Kingmakers, Graduation

32. Adrik

32

ADRIK

W e’re supposed to be going to Neve Markov’s wedding in an hour but nobody is ready.

Sabrina comes in from the garage, oil embedded all the way under her fingernails and in every little crack and line of her hands. Streaks of grease on her face and in her hair, which is twisted up in a knot on her head with pieces coming down all around her face.

She’s wearing a pair of Chief’s coveralls. When she grins at me, her teeth are the only clean thing on her filthy face.

“I did it!” she exclaims triumphantly. “I got that fucking bike fixed!”

The feeling I get seeing her like this is a hard, twisting jolt in my guts. I like her this way better than almost any other. I knew when I saw that first picture of Sabrina in the garage that this is her essential self—clever, industrious, loving to get her hands dirty.

“Jasper’s bike?” I ask .

Jasper has taken it back to the dealer three times with no success. They tell him the rattle is sorted, and it seems to be, until he passes 50 km/h.

“It’s fixed this time,” Sabrina says. “I’m sure of it.”

I’m sure she’s right.

“I did it, Jasper!” Sabrina shouts as he comes out of the kitchen into the hallway.

Jasper looks startled, until slow understanding spreads across his face.

“You were working on my bike?”

“Yeah! Fucking fixed it! Those lazy shits didn’t want to take the whole thing apart, but Chief helped me. The chain was too long, it was slapping against the bottom of the guide.”

Jasper stands in place, hands in his pockets, mouth moving as if he’s not quite sure what to say.

“Well … thanks.”

Sabrina grins. “I knew I could get it.”

“You better shower,” I tell her.

“What?” She looks down at herself. “You don’t want your date smelling like motor oil?”

“Actually, I love when you smell like that,” I say, low enough that only she’ll hear.

Sabrina gives me a wicked smile. “I know you do.”

“You gonna take that wrap off your face?” Andrei says to Jasper, likewise coming out of his room .

Andrei isn’t dressed either—I’m the only one who’s put on a suit. The rest of these idiots are going to be standing in freezing water when they all try to shower at once.

“I guess,” Jasper says. “It’s been long enough.”

Gingerly, he peels the plastic wrap from his jaw. We all crowd around to admire the new tattoo.

“Did you go to Bitterroot?” Andrei inquires.

“Yeah.”

“They’re the best.” Andrei nods. Then, elbowing Sabrina, he says, “When you gonna get your patch?”

“Never.” Sabrina tosses her head. “My body’s perfect exactly the way it is.”

She doesn’t have any tattoos. And it’s true—her skin is so flawless, it’s hard to imagine improvement. Like painting over marble, what would be the point?

“We all have a wolf,” Jasper says.

Even Jasper got one inked over the humerus bone tattooed on his right arm.

I never asked any of my men to do it. But they all did, one by one, after joining me.

“You have to,” Andrei says.

“No she doesn’t,” I interject, before Sabrina can argue.

Sabrina throws me a look that’s far from grateful. She doesn’t want me to fight her battles for her. Especially not in the house.

“You better hurry before we run out of hot water,” I prod her .

“Yes, Dad.” She rolls her eyes. “I’m going.”

I know she’s being sarcastic, but it sends a pulse of heat through my chest all the same. I want to take care of Sabrina much more than she wants to receive it.

Following her up the stairs, I say, “You’ll be the most gorgeous woman at that wedding.”

Sabrina pauses halfway, up turning toward me.

“Are you worried about going when Zakharov is still looking for you? He’s knows you’re gonna be there.”

“He’s not invited, and even if he was, there’s no way he’d start shit today. Nikolai Markov would skin him alive if he ruined his daughter’s big day.”

“When are going to deal with him?”

“Soon,” I promise.

Our biggest point of conflict is how we prioritize what needs to be done. We’re in a constant state of triage, bleeding out in a thousand places. All we can do is plug the most critical holes first. The order of those actions is where Sabrina and I disagree.

Things have been tense between us.

She thinks I lied to her, luring her out here under the promise of partnership, while putting myself in a position of authority over her.

She’s not entirely wrong. I need to find a way to show her how much I value her intelligence and her initiative, even if I don’t always agree with her.

She’s integrating with the group, but she’s not just another soldier .

I have to show her how much she means to me.

