Luka
Denying Pavel’s plan to break into Damien’s house and terrorize his family might have disappointed him, but it’s not long before I’m fed some information that might give us an even better edge on Damien.
Since Dmitri has quickly risen through the ranks and become Damien’s right-hand man, it’s just as imperative to get him off the streets for my sake as it is for Anna’s and Rachel’s. Vasya’s been tracking them both down in intervals, and he’s been able to pinpoint Dmitri’s habits to the point where he knows where he always is. Unlike Alexei, who was completely unpredictable when it came to his whereabouts, Dmitri seems to be a much more regimented person.
According to Vasya, Dmitri spends every Thursday night at a casino in town, right on the border of where civilization meets the unregulated filth of the red-light district. In a way, it’s like a gatekeeper. The place is always crawling with desperate hookers, rich men with coke addictions, and fucks like Dmitri who go there to piss away all of their money until they’re flat broke again. It’s a perfect introduction to the life you can expect once you pass the city limits.
I’ve enlisted Vasya to collect my more capable men to crash Dmitri’s night out with me to see how much of our inventory we can shake out of him. If he has an ego like his brother’s, he won’t be anticipating an attack, and we’ll have a much better chance of catching him than we would by chasing him around the city.
Without giving details, I text Anna that I won’t be coming home tonight, and all I can extract from her is a single “okay”.
As much as I hate to admit it, her cagey behavior has been wearing on me for a little while now. I want to understand what’s going on in her head. I know I haven’t been as present as maybe I should be, but she knew what she was getting involved with when she came to stay with me. Even still, I hate being the guy who neglects the woman he spends every night with.
After this mission, I’m going to confront her.
I need answers.
At nine in the evening, I pull up to the casino with Pavel and Leo in my car. The atmosphere is exactly as I expect it to be hollow, insultingly overdecorated, and sinister. A young woman no older than twenty approaches me quickly, faster than I’m able to turn and avoid her advances.
“I’ll suck your cock for a twenty,” she says excitedly, her eyes wide and glassy as she tries and fails to cover up the pockmarked skin of her face and hands.
“No, sorry, sweetie,” I reply, feeling sick to my stomach at the sight of her and knowing she’ll likely spend the night with someone who will abuse her far worse than I ever could.
Her eyes fill with tears, and she slinks back into the corner of the room, where she waits intently for the next disinterested man to walk through the door. Poor thing, but my mission isn’t to save every broad in the neighborhood. Tonight, I only have one person on my mind.
It doesn’t take long before we spot Dmitri and his crew of gangsters huddled around the bar, throwing back shot after shot of whiskey and growing increasingly more belligerent.
They should know better than to act like that when there’s a price on their heads, but that’s what separates the amateurs from the professionals. Damien lost his territory to me for a reason, and he’s going to lose it again.
“What do you want us to do now? He’s got more backup than we were expecting,” whispers Vasya, eyeing up one of the men at the far end of the bar with an obvious scar across the top of his head.
He’s right. I wasn’t expecting Dmitri to have this much backup. Though from what I can see, they’re all getting drunker by the minute, one of them even appears to be nodding off on some kind of opioid. If they were all at fully functioning capacity, I’d be worried. If we all stay sharp, we won’t have a problem.
“Let’s stay back for a while. Let them fall apart just a little bit more before we make our move,” I reply in a low voice.
Dmitri clearly has his brother’s ego, shouting at the waitstaff and taking up all of the social energy within a twenty-foot radius. It won’t be hard to see when he begins to slip.
It doesn’t take long before Dmitri is slurring every word and nearly falling out of his seat in five-minute intervals. I’ve barely even gotten a drink in before I realize it’s time to move in for the attack.
I nudge Leo, who has had his eyes glued to a pretty thing in a short dress for the past ten minutes. “Pay attention, man. It’s time to go.”
He snaps back to attention, placing his glass down on the table and reaching for his gun. “Ready when you are.”
I motion for Pavel to join us, and we swiftly enter the main area of the bar, surrounding Dmitri and his men in a matter of seconds.
They’re caught completely off guard, eyes wide with fright when just a moment before, they’d all been nearly asleep at the bar. Pavel jabs his gun at them. “Don’t reach, or your brains will be painting the wall behind you.”
“Hey, what the fuck?” the bartender exclaims. “Put the guns away!” Pavel points his directly at him. “Shut up, or you’re next.”
The bartender throws up his hands, shrinking back quickly under Pavel’s threat.
I glare at Dmitri. “Remember me? I killed your brother.”
Dmitri jumps at me, but I dodge him easily, allowing him to fall to the floor as the entire establishment descends into chaos. A hear a gun pop, but I don’t know who’s it is. My focus is only on Dmitri.
I begin kicking Dmitri in the ribs, slamming my feet into him with adrenaline-soaked fury. People race past me, screaming and crying as gunshots go off around them. It’s absolute chaos, but I’ve decided that I’m not going to let Dmitri go down so easily. I want him to hurt. A bullet is too easy.
Pavel’s already gotten himself into a bloodbath of a fistfight beside me, knocking teeth out of the guy who looked like he was nodding off on heroin an hour ago. He’s a lot more mentally present than I would have anticipated, and he’s throwing vicious punches in Pavel’s direction as Pavel attempts to slam his head into the bar.
One of Dmitri’s lackeys jumps on my back as I’m leaning over to move Dmitri’s hands from his face. He punches me in the back of the head before I swing around and break his jaw. His mouth fills with blood that pours from his mouth in a deluge of deep red. He must be even more inebriated than I thought because he’s conscious enough to keep hitting me without being bothered by the searing pain radiating from his face.
I dodge a few more of his sloppy punches before he finally lands one, almost breaking my nose and sending my own blood streaming down my face and all over the floor. He grabs me and tries to punch me again, and I swing him over the bar, sending him directly into the rail where a collection of glass liquor bottles break under his weight.
Another set of uncoordinated hands grabs me from the side and sends me into the barstools, causing me to lose my footing and fall into the bar as I’m attacked by a far more capable fighter than my last opponent. I withdraw my pistol and shoot him in the stomach, watching him crumble to the floor as a handful of patrons scream and flee.
“He’s leaving!” Pavel shouts.
I turn to see that Dmitri has taken off sprinting toward a door at the back of the room. I fire a few rounds in his direction, only grazing his left calf in my uncoordinated and hasty shot.
I run after him, followed closely by Pavel and Leo, but I already know that Dmitri isn’t going to let us catch him. He’s too far ahead, and there’s no telling where he’ll go once he gets outside. The streets are a tangled mess, and running out there with guns is a great way to get the police’s attention. We’ve done enough damage here already.