Big Bad Wolf Page 3

  Having a bloodier rap sheet than the rest of the pop didn’t make anybody feel all warm and fuzzy. And being a little fuzzy, or at least furry, didn’t earn any friends either. Especially with the Emergency Service Unit boys breathing down your fucking neck. You heard someone getting beat, someone crying into their pillow, someone busting a nut, and nobody looked anybody in the eye in the morning. You tried to keep out of ESU’s way but still ended up getting shoved into a wall. And a floor. And the bars of your cell. Knowing that if you let the monster out, it would just be an excuse for them to put you down. It wasn’t survival of the fittest, just survival.

  Joe had always been good at that. Surviving. After he enlisted in the Marines, he figured he’d get through boot camp on a prayer, but it turned out he thrived in the Corps. He made a good grunt, an even better sharpshooter. And a “truly exemplary” shifter on an elite team of military operatives. He managed to come back from multiple tours alive. He’d get through this, too. Unless he got life in prison, courtesy of the State of New York, or a death penalty courtesy of anyone who didn’t like his altered DNA.

  “We’re aiming for a reduced sentence,” Feinberg had told him during one of his weekly visits. “And, of course, we’re fighting for your rights as a supernatural as well. But there are no guarantees.” Joe had to admire that. No bullshit. No promises that he’d walk free.

  There was blood on his hands. He shouldn’t be allowed to walk free. But then again, there were a whole fucking lot of other people who shouldn’t have been on the street either. And they were all still out there—while he slid his arms behind his head and stared up at a concrete ceiling. Decorated with dried gum, graffiti, and hash marks no one ever bothered to scrub clean. The Brooklyn Hilton got a fancy upgrade way back in 2012, but it hadn’t taken long for it all to go to shit, especially with the new governor shutting down Rikers Island in 2020 and the rest of the prisons in the area still scrambling to pick up the slack. Jails were overcrowded. Everybody was overworked. Nobody was about to come by and fluff Joe’s pillows. They were too busy cursing Governor Nixon’s name and telling the mayor where to fuck off to.

  He was no stranger to less than five-star accommodations. He’d slept in muddy trenches. On rock and stone and concrete. Hell, he could catch a power nap standing up. When he got back stateside this last time, he’d crashed in Mrs. Castelli’s spare bedroom—his old high-school haunt—and that was like fucking luxury. After he landed a steady gig on a crew working out in Long Island City, he’d rented a cheap efficiency off the E train. Shared bathroom and a pay phone in the hall. No lease. No questions. They’d probably tossed his shit out on the curb the minute the cops took the yellow tape off the door. It’d been almost two years since he last saw that place, and he wasn’t exactly dreaming of going back. The NYPD had confiscated anything worth a damn. All he had left was himself. Stuffed into a six-by-eight cell.

  Sometimes they let him have books. A guy came by with a cart. Paperbacks falling apart and falling off it. He’d snagged a couple Patricia Cornwells and some medical thrillers by Tess Gerritsen. Not for nothing, but lady crime writers did love themselves some gory shit. He got creeped out—and wouldn’t that crack up the guys from his old team—but he read them anyway. Squinting at the pages in the dim light of his cell.

  He didn’t really sleep. Because sleeping meant letting his guard down. Because sleeping meant dreaming, and he wasn’t a huge fan of that picture show these days. He didn’t wanna see Kenny. All fresh-faced and awkward, that cowlick from when he was a toddler still sticking up at nineteen and twenty-two and twenty-six. He didn’t wanna see that fucking dive in Gravesend he’d visited a couple times when Kenny was on shift. With the saddest strippers he’d ever seen, making the saddest tips. Which meant even less for the bartenders. “It’s still extra money, Joey. Better money than anyplace else. Don’t ride me on this.”

  “You wanna work for a buncha Russian assholes, it’s your funeral, kid.” That was what he’d said. And of all the bullshit pronouncements he’d made in his life, that was the one that came true. Gravesend dug Kenny’s grave. He never should’ve left Maspeth. At least there they knew all the meth-head devils.

