Page 14 of Lethal Torture

I bite back a smile.

The trainee is a burly kid Anatoly found in the boxing gym he runs just around the corner from here, who would likely have wound up in prison without a mentor. Anatoly might well terrify the hell out of almost everyone he meets, but he’s an old softy underneath.

He’s also over sixty now. Lately I’ve felt a dark wave of guilt when I see him here in the early hours of the morning, standing out in the cold. The problem is that Anatoly won’t hear of delegating his role to anyone else, particularly since the attacks on me.

Which brings me back to the whole reason for tonight’s meeting:I need to find the leak in my organization.

For all I know, I can’t trust Anatoly either, and the thought makes me feel even more guilty, like it’s me doing the betraying.

“Hey, Zin.” Nadja smiles at me from behind the black marble counter.

I kiss her on both cheeks. “Hi, darling.”

If Anatoly is the muscle I need to terrify my customers, Nadja is the olive-skinned smoky-eyed siren I need to seduce them.

“Hey, Nads.” Charlie leans over the counter to help herself to a mint. “Make anyone cry yet?”

“Sadly, no.” Nadja curves her sheet of dark hair behind one ear and gives Charlie a wink. “But it’s only midnight.”

I look between them with raised eyebrows. Charlie and Nadja are entirely capable of talking all night in movie-line exchanges.

“Ten Things I Hate About You.Paraphrased.”Charlie grins. “Best. Movie. Ever.” She blows Nadja a kiss and wanders off to talk to Anatoly.

In one of life’s strange mysteries, Charlie, despite her blonde crew cut, mannish suits, myriad of tattoos, and brick wall of a body, is not remotely interested in women, while Nadja, who is a complete playboy fantasy, is a fully subscribed member of Club Sapphic.

The thought that either of them might be selling me out is sickening.

It’s like a prickle lodged just under my flesh, a constant, painful irritant that has me perpetually on edge. I thought I’d left that kind of head fuck in the grave with my father. After the yearsI’ve spent carefully building my team, the idea that one of them is betraying me would be heartbreaking, if I still had a heart left to break.

I’ve always had complete faith in my closest people. Now I find myself wondering if I might wake to find one of them holding a gun to my head.

“I seated your VIPs on Tier One.” Nadja gives me a rather sly glance. “If I was straight, I’d be taking that Roman Borovsky straight to the harem room. He is one long drink of fucking water.”

I give her a sly smile. “Been there, done that, long ago. And the engine matches the paintwork, believe me. But since I attended Roman’s wedding several years ago, and happen to actually like Darya, his wife, I definitely won’t be taking him out for another drive.”

It’s true. I did spend one memorable night with Roman Borovsky, back when we were both little more than teenagers. We might have been young, but were also damaged and deadly, and we both knew it.

Oddly, sleeping together removed whatever trace of initial attraction we might have had and left us with a mutual respect which has deepened over the years into a genuine alliance.

“Have Sienna take them a bottle of the good Scotch, with my compliments, and tell them I’m on my way.” I smile at Nadja, but move on rather than trading banter for a while, as I might once have done.

Maintaining my usual lighthearted manner with staff has been a challenge lately.

Joking with people who might be trying to kill you definitely takes the fun out of it.

I move past the marble entrance into a series of interconnected rooms beneath old arches. They were once the foyer of the theater and now serve as Pigalle’s public face.The vaulted ceilings and low lighting allow for both private conversations and a collective sense of muted excitement.

Despite Nadja terming it a slow night, every table is full of suited bankers from the city tipping lavishly for bottle service, their eyes lingering on the beautiful women waiting on them. Uniforms in Pigalle are cleverly cut to highlight the curve of a breast or length of a leg, creating the sense of a tantalizing banquet that is always just out of reach.

Off to the sides are the private gaming rooms with varying levels of buy-in. The higher the stakes, the more exclusive the game. More politics and business deals are done behind the closed doors of my clubs than ever happen in actual government buildings.

Men in power like to feel powerful.

I inhaled that lesson with every cut of my father’s whip. I train the girls in Pigalle Soho to make the lowliest private secretary feel like he could be the next prime minister, to soothe the wounded ego of a city trader who has lost a fortune on the stock market.

I walk down a side corridor, then punch in a code to open the door to my office and step inside.

The lights are off, leaving the semicircular office dimly lit through the curved wall of glass that overlooks the theater below. Computer screens line the wall behind me. Although there is another security office downstairs where Anatoly works, I can access all the camera feeds up here, in my private domain. I cross to the window and look down at the guests, scanning each face and occasionally zooming my cameras in on one.