“That’s unfair,” Roma said plainly. He had little else to counter.
“Whatever,” Benedikt muttered, pushing past Alisa. She stumbled ever so slightly, and Roma rushed forward, calling after their cousin, refusing to let him have the last word. But Benedikt did not so much as glance back while he took the stairs down. His footsteps were already thudding along the second floor by the time Roma neared Alisa and took her elbow.
“Benedikt Ivanovich Montagov,” Roma yelled down. “You—”
His frustrated insult was drowned out by the slam of the front door.
Silence.
“I just wanted to cheer him up,” Alisa said quietly.
Roma sighed. “I know. It’s not your fault. He’s . . . having some difficulties.”
“Because Marshall is dead.”
Alisa’s words were heavy, thick—a terrible weight sliding across her tongue. Hard truths tended to be that way, she supposed.
“Yes,” Roma managed. “Because Marshall is . . .” Her brother could not finish his sentence. He merely looked away and cleared his throat, blinking rapidly. “I must go, Alisa. Papa is expecting me.”
“Wait,” Alisa said, her hand snaking out and snatching the back of Roma’s suit jacket before he could start down the stairs. “I heard Papa’s meeting with Dimitri. He—” Alisa looked around, making sure no one else was nearby. She lowered her voice further. “Dimitri has a mole in the Scarlet Gang. Maybe even their inner circle. He’s been siphoning information from a source direct to Lord Cai.”
Roma was shaking his head. He had started shaking his head before Alisa had even finished speaking.
“Little good that will do us now,” he said. “Be careful, Alisa. Stop eavesdropping on Dimitri.”
Alisa’s jaw slackened. As soon as Roma tried to ease his jacket out of her grip, she only tightened her hold, not letting him leave.
“You’re not curious?” she asked. “How did Dimitri put a spy into the inner circle of the Scarlet Gang—”
“Maybe he is simply more intelligent than I am,” Roma interrupted dryly. “He knows how to sight when someone is a liar and can establish his lie first—”
Alisa stomped her feet. “Don’t mope!” she said.
“I am not moping!”
“You mope,” Alisa insisted. She looked over her shoulder again, hearing a rustling on the third floor and waiting for whoever it was to retreat to their room before speaking again. “Another thing I thought you would want to know: Papa received a threat. Someone claims to have the ability to resurrect the monster.”
Roma lifted a single dark brow. This time, when he eased his jacket out of Alisa’s grip, she let go, seeing no point in accosting her brother any longer.
“The monster is dead, Alisa,” he said. “I’ll see you later, yes?”
Roma walked away, his saunter casual. He could have fooled anyone, in that tailored suit and cold stare. But Alisa saw his fingers tremble, saw the muscle in his jaw twitch when he bit down too hard to keep his expression steady.
He was still her brother. He wasn’t gone entirely.
Three
One cabaret in White Flower territory is particularly loud tonight.
Business at the Podsolnukh is usually booming anyway, tables full and raucous for the antics that the showgirls pull onstage, overspilling with people and alcohol bottles and every combination of the two. The only place that may compete with its noise and vigor is the fight club next door, the one tucked underneath an otherwise unassuming bar, unknown to the city if not for the constant stream of visitors.
When the door to the Podsolnukh opens at the exact stroke of midnight, a gust of the winter wind blows in, but not a soul in the establishment feels it. Out there, when the day breaks, they are garbage collectors and beggars and gangsters, barely scraping by. In here, crammed shoulder to shoulder at every table, they are invincible so long as the jazz continues playing, so long as the lights don’t drop, so long as the night lives on and on and on.
The visitor who entered at midnight sits down. He watches White Flowers throw coins into the air, frivolous with their unending excess, grabbing showgirls adorned in white like they are brides, not runaways from Moscow with smiles as cracked as their hands.
Everyone is here for the exact same reason. Some chance it with drunken stupor, pouring gasoline into their veins so that maybe, just maybe, something will ignight in an otherwise empty chest. Some are more roundabout, collecting and collecting and robbing drunk boys dry when they look the other way, a nimble finger dipping into a pocket and hooking out three crisp notes with her sharply filed nails. Maybe one day she can quit this place. Open her own little shop, put her name up on a sign.