  So, no, Joe didn’t sleep. He didn’t want to see the kid he’d loved like a little brother dead on a slab, four slugs in his chest because some Russian fucknut had a grudge with another fucknut and thought a titty bar was the place to settle it. Four people had died besides the fucknuts in question. One of the girls. Two regulars. And Kenny. All of them forgotten in the twenty-four-hour news cycle. It was bullshit then and bullshit now, playing on Joe’s eyelids on a loop even though he was in another damn borough at the time.

  And he didn’t want to see Afghanistan either. Because that was the other option, right? The other matinee special at the Peluso Theater. All the things they’d done over there for god and country. The literal monsters they became in the name of patriotism and heroics. He could wash off the sand, wash off the blood, but there was no washing off the stain of those years, those souls. He was a damn good Marine. He fucking made corporal. He followed orders. He never missed a shot. He never left a man behind…unless it was one of the men he was putting down. He wasn’t sure that made him a good human…but they hadn’t wanted a good human, had they? They’d wanted a beast. They’d created a beast.

  It’s hotter than balls. Worse than a subway platform in August. And Joe has a hostile’s brains splattered all over his cammies. The ringing in his ears just won’t stop, but neither will the shells. It’s been hours, and he can’t stop tasting the meat…

  Fuck. No.

  So Joe turned to fantasies instead. It wasn’t always sex… No, who was he kidding? It was mostly sex. He didn’t wrap his hand around his dick, though—didn’t try to get off—because the cellblock didn’t need a show. It was just him and the double feature on his eyelids. Silent. Fists curled on the thin mattress. He remembered Tasha in the back seat of a borrowed Impala. His first. She was Kenny’s babysitter back in the day and still came around the Castellis’ house all the time. Gorgeous. Legs for miles. Then there was Mishelle, practically his common-law wife…if you didn’t count all the time he’d spent deployed.

  They’d had five good years together and two pathetic ones. And luckily no adorable Haitian-Italian babies to show for it. Because what kind of shit father would he have turned out to be? Thank Christ, Mishelle wasn’t tied to him and his bullshit for life. But when they were good… Yeah, they’d been pretty amazing. He could’ve happily died in her pussy. And now…? Probably in any pussy. He didn’t have a type or anything. He loved all kinds of women. Loved their minds and their bodies. Loved how they tasted and smelled.

  That doctor-lawyer-whatever. Neha. He knew she’d smell real good. Like that first gulp of air whenever he walked out of lockup. And she was soft under those clothes even if she pretended she was made of cast iron. She’d melt for him. Black hair all loose and wild. Honey on his fingertips and his tongue. Thighs spread. Begging. But she wouldn’t need to beg for it, not really, because he’d give it for free.

  While all the other dipshits at Aviation High were pressing their girls for blow jobs, Joe had learned how to make girls scream. He aced every lesson, got a 4.0 in eating out. He was a doer, Mishelle told him once. He didn’t bother protesting or arguing or trying to negotiate reciprocity, he just went for it. Why waste time when he could be knuckle-deep in a woman, licking her while she yanked at his hair and said his name like he was a god?

  If the death penalty were an option, if they gave him the chair, he knew exactly what his last meal would be. “An hour with her,” he’d say, and point to the doc.

  Chapter 3

  “Why is Joseph Peluso not dead yet?”

  “Boss, I—”

  “—have no excuse.”

  When her brother was angry, the whole world knew it. Not because of the volume of his fury, but because of the silence. After eight months in his e
mploy—and twenty-six years in his life—Yulia was more than used to the malevolent absence of sound that marked Aleksei Vasiliev’s displeasure. The moment after his interruption stretched to infinity, growing darker and more threatening with every passing second. She knew better than to cross the threshold into his office and, instead, pressed flat against the wall just outside. This wasn’t the first time she’d done so, and it was far from the first time she’d heard something sensitive. Such was the life when your family was Russian mafia…and a clan of bear shifters. You were far more likely to overhear your brother planning violence than discussing birthday gifts.

  “Our men have tried, Boss. On multiple occasions. Peluso is…formidable.”

