Crash (Brazen Bulls MC #1)(59)
One of Kirill’s men said something in Russian, his tone and his face leering, and the others laughed. Kirill turned an angry look on them and said something in Russian in a low, deadly voice. All the Volkovs straightened right up.
Kirill nodded toward Ox. “Maddie, she is yours, no?”
Ox nodded, slowly, ready to get his back up.
Rad squared his shoulders. Fuck, the Russians were going to start the shit.
“She is beautiful woman. I make apology for my men.”
Ox nodded again, this time with more ease. “Accepted.”
When they went into the chapel, Ox held back, and Rad saw him catch Maddie’s hand and say something to her, then kiss her cheek and head for the chapel.
The men took their seats—Delaney, Dane, and Rad in their usual places, Kirill at the opposite end, with his men on either side. The Horde officers took up the remaining seats. The other members of the Bulls and the Horde stood.
When the vodka and glasses were delivered on a tray, it wasn’t Maddie who brought it in. It was Kymber, a regular sweetbutt. Kirill made eye contact with Ox and gave him an understanding nod.
Okay. One crisis averted.
Delaney poured vodka for everyone and passed the glasses around. This was a thing Kirill always wanted to do—to open and close every sit-down with a toast. No big oration, just za vstrechu at the beginning and vashe zdorovie at the end, and everybody knocked back a glass of vodka. Rad had looked the words up in a Russian-English dictionary. It had taken him some time to figure out the spelling, but he was fairly sure the first one meant ‘to our meeting’ and the last meant ‘to your health.’ Pretty standard and danger-free.
Kirill held up his glass. “Za vstrechu.” His Russian companions and the Bulls echoed him. The Horde simply nodded, except for Little Ike, who tried saying the words. At Kirill’s nod, everyone drank.
And it was time for business.
“I make this meeting to know men who carry our wares over two states. To work with strangers is not good business, yes? We never hear of your club, the…Night Horde, until Brian say about you. I see for myself.” He looked directly at Big Ike. “This your club, I think.”
“I’m the president. I started it. So yeah, it’s my club. But all Horde have a say.”
“You do not do this work before. You are sure you can?”
Rad saw Big Ike’s composure begin to tatter. “The Horde protects our whole town. We can protect your guns.”
Kirill didn’t like that answer. He wanted humility from the Horde president. He wanted Big Ike to show that he understood where the power tipped at this table.
It was the Bulls’ table, but in this meeting, the power tipped away from Delaney, and nowhere near Big Ike. Shit, the Volkovs had only been in the country for about five years, and already they were stretching their reach from coast to coast. With Kirill’s mother, Irina, at the helm, they’d made themselves a force to be reckoned with back east, where the Italians had reigned unchallenged for decades, until the Feds had finally started finding cracks in their sacred omerta.
Russian families like the Volkovs grew up in those cracks. They’d found their power and strength in the Soviet era and come to the US after Gorbachev opened the markets and killed their business. If anything, they were tougher and more dangerous than the Italians.
So yeah, Kirill had the greatest gravitational pull at this table, and wise men knew how to acknowledge that without kneeling.
Big Ike wasn’t that wise. He met Kirill’s steady look with one of his own. Finally, Kirill turned to Delaney. “You wish to put your good name on this deal, Brian?”
Delaney considered Big Ike. The table nearly groaned from the weight of the tension among all the men. Then he faced Kirill again. “Yes. This is a good deal. Gives you a better route through the Midwest. Straight shot from Indiana to Tulsa, and then we got it from there. The Horde won’t let us down.”
Kirill stared into his empty glass. While he thought, if that was what he was doing, no one spoke. Rad scanned the table, trying to pinpoint where trouble would start if it was going to. He didn’t think Big Ike would be the first to move, though he would likely be the catalyst. No, it would be Kirill’s right hand, Misha, the big man at his side, who was always at his side.
Rad’s job would be to hold the Horde back, not to go for Misha. Whatever was going on between Delaney and Big Ike, the Bulls’ best friends in this room were from Russia, not Missouri. He wanted his club on the right side if this went wrong.
After a full minute at least, Kirill looked up at Delaney. “You have my trust, Brian. You have my mother’s trust. We have building good…uh…svyaz…good…”—his eyes sought the right word in the ceiling above them—“relationship, yes?”
“Yes, Kirill. A very good relationship.”
“Then I extend this trust I have for you to your friends.”
Before Rad could let out a breath in relief, Kirill added, “But one thing more I need. This run, this first. Your men to join Night Horde on it. To see things are right. The take, you will share equally. If all is well, then Horde take over after.”
He wanted the Bulls to ride with the Horde—all the way to Indiana and back—as their babysitters. For half a take. Shit. That would be a whole lot of bikers around that truck. Hard to keep a low profile. They’d have to make up some kind of law-abiding reason for a two-club run.