Kostya A Dark Bratva Hate Story

by Talbot, Ginger

  "Hey, Joe,” I say pleasantly, walking up so I’m standing close to him. His eyes shuttle frantically between Diego and me. “I don’t think that’s the case. People aren’t as loyal to you as they used to be. For instance, you probably didn't notice the one of your toothbrushes went missing recently. And your hairbrush. But they did, and it was one of your men who got them for us.”

  “So?” he looks baffled.

  “You know what’s on both of those items? DNA.”

  His face goes white.

  "So what the fuck do I care?" he tries to bluster. But his hands are shaking, and beads of sweat have popped up on his forehead.

  I shove my hands in my pocket, "Your legacy, Joe, is built on lies. You’re not a fifth generation made man; you’re an imposter. We found a branch of your surviving family in Sicily, and tested your DNA against theirs. Turns out, you're not related to them."

  "That's total bullshit.” His voice goes high with panic. “Every single member of my family is dead."

  I smile with pure malice. “Your family, maybe, but not the Esposito family.”

  “He’s lying!” Joe screams at Diego, his face flushing red. “Is that why you’re here? You bought his bullshit? Look, I’ll forgive you. We can clear this up, you and me. Just take him out. All of you, against him? He’s got no chance.”

  "I have a better idea,” Diego said. “We can just notify the council. They can do their own investigating, run their own tests.”

  "Why would you do that?" Joe’s voice is an anguished wail. “It’s none of their business!”

  Claudio walks over, and he looks at Joe with a cold, analytical curiosity, like he’s studying some kind of insect. “All those years everyone kissed your ring and shit themselves if you even looked at them wrong. You’ve got some big brass ones, I’ll give you that.”

  “So what’s his story, anyway?” Diego stares at Joe with contempt. “Did you find out who he really was?”

  Joe leaps to his feet, his eyes wild, ignoring the guns pointed at him. “I’m Joe motherfucking Esposito!” he blusters. Claudio punches him in the head, knocking him back onto the couch.

  "I don't know.” I say to Diego. “I'm not sure we’d even be able to find out, after all this time. But whoever that young man was who arrived in America 50 years ago, in his teens, he wasn't an Esposito. It was a lot easier, back then, to forge a new identity. While he was in America, his compatriots back in Sicily killed the entire Esposito family. Then this fraud, this man who goes by the name of Joe Esposito, went back and killed his compatriots so they could never talk. He returned to America, and came up with that tragic story about never returning to Sicily because it would be too painful. The truth was, he didn't dare go home again, in case anyone there saw him and recognized that he wasn’t who he said he was.”

  "That’s total bullshit!" Joe snivels. But I’ve pricked the inflated balloon of his self-confidence, and he’s visibly shriveled before us. All his self-confidence came from his fake identity. He’s like the Wizard of Oz, once the curtain’s been pulled back. Tears glitter in his eyes, and he blinks frantically, his shoulders hunched.

  “The council welcomed you with open arms,” Diego says chidingly. “Based on lies. Hell, you married one of their daughters. Fathered his grand children. But you weren’t from some wealthy, prestigious family who were among the founders of the Black Hand. What were you? Some street rat who saw an opportunity? One of their foot soldiers?”

  Joe stares up at him, his face puckered in misery, and doesn’t say a word.

  "Here are your choices," I say to Joe. “I can reveal the truth about you to the council, and they will investigate, and they will verify everything that I’ve just said. Your legacy will be destroyed. You will be a laughingstock. Your children will be disgraced, and so will their children. Or, you can go out in a blaze of glory, and die a hero. Send a message to the council telling them that you caught Tiberio skimming the books. Then call Tiberio to your house, and we’ll take care of the rest. We’ll stage a scene that makes it look as if you and your men died fighting off Tiberio.”

  Joe’s gaze darts nervously to Diego. "I have money," he whines. "You kill Kostya and keep this quiet, and I will make you all richer than you ever dreamed. You can have everything you want. Hell, I'll let you replace Tiberio. You'll be the Chicago boss."

