Hidden Monsters (Volkov Bratva #4)(119)

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Six months later…

Klaus turned his collar up to the wind as he headed back to his hotel. He’d spent most of his night standing outside a tavern in the heart of Hell’s Kitchen staring through the large windows to the girl behind the bar. She wore a small black apron around her waist, that familiar burnished red hair pulled into a messy bun and stabbed through with a pencil. Though he stood there for a little more than an hour, she’d been oblivious to his presence. She was lost in the life, whatever life he had left her to after he’d left New York City.

Ever since his return, he’d contemplated going to her, sparking up the conversation they should have had long ago, but he hadn’t been the same person he was now. Still bitter, he still harbored anger toward the world, but at some point, that red film of rage had lifted and he was no longer a slave to it. He didn’t know if he had her to thank for showing him kindness at a time when he needed it.

Klaus never liked being wrong. He hated it, in fact, and more than that, he disliked making mistakes. And now, as he headed home after a long night and time spent wishing for other things—things he had no business wishing for considering the life he led—he might have made a mistake five years ago when he’d left New York City and the girl, Reagan.

Somehow, despite all the people he had met and the sheer volume of information he processed daily, he still remembered her name.

That told him all he needed to know.

Reaching his motel soon after, he dug the key out of his pocket. Before he’d received the brand on his neck, Klaus hadn’t cared what hotel he stayed at as long as it was clean. Now, his stipulations were different. While it still had to be clean, he preferred motels since the managers usually looked the other way and accepted cash only. He also preferred places where an actual key was needed to get into the room. It was all too easy to duplicate an electronic key.

Celt had driven that point home since he was a freak about security.

Disengaging the lock, Klaus turned the knob and pushed, walking through and slamming the door behind him. It was dark in the room, all the lights turned out, but there was just enough moonlight streaking through the blinds for him to see Mishca sitting at the small dining table, turning a cigarette over between his fingers. While he might have felt surprise at seeing him there, especially since he hadn’t noticed anything off about the door, Klaus didn’t let it show.

He shrugged out of his leather jacket, tossing it on the bed, pulling a chair up so he could start unlacing his boots and taking them off. “Are you going to continue and sit in the darkness or get the f*ck on with whatever you came here to say?”

Since the Albanians took Luka, Mishca and he hadn’t seen much of each other, and the few times they had was because of Lauren. Klaus didn’t doubt that there would always be this tension between them for the sins of others. But they had come a long way since Klaus had stared at him through the scope of a rifle, contemplating taking his life.

Tossing his boots to an empty corner of the room, Klaus sat back in his chair, laying his arms on the armrests and studying the man across from him. He knew all too well how singular events could change everything. While Mishca had always seemed so cold, except when it came to his wife who he let his guard down around, there was something almost weary about his expression tonight, one that sparked a shred of pity in Klaus.

He might have led a life that was mostly death and darkness, but Mishca was burdened with a legacy that he wasn’t. He still wore his usual blank expression, never wanting to reveal his thoughts even for a moment, but Klaus was finding it easier to read him.

…Or maybe it was because it was easy to read his own reflection.

One eyebrow raised, Klaus decided to break the silence Mishca was seemingly determined to keep. “What do you want, Russian?”

“Where is he?”

Klaus didn’t have to ask who he meant because they both already knew. There was only one person who Mishca would come to him, specifically, about. But the real question was, why now? What had changed that made him track Klaus down in the wee hours of the night?

He tried to reason out the answer on his own, but not coming up with an answer, he decided to ask. “Even if I knew, why would you want to know?”

“My reasons are my own.”

Typical vague Russian bullshit. “Then I can’t help you.”

The muscle in Mishca’s jaw jumped as he ground his teeth, probably in an effort not to give a retort. “Whatever your reason for keeping Valon’s history to yourself is your business. I won’t pry. But on this, I need answers.”

“Why?” Klaus asked, genuinely wanting to know. “I thought he was dead to you.”

Mishca frowned. “You know that’s not true.”

“You wanna know what I don’t understand about you, Russian? You claimed you wanted to hash this shit out, to put the past behind us, but you went to my handler directly.” Klaus shook his head in disgust. “I could have handled that shit on my own.”

“Could you?” Mishca asked in the infuriatingly condescending tone of his. “Do you know the sheer number of people involved in that mission?”

“Obviously. I think I was there, Russian.”

“Then you know about the team who raided the Besnik compound in London? And the other that infiltrated a meeting on a yacht in the middle of the Bering Sea?”