Ruthless Creatures by J.T. Geissinger

He murmurs, “I never wanted to hurt you. I’m so sorry,
Natalie.”
“Great. Skip to the good part.”
He exhales heavily, presses a soft kiss to the back of each
of my hands, and releases them, rising. He returns to the sofa
opposite mine and sits.
“I take it you know I was involved with the mafia.”
“Yes.”
“I was an accountant for the New York syndicate. I
reported directly to the big boss.”
“Maxim Mogdonovich.”
David nods. “It was a desk job. I didn’t get my hands dirty.
I never harmed anyone.”
“Whoopee for you. Keep talking.”
He pauses to grind his jaw for a while. He doesn’t like the
new, bossy me.
“They recruited me right out of college with an offer of a
ridiculous salary. At twenty-two, it was impossible for me to
resist that much money. So I took the job. I told myself I
wasn’t doing anything wrong. I wasn’t hurting people. But
after almost a decade of working for them, I changed my
mind. I was an accomplice to their violence, even if I never
shed a drop of blood. My skills helped them thrive. So I
decided I wanted out. Permanently.”
He seems sincere, but this man is an accomplished liar. I
slept with him for years and never had a clue he wasn’t who he
said he was.
I gesture for him to continue.
“Except there isn’t a way out of the Bratva. You can’t
submit your resignation and walk away. I had to make a
careful plan, which I did.”
“So you turned Mogdonovich in to the government.”