Page 72 of Dance of Defiance
It’s me, Stepan, five of my father’s topavtoritets,and Pavel himself. He scowls, drumming on his desk with one hand while bringing the crystal tumbler of vodka to his lips with the other.
“I can reach out to Lukashov and see…” Stepan begins slowly.
“Do it,” my father grunts. “I want this marriage signed and sealed before Vaughn fucking Bancroft has Cosimo wrapped around his goddamn finger.”
“Sangrini is famously impartial though, no?” Boris, one of my father’s captains, ventures. “And he has no children of his own. The way to an alliance with him is through his goddaughter Dasha,” he shrugs. “Andpakhan, you have that buttoned up, eh?” He grins and reaches over to pat me heavily on the shoulder. “Not that Roman here is going to be suffering, hmm?”
He holds his hands out in front of his chest like he’s squeezing a huge pair of tits, and the room, predictably, erupts in laughter.
My father chuckles, but then shakes his head. “Who knows. Maybe Cosimo…you know…” he grins and holds up a limp wrist. “Is apidoraz, eh?”
The captains hoot to each other, mimicking my father’s limp-wrist and his vulgar gay slur.
“You think Cosimo likes the boys, eh, boss?” Andrey, another captain, asks with a chuckle.
“Who knows,” Papa shrugs. “But… That Vaughn is a sneaky little motherfucker. If Cosimo is…” He lifts a limp wrist again. “Maybe Vaughn decides to be apidoraztoo and fuck Cosimo up the ass, eh?”
More hoots and hollers. I force a strangled smile to my face.
My father suddenly scowls and swears in Russian. “Vaughn might not be apidoraz,” he grunts, “but his brother is. The sissy that dances with my Evelina.”
My jaw suddenly tenses so hard that my teeth hurt. My hand curls to a fist on the armrest of my chair and my drink turns acrid in my mouth when I take a sip.
Dad frowns. “Stepan.”
“Boss?”
“Look into it.”
Stepan’s brow furrows. “Into…?”
“Cosimo. I want to know if he takes it up the ass.”
Stepan looks mildly amused as he lifts a brow. “Boss, I’m fairly certain he likes women…”
So am I, and I barely know the guy. But he’s wealthy beyond belief and powerful beyond comprehension. He also isn’t part of the old-school circle jerk of toxic masculinity that the Bratva tends to be. If he was gay, there’s literally no reason Cosimo would feel the need to hide it, or mask it behind the women he’s frequently spotted with in exotic locales.
“Well, find out for sure,” Papa snaps. “Immediately.”
“Da, pakhan,” Stepan nods curtly.
“Good. Although, fuck, if he is…” Papa chuckles. “We’refucked. It’s not like we’ll find a butt-boy in the Bratva to go fuck him like a little sissy bitch.”
The captains erupt in laughter. Stepan smiles automatically and glances at me, shrugging.
When the meeting is over, Papa stops me.
“Don't go yet, Roman.”
“Of course, Papa.”
He pours us both another drink and passes mine to me before he takes a seat behind his desk again.
“Take down this address.”
I frown, nodding. Papa rattles off an address in Bay Ridge, which I type into a note on my phone.
“What is this?”
