Devil's Prey(30)

Mila Koslakova had never grown up and even at the tender age of  forty-six, she could be found in the VIP area, snorting coke and  laughing with some smarmy looking dealer of Hispanic descent. He was  young, probably closer to Mags age than his, fit and hugged up tight  enough next to his mother to know they were more than "tennis partners."

Mags looked back at him and smirked once they reached the top of the  stairs. The music was a bit lower and they could talk without shouting  but he merely wrapped his arm around her waist and walked over to where  his mother and her mystery coke dealer sat.

Mila laughed at something her lover said to her but her face barely  moved thanks to the Botox treatment she'd heavily invested in. She  turned toward her son casually before doing a double take, her  face-unable to feign surprise-looked merely frozen in place.

"Hello, Mila." Max smiled though it never reached his eyes. "Might we  have a word without your playboy hanging on to our every word?"

Her cerulean blue eyes looked dark in the dim light but she finally  acquiesced. "Javier, go get me a drink," she said with a hint of a  Polish accent she'd never managed to lose. "I'm thirsty."

Her lover stood and walked past the two of them, brushing against Max hard enough to almost push him out of the way.

"You do that again and I will break your fuckin' neck. Here. Now. And in this goddamn club," Max said loudly.

The guy smirked before he continued toward the upstairs bar area.         

     



 

"What are you doing here?" She ran a finger through her professionally  dyed flaxen blonde hair-top of the line extensions included-before she  set the mirror down with several lines of yayo ready to be snorted.  "Don't you know Dimitri has everyone looking for you right now? He's put  a price on your head and even I can't save you. Surely you didn't come  all this way thinking I could."

"Actually," Mags began as she placed her hands on her hips, "we were thinking about killing you just to send Dimitri a message."

Mila attempted to smile as she murmured an insult about Mags in Polish.  "This can't possibly be true. You wouldn't do that to me-you couldn't.  I'm your mother. I'm the woman who gave you life. I chose you."

Max could barely contain his temper as he shook his head. "I would  prefer we go somewhere private to talk about the negotiation of your  life, Mother. I still might blow your head off just because I can. If  you don't want to go back to the estate then we'll go somewhere else but  we will talk about this. Tonight."

Mags swallowed her dirty Martini and set the empty container on the  art-deco table as his mother stood and teetered toward him in  ridiculously high heels. "We'll go back to the estate. I'm safer there  than anywhere else, especially if I am alone with you and that girl. I  am pretty sure you've made that point, even if you hadn't planned to, my  son."

He was more than happy to leave that god-awful club with Mags next to  him. She retrieved their Range Rover from valet while he climbed into an  exclusive bulletproof top of the line Porsche Cayenne with his mother.  She had a driver who immediately rolled up the partition between the  front and the back, granting him and his mother complete privacy.

"Are you crazy?" she murmured in Polish. "You're wanted by one of the  most dangerous men in the world and you show up here? Do you think  Dimitri is stupid? He has been waiting for you to come here. I can hold  him off but not for long."

Max glared coldly at the woman who'd given him life. "Do you truly give a  fuck about me at all or was I always just a means to an end?"

"Why would you ask me something like that? Of course I care about you. You're my son-I carried you for nine months-"

"You also carried Edward too but that didn't stop you from handing him over to our father like he meant nothing."

Mila pinched the bridge of her nose. "The situation between Sean and I  was very complicated, Max. When we were together, I was property of the  club. It was a horrible life to live and to be honest, if I'd been  smart, I would have never ventured there in the first place. I should  have quit when Sean bought the Kitty Kat Club from Raymond Jackson."

"Why didn't you?" he questioned in an icy tone.

"Sean liked me from the moment he saw me. I decided to use the situation  to my advantage. I came from a poor country while it was still under  Communist rule, Max. You have no idea what it was like because you've  never lived in those conditions."

"I don't know what it's like? Really?" Max knew he was starting to lose  it but he couldn't help himself. "You say you love me but the moment a  very rich man came into your life, you dumped me in his lap. Dimitri  sodomized me and had his soldiers do the same. He tortured me and made  me kill a man when I was sixteen years old. I'm not exactly sure what  your definition of love is because frankly, I don't see how any parent  could allow that to happen to their child if they love them."

Mila threw her head back and laughed. "Do you think your life would have  been that much better with Sean? For God's sake, Edward belongs to a  motorcycle gang. He sells drugs and murders people. Same as you do. At  least you were exposed to the best in the world. You have made millions  of dollars working for Dimitri and you never have to work again. For  God's sake, you are worth over two hundred and fifty million dollars.

Why are you with that guinea mafia bitch? She's an Abandonato you  know-her mother, Sophia, was a meddling bitch of epic proportions. All  I'm saying is that she belongs to one of the most powerful Mafia  families in the world-they'd squash you like a bug. You cannot trust  her, Maksymilian."

Max could feel his temperature rise. He glared at his mother with a look  of complete contempt. "Don't talk about Magnolia that way."

"Magnolia-is that her real name?" Mila asked in a condescending manner.  "Darling, you could do so much better. I suppose she was that irate cunt  who showed up at the estate earlier today raising a fuss about some  Cuban woman?"         

     



 

He was well and truly pissed off at this woman who he called his mother.  If he didn't consider himself a better person, he would have punched  her the fuck out. "Yes, that was her. We were scoping the place out . . .  I knew you were home when I saw Viktor roaming the grounds. I know  Dimitri would never allow you to leave without him."

"He is quite annoying, following me around like a lovesick teenager. I  can't stand it to be honest. The only place I'm trusted to go by myself  is Oasis but that is because Dimitri's minions are crawling all over the  place." She tried to scrunch up her face but the Botox merely made her  expression seem like she was constipated. "I suspect the reason you're  here is because you want money. Trying to make me buy absolution from  you but . . . why are you broke in the first place? Were you foolish  enough not to keep any personal accounts? You're a college graduate,  Max-how could you be so naïve? I expected more from you."

"I was worth two hundred and fifty million but Dimitri has emptied out  all of my accounts except the one he never knew I had," he said in a  slow and deliberate voice. "There's over one hundred millions dollars  there. The problem is I can't reach that account because it's offshore  and I'm sure Dimitri has his computer experts tracing every move I make,  financially speaking. The money I worked so hard for, slaved and did  the unimaginable to acquire has been taken from me and is now in  accounts held by you and that slut half-sister of mine. I. Want. My.  Money. Back."

"Well, depending upon whether you can convince me you're going to let me  live, we can talk about whether or not I will help you get the cash  back that was stolen from you and more."

"You're going to give me as much as I want." He pulled out an  untraceable compact, Desert Eagle .45 Undercover pistol and pushed it  into her flat stomach. "Are you under any assumption I won't murder you  just to send that piece of shit you're married to a message? Please  don't underestimate the hatred and rage that has built in me over the  last decade and a half when it comes to you.

"I can't quite see you as this helpless woman who's merely a victim of  her circumstances. You knew what you were doing when you left Edward  with Sean and you still understand the implications of your behavior.  You best clear out that coke-addled brain of yours and get ready to sing  like a motherfucking bird . . . Mother."

Mila shifted in her seat as she crossed the leg closest to him over the  other. "If you kill me then you won't get any money, Max. You need me a  hell of a lot more than I need you. Furthermore, if you lay a finger on  me then Dimitri will come down on you like the wrath of God."

Max moved closer to his mother and leveled his face until they were  inches apart. "Tell me, does he know you're still a whore? How would he  react to finding out you're fucking men young enough to be your son?"