Chapter 76

Nico

I take one look at Andrewkov and wonder why I even bothered hiring this piece of shit. Once someone has betrayed me, they are like shit on the bottom of my shoe. He knows it. And from the look of his swollen and bruised face, the way one eye is closed with bruising, I can see that Aurora’s team have made a start on him.

I take a seat in front of him, a steel cold table between us. His hands are cuffed to a central metal loop in the middle of the table. His ankles tied with a zip tie.

With one leg crossed over the other, I examine my nails. Not that I need to, they are manicured every couple of weeks, so I know they are immaculate. He looks at me with his one normal eye and spits on the table. I arch an eyebrow not expecting anything less.

Aurora stands behind me to my right, in each corner of the stark room painted plain white, are four armed detail from her team. “So, you worthless piece of shit, was it worth the money they paid you?”

“Fuck you, Santangelo.” His accent now thick with tones of Russian. “You are a dead man and your common fiancée.” He spits again.

Aurora moves and slaps him across the face then pulls his head back and holds a knife to his neck. “One more disrespectful remark and I will slit your throat you fucking asshole.” She maintains the blade to his neck.

“Do not ever disrespect my fiancée again. In fact, do not ever mention her name again, understood.”

Andrewkov glares at me, getting something out him is going to be tough. The Russians aren’t known for giving in that easily and they’re known for never ratting anyone out. They would rather die, I am guessing Andrewkov would rather die too than give away whoever he is protecting.

Finished inspecting my nails, I rest both my hands, one over the other on my knee. “Tell me who hired you? Was it Yelena?”

No response. Aurora holds the knife a bit closer onto his neck, I can see the indent. Any further and she’ll make a cut. I nod my head for her to move away from the deadbeat in front of me.

“I’ll ask you once again, who hired you?”

“Fuck you, Santangelo.” As I expected.

“You have the choice to live or to die, Andrewkov. You were once one of my best men, why did you betray me?”

Silence, he doesn’t let his good eye waver from mine. I tap my fingers on the cold, metal of the table. “Let me end it for him now, Boss,” Aurora says with a menacing voice. The guards stand still with their firearms slung downwards across their chests to their groins, alert, ready if they need to be. Nobody would even know if we killed this piece of shit and took rounds to his body. Nobody likely would miss him. And the Cell is sound proofed. It’d be an easy kill.

“Water, Aurora,” I instruct. She leaves the room and reappears with a bottle of water, a bucket and some kind of cloth. Grabbing his head she tilts it backwards, places the cloth over his mouth and begins to pour water into it. I hear as he gags, it’s not a sound I particularly like but the fucker will be made to talk if I have to sit in the Cell all fucking night and the next day.

Knowing that Lucky is for now safe back in Atlanta, makes me feel at least somewhat relieved that nobody can get to her now. It doesn’t even cross my mind that my fiancée would defy me and venture out. Nor does it cross my mind that she won’t ever stay loyal to me.

Aurora stops for a few seconds with pouring the water, she releases his head. “Ready to talk yet, cunt?” I say.

“No,” he replies.

“Aurora, again.”

We do this a few more times until he is gagging and spluttering and begs her to stop. I give Aurora the nod. She stops and moves away; his head hangs forward.

“Ready to talk now, you piece of shit?”

“It was Yelena, she has a connection to you is all that I know.”

“And your connection to her? Why did she choose you?. I hand picked you, you were like I said one of my best and most loyal detail. Fuck, Andrewkov you even took a bullet for me many years ago on the street. Your shoulder was never the same afterward.”

Andrewkov lets out a low whimpering sound, he is defeated. After the non-stop beating he has endured before I arrived and the interrogation tactics he has been gradually worn down. He knows that next we would start on cutting off one finger at a time. He knows the drill; he’s been by my side enough times in the last many years.

“She’s my half-sister,” his voice is low, barely even audible.

“Come again?”

“She is my half-sister.”

I furrow my brows because right now I am not understanding. We did a full background check on Andrewkov before he was hired. He had worked for a Russian diplomat before me, the best in the field at the time. There was no link to a sister nor to the Sokolova family.

How could we have missed something like this? “There is no relationship between you and the Sokolova family, how can this be possible?”

“Her adoptive father gave her the name, but she and I share the same mother not the same father. I didn’t even realize I had a half sister until she approached me last year.”

I do not show any surprise or reaction as he tells me this. So, they have been planning the operation for a whole year. Well, fuck me! That means that Yelena will know almost everything about me since Andrewkov is one of my, I correct myself. Was one of my best detail.

Fuck, she will know about my residence in Atlanta.

“And what did the bitch offer you that I couldn’t?”

“Money, a share in her operation, a chance to be the King.”

I laugh, it is low and calculating. “The King? Are you kidding me, she isn’t taking my empire away from me. Who the fuck does that little bitch think she is? And what right does she think she has to my streets, my network, my people?”

He shrugs. “You asked me a question, I have given you an answer, Nico. Let me go, you don’t need me anymore.”

“Like hell I will let you go. How much did you tell her?”

“Everything.”

“Aurora, shoot him in the fucking head,” I get up and turn my back as I hear the sound of the bullet followed by silence. It is not in my interest to check; I know my best assassin has got the job done. I don’t need to see his brains splattered across the table and walls. Fuck him to hell.

I snap my fingers; Aurora appears by my side totally unfazed that she has killed yet another human. Tough, he should not have betrayed me. You live by the sword; you die by the sword. There is no in-between in our underworld, we all know the rules, we all know the consequences.

“I need you back on Yelena’s tail. I want times, dates, places. If she shits, I want to know about it. If she leaves the Waldorf I want to know about it. Keep her the fuck away from my fiancée. And Aurora, do not kill her, I want her to get as close as she thinks she can get and then bring her here.”

“Yes, Boss.”

Only my breathing can be heard as I make my way out of the cell. The cleaners will come in and deal with Andrewkov’s body. I pay them well to do what they do best.

My driver has the door to the vehicle open; I get inside and reach for my phone. Impatiently, I wait for Lucky to pick up. It goes to voicemail.

Hey you’ve reached Lucky. If I’m not answering your call, you know I’m busy so leave a message.

The fuck? She knows to pick up when I call her. What the hell? I try again, no dice, straight to voicemail. I ping her a message and still get no response. Now I have no idea is she is still at the residence or gone and done something stupid. My heart is beating wildly in my chest, a nervousness spreads through my body, beads of sweat begin to form on my forehead.

What will I do if Lucky isn’t safe? I don’t think I could handle anything happening to her. She has fast become everything to me, the air that I breathe, the light at the end of a dark and stormy day. She is so entwined in me now that I could never untangle her if I tried.

I try again and still receive her voicemail. Dread begins to seep through my body like damp in your bones.