Sins He Taught Me - Nicole Fox Page 0,18

vigilante bastard and the loss of my brother and his wife, and things are already teetering on a knife’s edge.

So getting lectured like a misbehaving child from this weak, pathetic social worker isn’t exactly a welcome turn to my afternoon.

Another nanny won’t work. Even the best that the nannying agency sent to me couldn’t cut it. I need someone who can’t quit.

I sigh. “Yaroslav!” I call out. The youngest of my brigadiers comes hurrying into the room. He’s a tall, skinny man, built like a scarecrow with a prominent Adam’s apple. But he’s a good man. Perceptive, diligent, and above all—loyal.

“Yes, sir?” he asks me respectfully.

“You have a new responsibility.”

“Anything you need, Matvei.”

I point down the hall, where Niko is playing in his room. “You watch the boy, around the clock.”

Yaroslav does a double-take. “I’m sorry, sir?”

My gaze swivels up and skewers him. “Was part of that unclear?”

He gulps. “Watch the boy. Understood.”

He lingers for a moment, unsure of what happens next. I jerk my head in the direction of Nikolas’s room. “Starting now.”

Yaroslav nods crisply and disappears. I sit in the room for a long time after he’s gone—thinking. Always thinking.

THE NEXT DAY

“Did you hear that, Matvei?” Timofei asks me.

I blink, turning my attention back to him. Everyone in my meeting room stares at me expectantly, and I sit up straighter, clearing my throat.

“No,” I admit. “Start over.”

“I was saying that this vigilante is doing a damn good job of staying invisible. We haven’t heard from him or seen him since he killed—er, since the accident. He disappeared. We’re trying to track him down, but it’s hard. There weren’t many clues at the warehouse after the explosion.”

“Go fucking figure,” I mutter, shaking my head. All our leads might’ve turned out to be dead ends, but I haven’t given up hope of finding him. I know that he’s out there somewhere. I know he’s hiding, probably because he understands that he just fucked with the wrong family. The safest bet for him would be to stay gone for good. Retire the Justice Killer identity and go back to his normal life, whatever that is. Pray that I never pick up his trail.

But disappearing will not be so easy. The whole state is talking about him. Everyone wants to know his identity. That kind of notoriety isn’t something you can just give up so easily. It’s addictive, and sure as I know how addicts behave, I know that he’ll come out once again.

When he does, we’ll be ready for him. He won’t get away a second time.

“I don’t know how many times I have to tell you,” I say, growing more annoyed with the situation. “Keep looking for him. He’ll show up again. He’s waiting for the right time. Probably when he thinks we’ve moved on. Too many people are talking about him for him to just throw in the towel.”

“I think we should all be ready,” Timofei says to the others sitting around the large oak table. “If Dmitry’s murder had anything to do with us as a whole, he won’t hesitate to take more of us down. Stay on alert, even more than usual. We don’t need any more of us ending up dead.”

Hearing how casually Timofei talks about my brother stings, but that’s why he’s my second-in-command. He’s emotionless, and that helps me keep my own self in check.

But this isn’t just business. This is family. Legacy. The one thing I swore to protect above all else. I struggle to keep my face neutral at the off-handed mention of Dmitry.

But inside, something deep throbs at my brother’s name.

“Next,” I say through a suddenly tight throat. “What other business is there?”

“Well, there is the matter of Brahim…” Timofei begins cautiously.

I growl deep in my chest. Bad news come in threes, they say, and the truth of that seems to be bearing out wickedly of late. Dmitry, Niko—and now, Brahim Shehu.

I remember when the Albanian first appeared, nearly a decade ago. Rumors of an Eastern European hitman, the most savage killer working on the streets, had reached my ears from distant corners of the city. He’d picked up a devout following quickly, and built what was once a ragtag Albanian crew into a major player in the import/export traffic that fed through the city’s southern vein.

Brahim.

Our encounters were few and far between, but they always left me with a bad taste in my mouth. He had been courteous and deferential, once upon a time, as was due to a man