Kingmakers, Graduation

28. Adrik

28

ADRIK

I really fucked up with Sabrina.

Maybe the pressure is getting to me. Navigating the complexities of the underworld in Moscow is like running a dozen games of chess in my head—if there were hundreds of players swapping in and out, and all of those players would shoot you in the back given the chance.

Meanwhile I’m supposed to direct the six other people in this house. I’ve got to keep them all safe and motivated, I’ve got to play to their strengths while shoring up their weaknesses. I’m a fucking babysitter and therapist and boss all rolled into one.

I’ve got to keep Vlad from bullying Chief, and Andrei from irritating everybody else. I need to find another assistant for Hakim, and figure out how to thaw the Cold War between Sabrina and Jasper .

I have to keep the cops out of our business and a constant ear to the ground for the backlash coming our way from our legion of rivals, as the success of Molniya draws way too fucking much attention.

I know Yuri Koslov is pissed at us. Veniamin has cut him out, giving us full access to sell in his clubs. Koslov is a member of the High Table, and not someone I would have wanted as an enemy. Unfortunately, while I believe in abundance when it comes to making money, power is a zero-sum game. For one to gain, someone else must lose.

The Wolfpack is on the rise. Several of the old guard are declining.

Moscow is in turmoil. Two of the kachki got in a conflict no one seems to quite understand—some say it was over a woman, others that it was a refusal to pay a gambling debt. Whatever the real reason, Boris Kominsky put a dagger in the eye of his old friend Nikolai Breznik. Even the High Table isn’t exempt—Savely Nika had his mansion raided, $48M in cash and jewels carried out by the cops. Nika himself is sitting in a prison cell, an unheard-of humiliation for a Bratva boss. Apparently he got on the wrong side of the Minister of Energy over a bad oil deal.

Chaos creates opportunity, but also risk. Everyone is on edge, violence breaking out in Solntsevo and Kapotnya over what should have been minor disputes. The Chechens and the Slavs are closer to war than they’ve ever been.

The distribution deal with the Markovs is crucial. They’re a powerful ally. I’m sure the Chechens and Yuri Koslov would love to squash the Wolfpack before our drugs get any more popular, but now they risk tangling with Nikolai Markov and Simon Severov’s family as well .

I had to roll that cash back into more product; I feel confident it was the right choice. And yet I do respect Sabrina’s intelligence. She’s not wrong—I’m taking a risk running such a thin margin. A calculated risk.

I did promise her to make decisions together. But at the end of the day, there can only be one general.

Still, I don’t feel good about any of this. I don’t feel in control.

I had so much confidence in my ability to do everything at once. Reality is messier.

Jasper is loading up the last of our ready-made product for Andrei to take to the distributors in the clubs.

I bring the totals to Chief so he can record the debts and the credits, tracking the ever-evolving centipede of our finances, devouring on one end and eaten up on the other.

Chief works out of a tiny office in the back of the house, the quietest space when Andrei and Hakim are playing video games at top volume, or when Vlad is blasting his music.

The accounting is complicated by the fact that anything written down in the ledger has to be recorded in code, on the off chance our records are ever used against us in court.

Of course, if you actually find yourself in the judge’s docket, something has already gone terribly wrong—as evidenced by Nika. A full thirty percent of our earnings goes to the police and various government officials, to keep them dutifully uninterested in what we’re doing.

When I finish with Chief, Jasper is lurking out in the hall. We haven’t spoken since the incident down in the gym .

Jasper already resents Sabrina’s presence the most of anyone in the house. He believes she’s warping my decisions. I had to show him that she’s no succubus bewitching my mind. I had to demonstrate that I’m the one in control.

Jasper may need a lesson of his own.

As soon as he sees me, he says, “I think Sabrina should stay in the lab.”

Both Jasper and Sabrina hate picking up the raw materials together. This isn’t the first time one of them has tried to get out of it.

“Not happening,” I tell Jasper flatly.

“She’s volatile,” Jasper says. “Unpredictable.”

“She’s also useful,” I remind him. “I’m not keeping her locked in the house.”

“You saw how she lost her temper over nothing. What if something really pisses her off? She could get us in serious shit.”

I turn and face Jasper, filling the hallway with my shoulders, blocking his path. Letting him know I’m fucking serious.

“Sabrina is a tiger. One of a kind, nothing else like her. And no, a tiger can’t be tamed—who would want it to be? All its power comes from the fact that it’s wild. You can’t cage a tiger. You can only try to be its master. Nobody wants a tiger that’s a shell of itself. You want the most powerful fucking tiger you can get. And that comes with dangers. If you have a German shepherd, that dog will lay down its life for you. With a tiger, if you don’t feed it, and you don’t respect it, it will eat you.”

Jasper considers this, eyes narrowed, hands stuffed in his pockets. At last he says, “Am I the dog in this metaphor? ”

“I don’t know,” I reply. “But I can tell you, the tiger doesn’t ask what it is in the metaphor. It already knows what it is.”

Jasper smiles thinly, accepting the reproof.

He may not like me taking a slap at him, but he can’t deny that Sabrina is valuable. She already proved her worth. The hybrid drugs were her idea. Hakim helped with the execution, but the formulas were her creation. She was the one bold or reckless enough to experiment on herself. She’s the one who knows how to create an experience.

The pills are selling beyond our wildest dreams, and Sabrina’s branding makes them recognizable and highly covetable in the open market. Imitators pop up every day, but the packaging is distinctive enough that the devotees will only accept the real deal. Molniya, Elixsir, and Opus are becoming as legendary as Orange Sunshine in the ’60s.

I have to keep my focus on the mob of rivals jealous of our success.

Jasper and Sabrina will keep working together. It’s good for both of them —they’ll realize that soon enough.