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I turn to him without flinching. “The disruption failed because they’re better organized than we assumed.”
Mikhail lets a beat pass before he says, “You may have been compromised.” His eyes never leave mine. “Proximity to the target has done what proximity is designed to do.”
The other council members don’t speak.
“You’ve gotten too close to see clearly,” Mikhail adds.
The council has assessed operatives as compromised before, a verdict delivered with cold finality. But the judgment has never been turned on me, and for a moment, the room tilts.
Years of discipline evaporate, leaving my training irrelevant before their judgment.
I cock my head to the side. “At our last meeting, you told me to lie on my back and think of the family. Now you’re upset I followed your directions?”
Giorgi’s chin lifts a fraction, while Aram freezes in the way men do when they’ve decided not to react. Alexei gives me a single, flat stare that says not here, not like this, and not now.
Mikhail’s jaw tightens, and he sets the report down with a care that lands with more violence than if he had thrown it.
“This is the problem.” He turns to Alexei, cutting me from the conversation, as if I’ve ceased to exist. “We put an Omega in the field and act surprised when sentiment clouds the picture.”
Across the room, I read the calculation in Alexei’s stillness, the cost of being wrong measured against the cost of appearing weak. His expression doesn’t change, but I see the subtle shift in his jaw that marks the moment the equation balances.
“We need to be sure,” he says, folding his hands on the table. “The pressure campaign failed, but that doesn’t mean Levon has been compromised. However, the mission parameters need to be reassessed.”
My stomach sinks. To be pulled from the mission would have been a clean failure. But a test, designed to force me to prove my loyalty, cuts so much deeper.
It takes everything in me to stifle my reaction. “Of course.”
Cold settles in my stomach as Alexei reaches into his briefcase and removes a thin folder, sliding it across the table to an empty chair.
“Sit.” He gestures to the seat beside the folder. “Read.”
I cross to the chair and lower myself into it, spine straight. Inside the folder, I find no cover sheet, only photographs, notes, and diagrams arranged in neat rows.
“The Blue Note survives because the neighborhood trusts them more than the police.” Alexei gauges my response as I take in the first page. “Debts, disappearances, rival crews stepping out of line…. People bring them problems because the Blue Note offers solutions. Quiet ones.”
The first photo shows the side entrance of the Blue Note, taken from across the street. I’ve used it a dozen times myself, arriving and leaving with Orien’s hand at my lower back. The next image zooms in, focusing on a locked cabinet built into the wall beside the back corridor.
“Since the pressure plan failed, we have to hit them harder. If we want to destroy them, we can’t simply shut down their business.” Alexei taps the second photo. “We have to poison the trust.”
My throat goes dry. “How?”
“A shipment is arriving three nights from now.” He turns to the third page. “Narcotics that were seized from one of our southern routes after a warehouse raid last month. Cheap product cut with fentanyl. Lethal in microscopic amounts.”
My lungs lock mid-breath, then resume, each inhalation a measured act of control.
“The plan is simple.” He points to the locker cabinet. “You will plant the drugs inside one of the Blue Note’s secured recovery lockers, where they store confiscated contraband taken from neighborhood dealers before disposal.”
Mikhail’s chest puffs up with self-satisfaction. “Succeed, and you prove your loyalty. Fail, and we learn it was a mistake to trust you.”
He turns to Alexei. “Unless the mission parameters need clarification from the head of the family?”
“Enough,” my brother snaps, his knuckles turning white on the table. “Levon understands the importance of his mission. Don’t you, Lev?”
“Yes, sir,” I murmur as I lift the third page to read the specifics.
The document details the exact time the shipment arrives, the location of the recovery lockers, and the rotation of Blue Note security. Despite the acid building in my throat, I keep my reaction buried.
“Once the drugs are in place, anonymous tips will follow. Then overdoses.” Alexei remains outwardly calm, but his thumbnail digs a crescent into the arm of his chair. “Kids first. Young enough to dominate the headlines.”
