Page 43 of The Beast of Moscow

“Spasibo,” he murmured, the thank you so quiet that Igor only cleared his throat, but otherwise, didn’t respond.

“Business?” the man asked.

Vaslav nodded.

Better to get on with it.

“The Italian has confirmed he’ll move forward with the first run of cocaine into Moscow—”

“You mean to say he’s finally done wasting time and has agreed to whatever you’ve put forth, no?”

“Essentially,” Igor returned, unbothered.

“Perfect.”

The bastard took more time than Vaslav had allowed. Lucky for him, the Russian boss was distracted with other things.

“After he sits down with you for dinner, and a chat,” Igor added.

Vaslav scowled. “What?”

“Apparently, it’s a matter of semantics—or theatrics. He doesn’t like to work outside of his typical circles, and you’re a new client, so to speak,” Igor continued quietly. “Who the hell knows how Italians get any business done, Vas ... all they want to do is eat and talk.”

Igor wasn’t wrong.

“Where does he want this to happen?”

“Paris, actually. He’s willing to do it with the middleman, who made a very gracious offer to be no man’s land. And we won’t be giving the location to the Italians until a time of your choosing.”

“When?” Vas asked.

“He’ll leave that up to you, but preferably—”

“As soon as possible.”

That’s how these things worked. The faster Vaslav moved for the Italian, the faster the Italian would move for him.

“What else?” he asked Igor, still pressing his palm down flat to the cloth for the pressure. The kindest thing to have touched his face since Vera’s soft hand ...

“Your next appointment is—” Igor sucked in air, adding, “Well, I forgot. But Mira noted it down.”

“Fuck the doctors.”

“Vas, it could be serious.”

“I said—”

“You’ve paid them a lot of money to run all of these tests. I know you don’t want to hear it, but a part of you must have wanted to know why it’s been getting worse, Vas, you ran for MRIs and every other test they wanted to throw at you for months. At least let them tell you—”

“What I already know?’ he asked under his breath, chuckling dryly. “Why bother?”

“You don’t know, boss.”

“Don’t I?”

Igor didn’t respond, and the seconds of silence continued to tick by.

“Dues?” he eventually asked his man.