We haven’t even had time to hook up the last few days. I’m aching for her. We need that physical contact to keep us connected—it’s crucial to our relationship.

While Sabrina showers, I run through a list of potential suppliers Jasper brought me.

He’s found a dozen different options, but none of them are great. None can provide all the ingredients we need, and I have to discard half the list on price, availability, or conflicting arrangements with rivals.

Sabrina emerges at last, lips painted, eyes smoky and catlike, hair piled up in cascading ringlets like Aphrodite. She’s wearing a plum-colored gown, draped and silky, the material clinging to her luscious curves by a few thin straps.

I haven’t seen her dolled up like this in weeks. She’s ravishing. My mouth waters, blood rushing into my cock.

In an instant, I’m up from the bed, seizing her by the shoulders and tearing the dress off her.

I’ve ripped Sabrina’s clothes plenty of times before. She loves when I’m ravenous for her, she loves when I’m rough.

This time, she shrieks with outrage, shoving me away.

“ What the fuck are you doing? ”

She’s never pushed me away before. She’s never stopped me from fucking her, not even in the most inappropriate or hurried moments.

I’m off-balanced, confused .

She lifts the dangling shoulder strap, torn from the dress.

“You ruined it!”

“I’ll buy you another dress.”

“I don’t want another dress! I loved this one. There isn’t a hundred of every beautiful thing, not everything is interchangeable!” Her cheeks are flaming, her shoulders shaking. “I want to be seen in this dress. I don’t want it ripped off me.”

I can see I made a mistake, which makes me feel stupid and angry.

“You always liked when I ripped your clothes before. You want me to be aggressive. I can’t read your mind, I’m just guessing.”

Sabrina’s lip quivers. She looks young and vulnerable in a way I’ve never seen before.

“You always guessed right before. When you care about something, you get it right.”

That hits me harder than any slap.

Sabrina glares at me. “I want to be your partner, not a sex object.”

I’m struggling to control the negative emotions swirling inside me. This is unfair, when sex has always been a keystone of our relationship. When I’ve always seen much more than her looks.

Fighting to keep my voice calm, I say, “I wouldn’t desire you if I didn’t respect you. From the day we met, I’ve only had eyes for you, because I respect you the most.”

Sabrina blinks hard, several emotions battling on her face.

At last she says, “I hope that’s true.”

She returns to the wardrobe to pick another dress .

I wait downstairs for her this time. She emerges twenty minutes later in a long black gown with gold chains at the bust and shoulders. To me, she looks just as stunning as before. But her expression is subdued, and she hardly meets my eye.

She rebounds a little at the wedding.

Neve Markov and Simon Severov are married at the Bykovo Estate. I assume they picked this location, instead of a more conventional luxury locale like the Four Seasons, because its remoteness allows the Markovs to arrange intensive security for their infamous guests.

The estate was long abandoned. Despite its recent renovation, there’s still an air of neglect in the overgrown forests of the grounds and park. The dark trees with their blanket of snow give a fairytale feeling, lovely and menacing all at once.

The ceremony takes place in a white stone church, with tall black spires and ornate bell towers.

Neve is a Tsarina in her fur cloak and gown, her twenty-foot train carried by several giggling flower girls.

Simon can only keep his haughty expression in place until he sees his bride proceeding up the aisle. Then he breaks into a smile that gives me an unexpected jolt of jealousy.

I look at Sabrina, upright and somber in the chair next to mine. I see the bare hand laying in her lap and I wonder what would happen if I offered her a ring. Would she accept it? Or would she see it as a manacle on her finger? One more way that I want to control and dominate her …

She’s not entirely wrong. The more attached I become to her, the less I want her in danger. Her encounter with Zigor’s bodyguards makes me sick when I think of it. Had they been more on their guard, she could have caught a bullet just as easily as Jasper.

Love and business were never meant to mix.

I look at my parents, seated across the aisle from us.

My father protects my mother. He would never let her take the risks Sabrina takes.

Then there’s Ivan and Sloane—partners in even their darkest and bloodiest endeavors.

I thought I wanted a relationship like theirs. But when it comes down to it, I don’t know how they do it. Ivan is the boss ultimately, isn’t he? When the Malina attacked their house, he threw Sloane to safety while he stayed behind.

