Page 96 of Scarlet Vows

“Why?” he asks.

Why? The big, billion-dollar question.

“I wish to do it with minimum manpower of my own. I want my men to see me as someone able to do the impossible, to pull off deals, to make things happen.”

Santo gives me a shit-eating grin, and it makes me want to punch his teeth out. “You want respect.”

“Yes.”

“The thing we all want.” He nods. “I’ll do it.”

“Just like that?”

“Just like that,” he says.

I frown. “Deals in our world don’t exist without an exchange.”

“I said I’d do it.”

“And I asked what you want for it.”

The grin stays on his face. “Do you always inspect gift horse mouths, Ilya?”

“I like to see if they’re Trojan.” I smile. “You must want something.”

“Look, obviously I do, but I don’t know what yet. There’sthe business I mentioned when I gave you my card, so maybe that, but whatever it is, we’ll work it all out later.”

I nod and take another swallow of the vodka. At the restaurant, he was even vaguer. And I don’t like the dodge and parry of his words.

People want things. A favor gets a favor. Sometimes people want money. They want some of your power. Or they want your backup when it’s their turn.

There are degrees to things, and I don’t want to just agree to find I’ve essentially signed away my firstborn. Metaphorical firstborn. I don’t see myself with children. I don’t see myself with any woman except for Alina. And even then, I’m not sure I can quite picture a future between us.

Not one that I want.

But I digress.

What the fuck is it Santo wants? That’s the point here. The fact he keeps brushing it off sits badly with me. But we both know I’m not in a place to bargain.

Still…maybe I should just do this on my own, find another way.

“Santo, I think?—”

“I’ll be honest.” He downs and then refills his glass. “I’ve wanted Simonov out of the picture for a long time. So in a way, Ilya, by your asking me this, you’re doing me the favor.”

“This makes us even, then?” I joke.

Santo laughs and shakes his head, then he looks at me, his expression deadly serious. “Not even close. So, do we have an arrangement?”

“If you want to get rid of him, then why haven’t you?”

He breathes out. “Many reasons. I might be don, but there are other alliances who don’t want dirty business with the Russians. A fight is what they mean by dirty. And our territories aren’t in dispute. We’ll work on this together. Poolour talents and resources. I know Simonov, his weaknesses. And I have a card up my sleeve.”

“What kind of card?”

He hesitates a moment. “If all else fails, or even if it doesn’t, I can call in someone to deal with it and do it in a way that your bratva knows it was because of you, but we avoid a war.”

Santo means an assassin.