Pointing at one house-shaped pill, Vaslav said, “That’s the only one in the bunch that matters, no? Apparently, the studies show it slows the dementia’s eventual progression when started early and taken long enough. But we’re talking what they’ve known for maybe thirty, forty years, so—”
What real effect it might have on him was still yet to be determined, and by the time it really mattered, would he even know the difference?
Vaslav shrugged, letting his statement cut off abruptly because frankly, he wanted to move on. He nodded at another pill on the desk. White and circular. “A migraine med that probably won’t help, but I had to indulge Bogdan to get the things I really wanted.” He pointed at a pale pink cylinder pill that had tumbled farther than the rest to the middle of the desk. “A sedative for the evening. Swears it’ll knock out a horse. At my worst, it makes me feel like a spineless slug.”
He didn’t bother with the rest of the pills. They were only meant to manage the worst symptoms that came from the other medications, or the mood stabilizer he took every morning that helped only slightly with his more neurotic behaviors and thoughts, but what difference did it make?
Vaslav scooped the pills up into his palm and dropped them back into their respective box. “The pillbox was a wedding gift from my wife—unironically, I want to enjoy these years with her. More than me, she deserves that, too. So yes,” Vaslav said, shrugging and he snapped the top closed. “She does know. Spasibo.”
Igor cleared his throat and shifted from foot to foot. The frank honesty made him uncomfortable, as it should. That was the point.
“Good to know you’ve been keeping up on all of that, then,” Igor finally settled on saying.
A good minute after the fact.
Vaslav didn’t feel a need to point out that his friend’s busy schedule—and his recent displeasure—kept him more distant than usual. Both were valid excuses. Vaslav blamed his friend for neither. Mere months ago, it would have been unheard of for Igor to miss out on Vaslav’s day-to-day activities.
“Demyan mentioned your plans for a dinner,” Vaslav hedged, opting to take their conversation in a new direction. “One where you would like my wife to make an appearance.”
Igor shrugged in the halo of light spilling in where he’d inched slightly closer to straddling the doorway’s threshold. This far at the end of the house, the music from the party was barely a murmur. “I think her presence, and rings, cement what it all means. I like to think it gives credence to the marriage and retirement rumors.”
“There are no rumors about my retirement.”
A sigh answered that indignant remark.
“Yet,” Igor replied.
Well ...
“I’m just not fond of the word,” Vaslav said. Such a thing didn’t exist in the true sense. Thieves had reversed their spiders for decades before him to say it was so, but he wasn’t foolish enough to believe that would be enough to protect him.
At least, not forever.
It was what it was.
Igor wanted an easy transition in the brotherhood as he took over. Vaslav, of course, pointed out that in the midst of reorganizing power and communication structures amongst thieves was always easier said than done. Igor’s efforts would be in vain—the wings waited with someone to strike when big changes happened in the criminal world.
Either way, it was a lesson better learned. Things like that couldn’t be taught, and Vaslav had to take a step back in that regard. He no longer had a desire to be the man constantly looking over his shoulder. Props to Igor for taking up the job—whether he wanted to or not.
“She can’t be used as a prop,” Vaslav warned.
Vera wouldn’t turn into someone’s next target, and certainly not because of someone else’s—mainly Igor—stupidity,
“At most,” Igor said, “she’ll be a passing moment in a significant day.”
Vaslav chuckled dryly. “Listen to you—romanticizing it.”
“Oh, don’t worry, Vas,” Igor replied as he turned away to leave, “I know good and well how lonely it is at the top. Also, compliments of you.”
Before the man could totally disappear beyond the doors, Vaslav called at Igor’s back, “What’s the latest news on Kiril?”
As he knew the question would—it stopped Igor’s leave in his tracks. “You don’t care.”
“Not what I asked, either.”
Igor’s shoulders lifted with a heavy exhale. “Looks like he’ll be out doing his thing again next week. Or around then. I may have paid for a decent legal representative to make a few visits.”
“And a few calls for him, too, I imagine.”
Igor didn’t confirm it, but Vaslav didn’t need him to.
Vaslav himself might not have been willing to step in on the boy’s behalf, but Igor had every right to the moment he agreed to take over for his former boss. Vaslav’s word was only law until it wasn’t, after all.
Igor glanced over his shoulder, finding Vaslav still sitting alone in the darkness of his den. “I’ll have to keep my eye on him, of course.”
Right ...
Because Kiril’s upcoming freedom meant very little at the end of the day. It certainly wasn’t a guarantee that trouble wouldn’t follow the kid—or his connection to the mafiya—beyond the bars of a cell. It also didn’t promise that he hadn’t talked.
“Good luck with that,” Vaslav muttered.
Igor shook his head, replying in kind, “Yeah.” Then, he asked, “Aren’t you getting back to the party?”
“Is it—a party?”
“You know what I mean.”
Vaslav scrubbed a hand down his jaw. “I need a break from the noise.” And hell, maybe his wife would come looking for him, and then he could get an early start on the better portion of his evening. Wouldn’t that be grand? “Why don’t you go dance with that green-eyed woman? You two certainly looked like you might enjoy it.”
“Smooth, Vas,” Igor bitched under his breath as he exited the office. “Really smooth.”
“Being lonely,” Vaslav called back, “doesn’t also mean your bed needs to be cold, old friend.”
Another lesson the man would be wise to learn from Vaslav.
*
Vera had stepped inside Vaslav’s office only a few short minutes after Igor left, and the second she closed and locked the door behind her—assured he wasn’t hiding in the dark with a severe migraine—it was on.
All Vaslav needed to get hard was Vera alone in a room with him. Fuck the door, it didn’t even have to be locked. Although, she was getting better at remembering to do so. Of course, once she had heard the laughter and music rising from down the hall, his plans turned dirty.
Why not?
No one would miss her for fifteen minutes.
Surely.
And even if they did—oh, well.
Vera was all his now. She agreed the second she let him slip a wedding band down her finger. Who was he to ignore the constant hunger that churned in his gut for the woman whenever she was within his reaching distance?
Vera taught Vaslav an important thing about people that he hadn’t given much attention to before. Love’s language. Different for everyone, the way they showed their love was often what they also needed to receive. Hers was tangled in a deep web of emotions and desires. Wrapped up entirely in her long conversations and ever-present empathy. Soft-hearted, but only sometimes soft-spoken.