He entered a small, sloppily kept bedroom and immediately saw Slava and Zoya, his ex-wife’s cousins. The pair had grown up about thirty miles from Moscow. They had been in the army until the summer of ’98, then they emigrated to America. They’d been working for him for less than eight months, so he was just getting to know them.

“You live in a garbage dump,” he said. “I know you have plenty of money. What do you do with it?”

“We have family at home,” said Zoya. “Your relatives are there too.”

The Wolf tilted his head. “Awhh, so touching. I had no idea you had such a big heart of gold, Zoya.” He motioned for the bull to leave and said, “Shut the door. I’ll be out when I’m finished here. It might be a while.”

The Couple was tied up together on the floor. Both were in their underwear. Slava had on shorts patterned with little ducks. Zoya wore a black bra with a matching bikini thong.

The Wolf finally smiled. “What am I going to do with you two, huh?”

Slava began to laugh out loud, a nervous, high-pitched cackling. He had thought they were going to be killed, but this would just be a warning. He could see this in the Wolf’s eyes.

“So what happened? Tell me quickly. You knew the rules of the game,” he said.

“Maybe it was getting too easy. We wanted a little more of a challenge. It’s our mistake, Pasha. We got sloppy.”

“Never lie to me,” the Wolf said. “I have my sources. They are everywhere!”

He sat on the arm of an easy chair that looked as if it had been in this hideous bedroom for a hundred years. Dust puffed from the old chair as it took his weight.

“You like him?” he asked Zoya. “My wife’s cousin?”

“I love him,” she said, and her brown eyes went soft. “Always. Since we were thirteen years old. Forever, I loved him.”

“Slava, Slava,” the Wolf said, and walked over to the muscular man on the floor. He bent to give Slava a hug. “You are my ex-wife’s blood relative. And you betrayed me. You sold me out to my enemies, didn’t you? Sure, you did. How much did you get? A lot, I hope.”

Then he twisted Slava’s head as if he were opening a big jar of pickles. Slava’s neck snapped, a sound that the Wolf had come to love over the years. His trademark in the Red Mafiya.

Zoya’s eyes widened to about twice their normal size. But she didn’t make a sound, and because of that the Wolf understood what tough customers she and Slava really were, how dangerous they had been to the safety of the organization. “I’m impressed, Zoya,” he said. “Let’s talk some.”