  "Actually, I think Claudio would make an excellent boss," I say. "I was picturing Diego for your seat on the council."

  “Me? The Chicago boss?” Claudio looks shocked. “Jesus, that’s a lot of fucking paperwork. Rocco, you do it.”

  “Nahh, they always want someone who looks respectable. Someone who’s married, or at least willing to be married.” Rocco’s lip curls in contempt. “There’s not a woman on earth who I can stand to be around for more than an hour without wanting to put her lights out.”

  “Excuse all of you,” Diego snaps. “If the council accepts me, I will decide who’s Chicago boss, and they will take the job and fucking like it.”

  "Bullshit! They'd never fucking accept a mutt like you on the council! You’re one step up from a street soldier! You got no fucking pedigree!" Joe splutters.

  Diego grins fiercely. "I'm willing to take that risk."

  "Times are changing,” I say. “And Diego is extremely popular, and everyone knows how much profits have increased since he became underboss,” I say. “Much as you and Joe try to take credit, the council knows better. Everything turned around as soon as Diego was promoted.”

  “My son is in line for the job. He’ll get it,” Joe bluffs.

  I shake my head. “I’ve done my homework, and Diego confirms it. Your son doesn’t want a council seat. He’s a numbers man, he’s good at it. In fact, now that I think of it, when you send that message to the council, you’re going to tell them that if you don’t survive today’s meeting with Tiberio, you want Diego to replace you. It’s time for the council to get some new blood, and you believe he’d be the best man for the job.”

  Joe begs, he wheedles, he offers bribes that would leave him bankrupt. But in the end, he does what Diego tells him to. There’s no other option for him. If we told the council what he’d done, they’d verify it and then kill him in an agonizingly slow and cruel fashion, for making fools of them for the last fifty years. And his name would be a disgrace, and his children’s lives would be ruined. His wife, dying of cancer – she only has months to live, and she’d die knowing she was married to a liar. Everything his family owns would be stripped from them – because it was all earned by his fraud.

  This way, he dies quick – a bullet to the head – and we keep his secret.

  Within the hour, the entire power structure of the mafia in the Midwest has been forever changed.

  Joe sends the message to the council, and then he calls his guards in. By the time they come strolling through the door, Diego’s shot him in the back of the head.

  His guards walk into the ambush without a clue. We kill every last one of Joe’s them except for the one who gave us the toothbrush and comb – he’s on Diego’s payroll.

  Tiberio and his men show up minutes later. The fight is fierce and quick. Diego insists on killing Tiberio himself. He stands over him and shoots him in the gut, right there in the living room, and as Tiberio screams in pain, Diego leans over him. “You killed my father. His name was Roberto Costa,” he says. “He meant nothing to you, so little you didn’t even attend his funeral. But he meant everything to me. He meant everything to my mother. She died of a broken heart, and I ended up on the fucking street.”

  “Glurrghhh....” Tiberio writhes in pain.

  Diego puts his foot on the gunshot wound, and presses down. Tiberio screams.

  “I had some hard years there, living on the street after my parents died. Eating out of fucking garbage cans. And you know what kept me going? Picturing this very day.” His eyes shine with righteous fury. “I worked my way up in the organization, and the first time you met me? You didn’t even recognize me, or the la
st name Costa. Here’s a newsflash for you, I look just like my dad. He was a good man, you know that? I used to be a good man. But you people made me a monster.”

  Tiberio’s in agony, trying to beg for his life, but it’s hard to understand through all the gurgling and choking. Diego stands there and watches, like a lion with its prey, kicking Tiberio, jabbing him in his gut wound, wrenching every last sob and whimper from the man until the light fades from his eyes.

  Then he looks at me. There’s a lightness to him now, and it’s one that I recognize. I felt the same way after I killed the men who assassinated my father.