Do they argue like Sabrina and me? Have they ever?

How can I get what I want, when it changes every day?

Sometimes I want Sabrina with me every moment. Other times I want to lock her away in a tower, where only I can visit her. Where she’ll always be safe.

She would hate that worse than anything.

All I know is that I want her, more than anything else in the world.

I picture her walking down the aisle toward me, more beautiful than Neve Markov or any other bride …

I want her bound to me forever.

I seize Sabrina’s hand, the left one, and squeeze it tight, murmuring in her ear, “That should be us at the altar.”

She turns to look at me, her eyes strangely clouded .

“I only just turned twenty. I’m not planning to get married any time soon—if at all.”

It feels like she took out her favorite knife and stabbed it in my side.

She’s young, I know that. I always forget how young.

But fuck, does she really mean that? She doesn’t know if she’d ever marry me?

The more I try to pull Sabrina closer, the more I push her away.

She’s my little tiger—wild and ferocious.

What do tigers want?

… To eat men alive.

How can I make her want what I want? How can I bring us into alignment?

I barely follow the ceremony, my head full of contradictory thoughts. What to do about Sabrina, what to do about Zakharov … how to salvage my business, how to keep us all alive …

The priest crowns the beaming couple, and they share their cup of wine.

Ilsa Markov stands next to her sister, wearing the silk sash of a witness over her pale-blue gown. Simon’s brother stands on the opposite side in the same position.

Nikolai and Nadia Markov and the two Severovs offer their children crystal glasses, which they smash with all their might on the tiles of the chapel floor. Everyone cheers at the hundreds of glittering fragments, each one representing a year of happy marriage to come .

The ceremony complete, we all proceed to the reception in the grand hall.

I introduce Sabrina to everyone who hasn’t met her yet. Her Russian has improved so much that I hardly have to translate for her anymore. She’s been studying late into the night. She works feverishly at every task, sometimes staying at the lab for fourteen hours in a row when she’s in the middle of a new formula. I never thought I’d meet someone more driven than me.

We chat with my parents. It was only a few hours’ journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow—much farther for Ivan and Sloane, who only arrived this morning after an all-night flight. You’d never guess it. Sloane looks sleek and elegant in her black gown, Ivan the dark shadow always beside her. He kept the beard and longer hair he grew in that Khazak prison cell, now carefully trimmed and groomed. It suits him.

My mother looks like Nefertiti in her gold gown, her hair cut in a blunt bob.

She hangs on my arm, happy to see me after several months’ absence.

“Do you feel at home yet?” she asks Sabrina.

“ Bol'shuyu chast' vremeni, ” Sabrina replies. Most of the time.

“Ochen' khoroshiy!” my mother cries, delightedly clapping her hands. Very good! “You’ve been practicing!”

“A little,” Sabrina says.

“A lot,” I correct her.

“Did I tell you my mother was Italian?” Lara says .

“No.” Sabrina looks at me, surprised. “I didn’t know that.”

“She was a Fratto from Sicily. My father was Armenian.”

“That explains why Adrik is so dark.”

My mother laughs. “His hair when he was born—I’d never seen anything like it. A full shock of jet-black hair, three inches long, sticking straight up off his head.”

Sabrina smiles. “So basically the same as now.”

“Yes, exactly.” My mother reaches up to ruffle my hair. I sigh and let her do it. It wasn’t going to lay flat anyway.

“Do you ever go back to Sicily?” Sabrina asks her.

She shakes her head, the smile fading from her face. “My mother died when I was young, my father shortly after Adrik was born. My brother, too. Dom is all I have. And the boys, of course.”

“I’m sorry,” Sabrina says.

“Dynasties can fall in an instant, no matter how powerful they may seem.”

“Your father had it coming,” my dad says, angry after all this time. If my grandfather were here in this room, my father would kill him all over again for how he treated my mother.

“Sabrina’s father is Italian but her mother is Puerto Rican,” I say, to change the subject.

“It’s good to intermarry,” my father says. “Keeps the bloodline strong.”

“Of course you’d say that,” my mother laughs, kissing him lightly on his scarred cheek. “You’re completely biased. ”

“Too bad Kade couldn’t come,” Sabrina says.

