Alessia
Damn Vlad. My eyes get hot and watery under his sympathetic gaze, and I have to look away again.
I wish he weren’t so damn observant.
I haven’t told anyone about the stage 3 kidney failure. Not any of my brothers, especially not my mother. So I haven’t had to face this moment before, of revealing my sharpest disappointment in life.
Desperately needing to change the subject, I turn back to him and draw a breath. “What about you, Vlad? What is your job in Russia?”
“I am derzhatel obschaka. Bookkeeper for the bratva. I’m the money guy. I move money, launder money. Hide money. I had reached out to your brother not to cause problem, but to offer solution. Clean his money, too. But then my mother died in Moscow. I had to fly back to Russia, and Ivan, my i***t compatriot decided kill