  Yulia winced. There was no “trying” in Aleksei’s world. You either succeeded or you failed. This flunkie was either terribly new or terribly clueless. Perhaps terribly arrogant, for that was also a rampant disease in this place. Either way, he would learn the lesson that she had as a cub: One did not upset or disappoint Aleksei without consequence. Nearly fifteen years her senior, he’d won his control of Little Odessa coldly and ruthlessly—without even one swipe of his massive paws—in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, indebting struggling businesses in South Brooklyn’s Russian community to him with a huge influx of cash. He’d rebuilt their restaurants, their family groceries, their shops…and bought so many souls. He was forever expanding his territory into different neighborhoods, different aspects of illegal activity. Some Ukrainians had pushed back more than a year ago. This Joe Peluso person…he’d become her brother’s obsession when he placed himself in the middle of the conflict. She’d seen some of it on the news. There was only so much she wanted to know. Only so much she could bear…so to speak.

  There was a human woman who’d often come into the Confessional, the bar where she’d worked before. A writer bent over notebooks, drinking Moscow mules—which would be funny, perhaps, in any other situation. “Russian mafia heroes are huge in romance novels right now,” she’d confided once. “Hot Russian billionaires. Hot Russian hit men. Is that even a thing?”

  Yulia had laughed and laughed. “No,” she’d managed to gasp out. “This is not a thing for us.”

  Fear was a thing. Forced respect was a thing. Hiding outside your brother’s office and praying you did not catch him in a terrible mood was a thing. But she’d taken the time to explain to her clueless patron that not all Russians were billionaires or hit men. That she knew plenty of hard-working average Russian-Americans who did their jobs and went to church and did not even jaywalk. They just didn’t happen to number among her family members. And she had not mentioned her family’s other truth at all.

  She drew in a shaky breath, made to step away and head back toward the main floor of the club. But Aleksei’s laughter stopped her in her tracks. The sound was like icicles breaking away from frozen window ledges in midwinter. So cold. So sharp.

  “I admire your balls, Anton. But I expected better from you. I expected results. Shall I call Yuri?”

  “You may call Medvedev if you like, but I will deliver,” the underling—Anton—assured Aleksei. He smelled not of bear but of bird. “I can be trusted to serve your interests as well.”

  Medvedev. Yuri. Yulia shuddered. Another cub she’d been raised with. Another killer. The most valued of her brother’s enforcers and the most lethal. She had no desire to see him darkening their doorstep once more. A visit from him was like a visit from Death. She hadn’t always thought so. As a silly young ursine shifter, she’d thought him glamorous and powerful and handsome. The light to Aleksei’s darkness. She knew better now. And she knew better men now. Men with sweetness in their eyes, warmth in their touch…warmth that could have so easily been heat, fire, if she’d allowed it.

  “Hey. Hey, you know you can call me any time, right? I’m here for you.”

  “You don’t understand. Danny, it’s too dangerous.”

  “Not for me. Never for me. Yulia, I can handle it. I have connections, too.”

  He was not for her. He was never for her. But Yulia still hugged the image of Detective Danny Yeo close as she fled back to the hostess station, her reason for seeking out her brother forgotten. There was the light in her darkness. Golden-skinned and brown-eyed. Slight and slender but still so strong. A beautiful man she could never have. Not if she wanted him to live. After all, if her brother could so easily, thoughtlessly, order the death of someone like Joe Peluso—someone he did not even know—what could he do to a human police officer that his sister held affection for? The possibilities were endless, each grislier than the last.

  She knew it was cowardly to just go back to her job like she’d heard nothing of consequence. Cowardly to paste on a smile and pass out menus and continue pretending Kamchatka was nothing more than an upscale supper club and bar just steps from the boardwalk. But cowardice had kept her, and the people she cared for, alive thus far. Perhaps there would come a time when she would need bravery. It could be tomorrow, or next week or next month. Right now, in this moment, Yulia Vasilieva was content to simply survive.

  * * *

  Danny Yeo swiped away the pictures on his tablet, tossing the device down on his desk with a clatter and a huff of frustration. Neither noise made much impact in the cavernous space that was the open floor of Third Shift Security. But, then, he was used to not making much impact, wasn’t he? Both at this job and his primary one at the NYPD.

