Page 142 of Ruthless Sinner

I’ve seen that look many times on him.

Thank God my father never looked at me like that. I’d hate it.

I can just about stand Igor looking at me this way when it’s me who’s been wronged.

This has all been so fucked up. How could it be right that Jason did all sorts of shit to me but I couldn’t even go to my uncle and tell him what happened, because to Igor Levitsky, blood is as thin as water when it comes to gaining power.

I walk into the office and dip my head.

“Dante.” The tone of his voice reflects what I see in his expression. “Good to see you.”

“And you uncle.” I pull up the chair in front of his desk and sit, then we stare at each other as if we’re getting ready for a duel.

Igor sits back and steeples his fingers, resting his elbows on the desk. “How are you?”

“I'm fine. And you? How have you been?” I know exactly how he's been, but while we're being pleasant, I might as well go with the flow.

He pulls in a breath and raises his brows. “Well, over the last few days, I've been missing my little nephew. The same little nephew, I adored.”

I hate when he does this. “Uncle—"

“No. Let me finish.” He holds up his hand. “To me I was always blessed with three sons. The night of the massacre. When I lostmytwo, I still had you. You are a man now, but as I watched my brother sacrifice himself so that I could live, you became my responsibility. But then you always were. What happened to us, Dante? Why can't we see I to I when it comes, Jason Bell? You tell me, please. You say you trust me. You acknowledge me as the Pakhan of the Zaitsev. You tell me you trust me to be your leader. You tell me you are with me, but you aren't. How do we fix this? I hate it.”

I stifle a groan, not knowing what to say. This is the kind of situation where the truth would be pointless and there’s no sense shit stirring when you know how it will end. But I feel that I should give him something, some kind of answer, so I say, “Jason Bell clouds your judgment.”

Igor shakes his head. “Damn it, Dante. Not this again. He doesn't. Jason never has. I'm not sure why you think this when I have shown time and time again that I can be objective.”

This is exactly what I meant and now wasting my breath is just pissing me off. “Okay, then tell me this. If he wronged you, would you kill him? If you found out that he was doing shit behind your back, would you kill him?”

This feels like a follow on from the conversation we had when I first got released from prison when I went to see him. It feels like we're back there at that moment when I was testing the water to see what he would do for me.

Igor bites down on his back teeth as if put out by the question. “Of course, it would depend on the wrongdoing. Jason is a man I would think twice about killing because he's done so much for me. I won't be a fool or deluded enough to think that I would've been able to achieve all that he's done for me on my own. I don't care if that makes me sound weak. I always give credit where it's due.

Without him, we wouldn't have this deal with the Japanese comp government for a company. There are several things we wouldn't have possible without him. There are many things he did while you were away in prison. Many other things he did before, that your father and I were both proud of. So I can't sit here and say he's not valuable to me or the Creed. Whatever he does for me and whatever he did for your father benefited the Creed too in a massive way. I can't overlook those things, Dante.”

No. Of course not. I didn't think so. And he's given me confirmation again. He wouldn't do shit if he found out what Jason did to me.

Why?

Because I’m not valuable to him.

I haven’t done what Jason can do and never will.

I’m not fucking jealous. I just know where loyalty should lie.

For all I know this Z person could be in the government or something worse. Jason could be feeding enough information to the Feds and other enemies to put us all away for life.

I'm just hoping that when I find this Roland, he'll be able to tell me the real reasons for what happened during that time. And if it's still going on, then I can stop it before it festers into something ot of our control.

“Is that understood now, Dante?”

“I hear you. Pakhan.” Because I only call him Pakhan in front of everyone else to show respect he looks taken aback by the comment.

At this point I don't care if I offend him. It’s best we stop talking about this now anyway.

“Right. I can see we’re not going to fix things today.” Igor’s gaze becomes harder. “No point wasting time. There are other things I want to talk to you about.”

“Like what?” I feign ignorance and he shakes his head again, knowing I’m completely pissing on him.