  “Your debt to us is repaid,” he says.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Anya

  It’s been three days since Kostya discovered that Raisa and her friends escaped. Kostya’s not speaking to me, and I’ve taken to sleeping on the living room sofa. I don’t see Aleksandr or Mikhail at all, which is weird, but when I try to ask Kostya where they are, he just walks away. That’s on the rare occasions I see him.

  He’s drinking a lot, too. He seems to have sunk into some kind of dark cavern of gloom, and I can’t help him if he won’t talk to me.

  Yesterday I asked Kostya if I could leave. He just gave me a blank look and stalked off. I’ve been trying to open various windows and doors which might lead to the outside. They’re all locked. I grabbed a chair and tried to smash a windowpane; the glass seems to be bulletproof. Of course, even if I could shimmy out the window, I’m sure that his men who patrol the grounds would stop me. I did it more out of boredom and curiosity than actual hope of escape.

  And do I want to escape? I still want Kostya – but I want all of him. I want us to be a team. I want him to trust me enough to let me in, to turn to me for help.

  The cook brings meals out to the dining room at breakfast, lunch and dinner, sets them on the table, and walks away. Kostya doesn’t join me.

  I read, I watch television, I sleep on the couch in the living room. My whip marks are mostly healed, and I can move without pain. Kostya’s provided me with clothes, in exactly my size, hanging in a section of his closet. I go in his room to change every morning and he’s never there – he always goes to his office, and that door is locked.

  So this afternoon when I am eating lunch in the dining room, and I see him pass me, heading to the living room, I jump up and hurry after him. I catch up with him at the bar, pouring himself a drink, and I grab the glass away from him.

  “Kostya! Will you please just talk to me?” I shout. He takes the glass back, and drains it in one long gulp.

  “For the love of God! If you’re not going to spend all your days ignoring me, then just let me go!” I stomp my foot in frustration.

  “You want to leave me?” he asks, leaning on the bar and glowering at me.

  I soften my voice. I want to reach him. To help him. “Part of me does, Kostya. And not because of everything that you’ve done to me. Because you’ve just given up.”

  He grabs the vodka bottle and refills his glass. “You want a drink?”

  “No, I want you to talk to me.”

  He looks at me, blearily. His eyes are blood shot. He’s got a shadowy beard growing in. “I haven’t given up. I’m spending all day, every day, trying to find Mikhail and the girls so that I can contain the damage. Trying to fix the problem you caused,” he says accusingly, and downs half the drink in one long gulp.

  Wait, what? Mikhail is with them?

  I feel more hopeful than ever now – but also, furious at Kostya. How dare he make it sound like this is my fault? “You actually think that I shouldn’t have encouraged my friend to try to save herself from a short, horrible life as a sex slave?” I say incredulously.

  His gaze slides away. “I told you I was working on a way to get them back. If you’d just been a little patient...”

  “Seriously?” I hiss. “How patient would you have been if it was your sister?”

  “Damn it, Anya. Yes, I know what they faced over there, but in the end, I’d have found a way to get them out and some day they could have put it all in the past. I’d have given them a nice chunk of cash to set them up in new lives.”

  “First time you ever mentioned this to me.”

  “I told you I was working on it! You should have had more faith in me! If my stepfather finds out they’re gone, then my family is fucked! And you knew that, when you encouraged Raisa to escape.” His angry, accusing gaze drills into me.

  The hell with the nice approach. Like that ever worked with him. “You know what? Boo fucking hoo. I don’t care.”

  He stares at me in disbelief.

  “Seriously.” His voice his thick with fury. “You don’t care about the suffering Elizaveta will experience?”

  “Of course I do. It makes me sick. But it also makes me sick what was going to happen to Raisa.” I lean forward, glowering at him. “Why do you think your family’s lives are more important than those of my friend? You had to make a choice. You chose your family. I had to make a choice too. I chose Raisa.”

  The fight seems to leak out of him. He slumps against the bar, his eyes glazed. Too much alcohol, too little sleep. He’s killing himself by inches.