“Kingmakers is so strict.” My mother scowls. “They should at least let them come home for Christmas. Or you should have,” she shakes a finger at me.

“We were working.”

“I’ve heard about your work.” My father raises an eyebrow at me. “Not exactly what we discussed.”

“I think you know I’m always going to exceed the mandate.”

“Is that what you call what happened with Zakharov? Exceeding the mandate?”

“We’re not here to talk business,” my mother says, laying her hand on his arm.

“I don’t need you checking up on me,” I tell my father, my temper rising.

If I wanted to be under his thumb I would have stayed in St. Petersburg.

Sabrina slips her hand into mine, standing close by me.

“Adrik is doing incredible things here,” she says. “No one’s ever grown a market as fast as him. Every one of his men is brilliant and loyal to the bone. He’ll handle Zakharov like he handles everything else—like the man you taught him to be.”

I look at Sabrina, my throat too tight to speak. She’s meeting my father boldly, her tone respectful, but her words impossible to mistake. She won’t stand anyone criticizing me.

My father is surprised, though not entirely displeased .

“Indeed,” he says. “Adrik has always been a son I could be proud of.”

As my parents move on to congratulate the Markovs, I pull Sabrina tight against my side.

“Remind me not to piss you off.”

“If only you would take that lesson to heart,” she says, sipping her champagne.

“And what about you?” I say. “Queen Shit-Stirrer.”

She smiles. “What fun would it be if I always behaved?”

“I can’t even picture that.”

“You’ll certainly never see it.”

We part shortly afterward, pulled into separate conversations. I shake hands with Simon and his new bride, and give Ilsa Markov a congratulations she accepts with brittle thanks.

The Markovs are popular as well as influential—almost every gangster of note is here to pay their respects.

I see the several of the kachki , including Cujo himself, who watches me impassively from the other side of the room. If he really has been hired by Zakharov to seek revenge on his behalf, it must irk him to stand so close without being able to take action.

While I’m keeping an eye on Cujo, Yuri Koslov sneaks up on me.

“Adrik,” he hisses.

“Yuri.”

He’s tall and shaped like a rectangle, with thick dark hair combed forward in a Ceasar. His heavily hooded eyes have a bluish tinge to the li ds, crowded close to the bridge of his hooked nose. He wears a heavy gold watch and ring on his right hand.

“Congratulations are in order,” he says.

“I’m not the one who got married.”

He smiles thinly. “More the home-wrecker type.”

“I wasn’t aware you and Veniamin had officially tied the knot.”

“We had a successful partnership for six years until you showed up.”

“That’s funny. Veniamin seemed only too eager to make a new arrangement. But isn’t that always the way? The husband is surprised when the wife files for divorce.”

“Especially when someone’s fucking her on the side.”

“That happens when the husband isn’t getting the job done.”

His mouth twists in a sneer, upper lip almost touching the bottom of his nose.

“Arrogant as ever, I see.”

“Arrogance is an exaggerated sense of one’s own abilities. I’m accurate.”

“You might want to reevaluate your perceptions. You’ve underestimated the sway I still hold. I’m not the only one displeased with your attempts to jump the ladder in Moscow. The Petrovs think they can spit in the face of the High Table? We haven’t forgotten the events of the last year.”

“Nor have the Petrovs,” I say, quietly .

I haven’t forgotten who conspired against us. Danyl Kuznetsov may be dead, but Foma Kushnir is still a member. And I doubt those two acted alone. At minimum, they had the tacit consent of the other Pakhans, including Koslov.

“I thought you came to Moscow to renew the bonds of friendship,” Koslov says. “Instead you steal from me.”

“I can’t steal what you never owned. Those are Veniamin’s clubs. He was free to make a new deal.”

Koslov’s heavy lids drop lower than ever. “A deal that should have included me. You’re making enemies Adrik … it’s not too late to make a friend.”

I know a shakedown when I see one.

“Friends bring something to the table. Come to me with an offer instead of a threat and perhaps I’ll consider it.”

Koslov’s sallow face flushes with rage. He would love to punish me for my insolence, but he knows as well as I do that I possess a resource everyone wants. That gives me power. I build my allies by the day, as well as my enemies.

If he knew how precarious my position actually is, we’d be having a very different conversation. Luckily I’m not stupid enough to show the slightest sign of weakness.

