Second Best (Volkov Bratva 1)

Slavik and I couldn’t make this work. Neither of us had anything in common. He’d gotten what he wanted, and now, I was back to being the irritating wife.

****

Slavik

I stared around at the carnage before me, pissed off. While I’d been fucking my wife, one of my most prestigious nightclubs, Shiver, had been attacked. There were three dead bodies, several injured, and now I was enraged.

Shiver was a civilian club to the outside world. No link to us, dealt with through a company of a company until you got to me, the owner.

This was where we handled some of the coke we distributed, but it was never within the walls of the club. We kept out illegal businesses running side by side and within the restrictions of the law.

No one thought to attack this place. This was private business. Only those closest to me knew about this, unless someone had talked and gotten sloppy.

With my hands on my hips, I knew the cop on my payroll wanted to talk to me. I nodded my head toward the back of my office. Daniel was a good guy. His kid got diagnosed with cancer five years ago. I saw an opportunity and took it. His salary didn’t pay for the extensive treatment his son needed, and well, we came to an arrangement.

Arms folded, I waited as he closed the door.

“What do we have?”

“All the witness reports are unclear. Several men enter the establishment at approximately ten o’clock, and they start firing. Your barman is the first victim.”

I made a mental note to deal with the family.

Ricky was a good guy. A family man and loyal. He’d been manning this bar ever since it opened ten years ago. He’d always been the first one to call when anything fishy was happening, which told me this attack was designed to look random but with the missing coke, it wasn’t.

“The next two victims?”

“Women in their early twenties. They were out looking for a good time. Neither of them are related to your work.”

I rubbed at my chin. “So we’ve got three dead people, many injured, and a busted-up nightclub.”

“Is there anything else you need to report?” Daniel asked.

“Nothing you need to know.”

“Look, Mr. Ivanov, this is pretty serious. I know you have your … company problems, but this might be completely random. This place isn’t even associated with you.”

He chuckled, but I felt no humor. “You know when you’re a kid growing up and there’s something you want? A cookie, a video game, some shit like that.”

“Your point?”

“When you try to get mommy’s and daddy’s attention to buy you that, you talk about anything but that, right. Until they finally turn around and say, what do you want, sweetie?” I kept my voice low.

“What do you want me to do?”

I folded my arms. “I want the security footage for outside on the street.”

“Mr. Ivanov, you know I don’t have that authority.”

“Then find someone who does, but I want a copy. I need to see what I’m dealing with here.”

Daniel didn’t look happy about it, and the truth was, neither did I. The little elitist group of soldiers hadn’t attacked in a while, but why here, why now? None of it made any sense.

“Are you sure there’s nothing I can do for you now?” he asked.

“No.” I needed those security tapes.

“I don’t like this, Mr. Ivanov.”

“I don’t pay you to like it. How is your son?” It was the fastest way to get him to leave. Daniel left the room to join the rest of his men working through my nightclub.

My cell phone rang, and I pulled it out to see Cara was calling me. I stared at the call for several seconds before finally picking it up.

“Hello,” I said.

“Hey, you. I wanted to check in. See how you were,” Cara said.

“Why?”

“I don’t know. I’m a curious woman, you know.”

“Cara, you haven’t called to check up on me in nearly fifteen years. Is there a problem?”

“No, no problem. I wanted to see how my best friend was doing.”

I looked around my office, suspicion rising up inside me.

“I don’t want you touching my woman ever again, do you hear me?”

“Ah, we’re back to that. Did you at least heed my advice? Did you make her yours? Showed her what a real man could do?”

“I’m busy right now, Cara.” I hung up my cell phone and sent a quick email off to the private alerts for Ivan Volkov and the rest of the brigadiers to alert them of a possible impending attack.

With nothing in my office to keep my attention, I made my way out to the main floor where most of the damage seemed to have taken place.

I moved to the bar and looked around. Moving up and down the length, I checked out the entrance point, but from the bar, there was no direct shot of everyone coming in or out.