SWNOVELS Heavy Crown: Chapter 25
When I wake up, Yelena is sleeping beside me, curled up against me like a kitten.
Her face doesn’t look tense with strain anymore. Instead, she’s relaxed and peaceful. Like she used to be when we were alone together, just the two of us, before we were married.
The sight of her laying there, happy in her sleep, away from the reality of our situation, makes my heart seize up in my chest. The love I feel for her is still there, stronger than ever. But it’s drenched in pain and regret. It hurts to look at her, and yet I can’t look away.
Gently, I smooth her pale hair away from her face. I kiss her, softly, on her forehead.
Then I get up from the mattress.
She doesn’t stir a muscle. She doesn’t hear me leave.
I close the door behind me, listening to the magnetic bolt slide into place.
It’s for Yelena’s own safety.
My mind is clear, and more focused than ever. I can see what I have to do, laid out before me like a chessboard.
I was never the planner, the strategist. I was never meant to lead this family.
But my father is dead. Dante is in Paris. Nero is lying in a hospital bed.
I’m the only one left. The only one who can finish this.
I remember what Papa said, that last night that we played against each other, up on the roof:
Play the opening like a book. The middlegame like a magician. And the endgame like a machine.
When this whole thing began, I played by the rules. I did everything the way I was supposed to—I met with Yenin, and I signed the contract.
Now it’s time to become a magician instead. It’s time to surprise and shock him. It’s time to make everything he holds dear turn to dust in his hands, without him understanding how it’s even happening.
And then in end . . . I’ll kill them all, as cold and relentless as any machine. Without hesitation, without mistakes, and without mercy.
I’m not angry at Yelena anymore. I understand that she was as blinded by love and hope as I was. But she’s safest exactly where she is. She can’t be a part of what happens next.
I run over the information I confirmed with Yelena, the day I interrogated her down in the cell.
I picture the chessboard, with Alexei Yenin in the center as the King, safely surrounded by his men who will protect him to the death. In a chess match, the object is to capture enough of your opponent’s pieces that the King becomes vulnerable. You have to lure him out of safety.
In a chess game, each piece is assigned a point value. The points have no bearing on the game—capturing the King is all that matters. But it gives you a sense of how well you’re doing. Of how much you’ve managed to reduce the other player’s forces.
I picture Yenin’s men as those pieces.
His low-level bratoks are the pawns, of course. He has a dozen or so of these men, and I’ll kill as many as I have to, though they aren’t my main focus. If Yenin is dead, they won’t come for revenge on their own. One was already shot at the wedding: the baby-faced driver Timur.
On the next level up, Yenin has his boyeviks, his warriors. Those would be his Knights. Yelena says he has four main enforcers: Iov, Pavel, Denis, and Pyotr. Two were killed at the church: Iov, the pretend kidnapper was crushed by the triptych, and Pavel, the man I shot with Adrian’s gun. The two remaining are Denis, a former bare-knuckle boxer from St. Petersburg, and Pyotr, who Yelena tells me was a freelance killer for hire before her father recruited him to come to Chicago.
Then Yenin has his brigadiers—the lieutenants in charge of a particular aspect of his business. Yelena says his most trusted lieutenants were likewise at the wedding: her uncle Vale and her cousin Kadir. Vale is the one who tried to shoot me, and hit Yelena instead. He handles bookkeeping and bribes, while Kadir is in charge of stocking Yenin’s sex clubs and strip joints with a fresh supply of girls from the Ukraine and Belarus. Those two men are Yenin’s Bishops.
Adrian Yenin could be considered the Queen—Yenin’s right hand. But in truth, Adrian is young and inexperienced, and not particularly vicious. He’s more like a Rook: important for certain maneuvers, but not truly crucial.
It’s Rodion who’s the Queen—Yenin’s most powerful and dangerous asset. He’s also the greatest threat to Yelena. If I don’t eliminate him, then even if Yenin and I are both killed, Rodion will come for her. I’m sure of it.
I compare my forces to Yenin’s.
I have Jace, who alone escaped from the wedding completely unharmed through sheer dumb luck. Since he’s the person I trust most, I’ve sent him to the hospital to guard Nero’s room 24/7. I told him not to leave Nero’s side for any reason, and to shoot anyone who tries to come through the door who isn’t a doctor or nurse.
In addition, I have Matteo Carmine’s two sons stationed in the hallway outside Nero’s door, watching the elevator and the stairs. With Nero sequestered on the top floor, this should keep Yenin’s men from finishing what they started.
The Carmines are one of the three Italian families most loyal to my father. The other two are the Marinos and the Bianchis. Bosco Bianchi is a fucking idiot, but he owes us for getting him out of a jam last year. Antonio and Carlo Marino are both strong fighters. I’ll use them, and my father’s top three enforcers: Stefano, Zio, and Tappo.
Stefano is a ferocious fighter even though he’s pushing fifty—he’s been collecting debts on my father’s behalf for the last thirty years. Zio is the youngest of the bunch and relatively inexperienced, but he’s my cousin, and intensely loyal to Papa, who paid every expense for his baby sister’s heart surgery a few years back. Tappo is surprisingly small for an enforcer, but he’s vicious as they come. He was a lightweight MMA champion, known for knocking out his opponents with one punch. Even I’d think twice before squaring up against him.
It’s not a very big army. I’m realizing now how many of my father’s men have grown old, settling into less demanding duties. Most of them work in the construction or hospitality arms of our business now. They’re barely even gangsters anymore.
I’d be worried—but I also have Mikolaj Wilk and four of his men.
I’d put the braterstwo up against anyone, and I’d put Miko against all of them. They’re just as vicious as the Russians, and even more cunning.
So, early in the morning, while Yelena is still sleeping down in her cell, I drive back to Mikolaj’s mansion so we can launch our attack.