Chapter 6 - The Kingpin On His Knees
The silence in the Russian restaurant was so heavy you could hear the neon light humming outside the glass.
Volkov’s six lieutenants gripped their weapons, their eyes darting nervously toward their boss, waiting for the order to open fire.
Volkov held up his trembling, thick hands, frantically signaling for his men to stand down.
"Wait! Nobody move!" Volkov barked in Russian, his face slick with greasy sweat.
He pushed his chair back, his heavy boots clattering against the floor, and slowly lowered his massive frame onto both knees right in front of the banquet table.
"Lady Helena," Volkov choked out, pressing his forehead against the hem of her trousers.
"We did not know the Mercer debt was protected by the St. Claire trust. If we had known, we would have cut Grant Campbell’s tongue out before taking his markers."
I stood behind Eleanor, my hand hovering near my holster, watching the most feared gangster in South Brooklyn groveling on the floor like a street beggar.
The plain, quiet secretary who had fetched my black coffee for thirty-six months had brought a criminal syndicate to its knees in under ninety seconds.
"Rise, Dmitri," Eleanor commanded, her voice dropping into a register of chilling absolute power.
Volkov scrambled back to his feet, keeping his head bowed, not daring to meet her piercing gaze.
"The debt is forgiven, Dmitri," Eleanor announced smoothly, walking around the table to pour herself a shot of clear vodka.
"On two conditions."
"Anything," Volkov promised instantly, wiping his brow with a silk handkerchief.
"Name your price."
"First," Eleanor said, raising one finger.
"You return every ton of diverted structural steel to the Brooklyn pier site by dawn tomorrow. If one bolt is missing, I will have the federal maritime commission seize your shipping containers in Newark."
"It will be there before the sun comes up," Volkov swore, nodding frantically.
"And second?"
Eleanor took a slow sip of the vodka, then set the glass down onto the table with a crisp, final click.
"Grant Campbell leaves New York tonight," Eleanor dictated.
"He will be put on a cargo freighter bound for your timber camps in Vladivostok. He will work off his remaining gambling markers with an honest axe for the next five years."
A cold shudder ran down my spine, but I didn't say a word.
Grant had tried to destroy our family company, steal our steel, and sell out the woman standing before me.
Sending him to an honest work camp was far more merciful than what my grandfather would have done to a traitor.
"It shall be done, Lady Helena," Volkov said, bowing deeply.
Eleanor turned toward the door, her silk coat sweeping behind her as she walked toward the exit.
"Come, Julian," she said, looking back over her shoulder with an intoxicating smile.
"We have a company to run."
I followed her out into the cool ocean night, my heart pounding with an entirely new kind of fire.
As we stepped back into the Bentley, the fog seemed to clear over the Atlantic, revealing thousands of stars glittering above the dark waters.
I looked at the woman sitting beside me, stripped of her disguise, radiant, dangerous, and magnificent.
"Who taught you to do that, Eleanor?" I asked softly, my voice filled with awe.
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"My father taught me how to shoot, Julian," she whispered, turning her hazel eyes toward mine in the dim leather interior.
"And three years of watching you taught me when to pull the trigger."