  “Fuck, Anya. I’ve wracked my brains trying to think of a way to get my family out. Maybe you can come up with something. Unless you’re so angry at me that there’s no room left in your heart for them.”

  I look at him warily. Does he really mean it? Will he truly, finally, turn to me for help?

  “Come sit on the sofa with me. Tell me everything about the situation.”

  He nods, glances over at the glass, but leaves it there. We sit side by side on the sofa, and his warmth and nearness calms my agitated mind, despite everything. When we’re together, it just feels so right, as if our strengths pool together and

  “I’ve missed you,” I tell him.

  He manages a resigned smile. “I missed you too. I miss sleeping with you. Joking around with you. Watching terrible movies with you.”

  “We could be like that again. Just let me help you. This situation with your stepfather can’t be delayed much longer. You’re waiting for him to make the first move, which means that you’re in the defensive position. That’s never good.”

  “Well, it’s a problem with a lot of moving parts. My stepfather is still one of the Elders. For me to be able to take him out, I’d have to convince them that he’s become a liability. I’ve been gathering all the evidence I can. He’s getting forgetful, and impulsive, and acting rash. He is trying to provoke a war with the mafia here in Chicago without having consulted with the Elders. And there’s no just cause for the war, it's all his doing. That will cost us a lot of money and bring down the heat on us. It might be enough, but I don’t want to risk my family’s life on ‘might’.”

  “Okay. What else is going on?”

  “My sister is at summer camp, and I could get her away safely. She has a passport, I have connections, I could get her to America. But the real problem is my mother.” He scowls. “She doesn’t want to believe that my stepfather would ever really harm her, and when I try to talk to her about Elizaveta, she changes the subject and says that he just wants what’s best for her. She’s in denial. So I’m stuck.”

  A chill settles over me.

  He sees the expression on my face. “What?”

  “You’re not going to like my answer,” I say.

  “Tell me anyway.”

  “You can’t save both your mother and your sister, and you know it. So pick your sister. Your mother made her choice – to marry a Bratva man. And she made it twice. When he was gunned down, that was her chance to walk away from the life entirely.”

  “That is not fair to her at all,” he says heatedly. “She genuinely loved my father, and he was a very different man than Yeger. He represented the best of the Bratva. Strength, honor and courage. Forging our own path, bowing down to no man. And he treated her like a queen. She had no idea what she was getting into when she married Yeger. He
was my father’s best friend, after all. And she’s been raised to be nothing but a wife and mother. She didn’t know how to live on her own. She didn’t know how to do anything else, how to be anything else.”

  “She could have married someone who wasn’t Bratva.”

  Kostya’s face flushes with anger. I know how much he loves his mother, and what I’m asking of him, he will never do. But I persist, because it’s the only option. “She knew about the Bratva lifestyle. Her choices are the reason why your sister is being used as a pawn in your stepfather’s sick games.”

  “So your brilliant idea is to just abandon my mother?” he snarls. “Sentence her to death? I was a fool to ask you for advice!”

  “My brilliant idea is that you should grab your sister, get her somewhere safe, and then go to the council, and do everything you can to convince them of the fact that Yeger is a danger. Maybe even get the Italians to back you up on the fact that they want peace and your stepfather keeps trying to push them into a very expensive war which could easily expose your operations to the public.”

  “You think I should do that, knowing that if I succeed in stripping him of power, Yeger will have my mother killed?”

  “You literally have no other option. And you know it. If you did, you’d have come up with something by now. And either way, sooner or later, Yeger will get rid of her, so why not at least save your sister and stop living under Yeger’s thumb?”

  His face flushes with anger. His rage is so thick, so intense, I can feel it prickling my skin like heat rash. “How could you even suggest that? I’m done with you, Anya! Get out!”

  “What?” I say, stunned. He can’t possibly mean that.

  “I said, get the fuck out!” He leaps to his feet and grabs me by the arm, yanking me to my feet.