  To say that the years after the Darkest Day hadn’t been kind was a gross understatement. New Patriot Acts. Travel bans. Increasingly isolationist policies that benefited the very rich and took advantage of the already struggling working class. The rolling back of LGBTQ rights and women’s rights that had been protected for decades. New sanctions against classes of supernaturals who’d been living quietly among human populations for centuries until all too recently. It was, as Danny’s bosses liked to say, a total clusterfuck.

  Growing up thoroughly geeky, he and his sister had frequently boggled at how things could go so completely to shit in the eighteen years between Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith and Star Wars: A New Hope. “It got so awful that Ewan McGregor turned into Alec Guinness! Damn!” Sarah would laugh. They didn’t laugh like that now. Because it had taken less than five years for the same thing to happen to the United States of America. That rapid descent into dystopia was why a lot of people had started calling the turning point in 2016 the Darkest Day…which was particularly ironic considering the even darker times that had followed.

  Danny scowled, waking his desktop computer from sleep mode and calling up the interoffice messaging system. Two new chat windows awaited him. One from the higher-ups about a team meeting at 2200 hours—10:00 p.m. to a civilian like him—another an automated reminder from their admin about updating his personal information with any relevant changes to name, address, or other occupations. Third Shift might operate by their own set of rules, but they still had to answer to the government at large. And the government’s questions had only gotten more personal since the 2016 election cycle. More personal and more dangerous.

  The most popular rumor about the “outing” of supernaturals in December of that year was that it had been a controlled leak from the NSA. Spilling the secret before the new POTUS could blurt it out at a press briefing. It was one of those “keys to the kingdom” things, like the existence of aliens and the Illuminati, that probably went back to the very founding of the nation. Danny had every confidence that various government agencies and the military had known about supernaturals, and used their talents for warfare, from the very beginning. The only reason the country hadn’t descended into utter chaos when the news hit the media sites was that several key members of Congress and the Supreme Court had stepped into the light as supes, too. Both Democrats and Republicans. So, deals had been made across the aisle. Senate subcommittees, a hastily formed Supernatural Regulation Bureau. Detention centers, too, of course. They lined both the northern and sou
thern borders now. Though people of color seeking asylum and aid were still the primary target, the camps had more recently been outfitted for superhuman occupants as well.

  The Resistance still rallied, both in the streets and behind closed doors. What remained of the free press still spoke out as much as they could. Sure, the New York Times had finally come out publicly as a propaganda machine for the ruling party, but the Daily News had survived to shit-stir, hiding behind its shield of tabloid-worthy headlines and over-the-top graphic design. Large metropolitan centers like New York, Chicago, Atlanta, and Los Angeles had taken the concept of “sanctuary” one step further, almost operating as city-states to protect their vulnerable citizens. They were capital-letter Sanctuary Cities now, offering shelter to humans and nonhumans alike. And, somehow, America trudged on. The TV shows hadn’t changed that much—aside from a major uptick in ’80s–’90s nostalgia and paranormal content—and gas prices were manageable. The day-to-day for the average white human citizen was as it had been a few years before. Most people got out of bed in the morning without thinking about how the Empire was in charge.

  Danny wasn’t most people. His family and friends weren’t most people. As an idealistic kid, he’d thought joining the NYPD would be enough. That changing the system from the inside was the best way to fight it. Now, just shy of thirty and wearing a detective’s shield by day, he knew better. Because he’d learned quickly that idealism and reality were like oil and water. And he’d nearly quit the force a dozen times. It was his sister, Sarah, who’d talked him out of it. “Think of how much good you can still do, Bro. They need people like you to de-escalate situations. You can’t let it be a white, human boys’ club.” And she was right. As much as it hurt to deal with all the racist crap behind the impenetrable blue line, being able to advocate for minority citizens and keep an eye on his pale police brothers was invaluable. Too many Asian-American cops were complicit in police brutality. He refused to be one of them. If his efforts to be the change he wanted to see in the world didn’t do nearly enough to fix a shitty system… Well, that was where moonlighting paid off. He could use his investigative skills and his inside knowledge of the NYPD’s operations for bigger things.