Page 253 of Sweet Ruin

“You called me right away?”

“Yes, sir. The second the car turned the corner. I wasn’t gonna leave the door.”

“Good.”

“Boss, I’m sorry. I should have⁠—”

“You should have what? Gotten shot in an alley? No.” I wrap my hand around the wheel and squeeze. “You did it right.”

He exhales with pent-up relief. “I don’t know what he said to her. I couldn’t hear anything from the back. I don’t know what he wanted or what she told him.”

“Was she upset when he left?”

“I don’t know. She came out with the trash a couple hours ago and told me to go home. That was before. After he left, she didn’t come out. She’s just been working.”

Working, after the day she’s had. I’m not surprised.

“You want me to go in and talk to her?” asks Josef.

“No. Stay there until the night shift arrives,” I instruct him. “I have a feeling we’ll get answers soon enough.”

As I suspected, the photograph comes the next morning.

Anton brings it to the dining table on a silver tray, which is his way of telling me he doesn’t like it. An unmarked white envelope, hand-delivered to the door by a kid on a bike who was gone before Anton got down the steps.

Inside is one picture, shot from the street through the front glass. Osip Vetrov sitting in one of Lilah’s little café chairs with his hat on the table. Lilah standing a few feet off with her arms folded.

There’s no note. There doesn’t need to be. He took the picture and sent it so I’ll know she heard him out.

I understand implicitly what he wants from me.

He wants me to drive to Sheepshead Bay, stand on her porch, and tell her what happens to people who deal with Osip Vetrov. He wants me to burn his chop shop and put two of his nephews in the river so he can go to the old men in Brighton and say, Look, look what Semyon’s boy did over a bakery. Most of all, he wants me to weaponize my leverage and take the building, because the moment I take it from her by force, she becomes his. She’d sign anything he put in front of her. She’d sign it in blood. Mine, preferably.

He offers me only choices that prove her right about what I am.

I refuse them all.

Niko comes at ten and sees me staring holes in the photograph on the table.

“Alright,” he says. “What do you wanna do?”

“Call Gershon. Tell him I’m coming at one and to clear his afternoon.”

“Gershon.” He blinks. “Your lawyer? That’s not who I thought you’d say. Are you feeling okay?” He plops down in a seat. “Kane. Vetrov stepped inside her shop. He could’ve hurt her, if he’d wanted to.”

I wave the photograph at him. “I saw.”

“And that’s your answer? Gershon? We’re gonna be lawyerly about this? Why aren’t we ripping his fuckin’ head off?” Niko rubs his hand over his jaw. “Yuri’s got four men waiting in the yard because they figured today’s the day.”

“Send them home.”

He doesn’t move. “You’re really not gonna touch him.”

“Nope.”

“Why the hell not?”

Because if I put a hand on Osip Vetrov now, it becomes about him and me. That leaves Lilah standing in the middle holding the last piece, where she’s been since before she ever knew my name. Caught in the crossfire. Vulnerable.