“You speak to me as if we’re equals,” his seethes.

I’d like to tell him that I don’t see him as my equal at all.

But my father is close by, and that reminds me to practice at least some level of diplomacy.

Softly I say, “Time will show. ”

I’ve barely seen the back of Koslov when Avenir Veniamin saunters over.

“Is he gone?” he laughs.

“For now.”

“Still salty, I suppose.”

“As a pretzel.”

Veniamin laughs. “You’ve already doubled his sales volume, and you actually pay me on time. The results speak for themselves. I’m hearing incredible things about this Opus —I want the whole line-up.”

“It will sell just as well.”

I don’t tell him that I have literally no pills at the moment, and no way to make them.

Across the room, I see Sabrina speaking with Krystiyan Kovalenko. She’s gesturing with her hands, her face animated. He’s leaning in close, his thumb sliding slowly up and down the stem of his champagne flute.

Heat rises up my neck.

“Excuse me,” I say to Veniamin, cutting him off in the middle of more effusions on our future prospects.

I stride across the room, pushing my way through the crowd. When I reach Sabrina, I grab her by the arm.

“Adrik!” she says. “Have you?—”

“Let’s go,” I bark .

“Adrik,” Krystiyan gives me a shit-eating grin. “It’s been too long. I was just talking to your lovely partner here. It seems we can help each other.”

I turn on him, practically snapping in his face.

“Help each other? Like you helped Mykah? No fucking thank you. I wouldn’t take a pint of blood from you if I was dying in the street. I’d rather bleed out than have any part of you touch any part of me.”

“Mykah?” Krystiyan laughs in such a convincing way that I could almost believe him—if I were a fucking idiot. “You got that all wrong. I had nothing to do with that.”

“Save it. When your loyalty was tested, you showed everyone who you were.”

He doesn’t like that. His smile strains, pulled thin at the edges.

“Like when Ivan was taken …” Krystiyan says, softly. “And it showed everyone how weak the Petrovs really are …”

I step in close, close enough that I could rip out his throat with my teeth.

“And yet Ivan’s here today, at this wedding, because of what we were willing to do to bring him home. Someday you’ll learn the difference between a brother and a hired gun.”

Grabbing Sabrina by the arm again, I march her away from that smarmy fucking snake before I do something I’ll regret.

Sabrina allows me about four steps before she rips her wrist out of my grip.

“ What the FUCK? ” she hisses at me .

“We’re not working with Krystiyan.”

“Perfect!” she snaps, throwing up her hands. “ ‘Cause we have so many other options and so much time to get what we need. Oh no, wait—we owe six different people massive orders of drugs with no possible way of fulfilling any of them.”

“Keep your voice down.”

“Are you fucking kidding me right now?”

“You have no idea who he is or what he’s like.”

“No, why would I? You haven’t shared that information with me. It’s so much easier to interrupt my conversation and drag me away by the arm like a fucking child on a playground following a predator to his car.”

“Stop behaving like a child and I’ll stop treating you like one.”

“You’re the one holding some old grudge from school!”

“It’s not my grudge. Krystiyan was the Miles Griffin of our school—he was the connection for contraband. And he had a partner—Mykah Leonty, you remember him from Apothecary?”

She nods.

“They got themselves in hot water selling tainted product. A girl in our class OD’d on fentanyl. Somehow Krystiyan walked away without so much as a slap on the wrist, while Mykah lost two fingers and was expelled from school.”

“You’re saying Krystiyan sold him out.”

“He’s a back-stabber. And I’ll tell you something else—he’s connected to the Malina. Whether he was involved in what happen ed to Ivan or not, he fucking knew about it. We are not EVER working with him, under any circumstances.”

“Understood, boss ,” Sabrina says, tossing back the last of her champagne.

“Don’t be like that.”

“How do you want me to be, Adrik? You act like I’m independent, until the moment I’m not doing exactly what you want. We make choices together until I don’t agree with you. Stop the charade already.”

Before I can reply, she’s set her empty champagne flute on the tray of a passing waiter, and turned and walked away.

Perfect. I’ve managed to alienate the High Table, turn away a potential supplier, and seriously piss off the woman I love.

Well done, Adrik. That’s got to be some kind of record.