that little fable.

“I just had to stop you, miss,” he says. “I have to ask you how you get your hair that shiny. It’s very beautiful.”

I run my hand over my dark hair. My father used to say it was the color of Saperavi wine—a wine so dark red that it looks black. I’ve had family members, friends, strangers, and hairdressers all fawn over it. Personally, I always wanted to be blonde.

It’s nothing new for an unfamiliar man to comment on it, but this particular Romeo’s eyes seem more interested in my chest than my hair.

“I just use store-brand shampoo,” I reply curtly. I try to step around him, but he shadows me, blocking my path.

“There must be more than that,” he says. He reaches forward, touching the edges of my hair. I jerk my head away, letting the strands slip out of his hand. In North Carolina, if people witnessed what was happening between us, they’d at least stop to see if they needed to intervene, but in this city, no one cares enough to even notice. Hard to blame them. Like I’ve said before, there are monsters everywhere you look in