Chapter Text
March 2017
Montreal, Québec
This was bad. Really fucking bad. Shane had a six-shooter in the car door but he’d never get to it. And there was no backup, no cover, no one even knew he was here. No one other than Ilya fucking Rozanov, and just then he was not helping to deescalate.
Lai had a gun trained on Shane, pointed right at his heart. And he was mad. Shane had only been studying Mandarin a few months, only slightly before he met Lai and Yuren. But he knew enough Mandarin to know the words for “liar” and “cop.” And he knew Lai well enough to know he didn’t pull his gun idly.
“Yuren, will you please tell your boy to chill the fuck out?” Shane’s hands were up, palms open. He was shocked by how steady they were, how steady his voice was. He was almost certainly about to die and he wasn’t shaking or sweating. If anything, he was kind of pissed. Exposure was always a risk, of course, but he hadn’t guessed it would be this guy to make him. Lai was nothing. An underling’s underling. But Shane must have fucked something up, because Lai didn’t just think Shane was a cop. He could see in this guy’s eyes. He fucking knew it. Shane would not be talking his way out of here.
There was more shouting and swearing that Shane couldn’t quite grasp, a mix of Mandarin, Russian and English echoing around the warehouse bay. Ilya’s voice was loudest, aimed mostly at Yuren, but Lai was matching him in energy. Shane was pretty sure that Lai had just used some combination of slurs in Mandarin that amounted to Japanese faggot.
Couldn’t fault the guy for accuracy, Shane supposed.
More shouting. Shane forced himself to be still. If Lai knew then Shane wasn’t walking out of here, not unless Ilya pulled off some kind of miracle save. But Ilya was getting too heated.
Shane was definitely going to fucking die tonight.
“Ilya, talk to me, what’s the problem here?” Shane asked. He decided to commit to his innocence. Maybe Lai knew, but what could he prove?
“The problem is Lai has lost his fucking mind!” Ilya put his own gun right into Lai’s face but pulled back just as quickly. “He thinks you are police. Thinks I bring krysa into my operation! He thinks my father is stupid, that we are all stupid!”
Ilya spat at the ground near Lai's feet. “Ublyudok!”
It was Yuren’s turn to raise his hands, to try to placate Ilya. Yuren’s Russian was decent, about as good as Shane’s so Shane followed that conversation okay. Yuren didn’t want to upset Ilya, didn’t want to insult him, didn’t want anyone to do anything they couldn't walk back…but it wasn’t enough to save Shane. What it came down to was that, while Yuren didn’t like the move Lai made, he wasn’t doubting the accusations.
So, Shane was well and truly fucked, then.
He figured the most likely outcome was that Lai would kill him, here and now. He wondered if he’d even hear the gunshot. Maybe if Lai kept it aimed at his chest instead of his head. Once Lai shot Shane, Ilya would kill Lai, even though it was a stupid fucking move. Yuren and Ilya would probably be able to make nice, probably. And then the Rozanov syndicate and the Song Family would come up with some payment plan to smooth out any anger. What was a dead cop and an insulted heir-apparent worth? Some level of percentage, points, Shane supposed.
Plus, Shane’s mother would get a flag, or a star, or something to prove her son had lived and served and died for a cause. Like that told even half the story.
“Hollander is not a fucking rat! And if anyone says this again and I will kill them!"
That one got a half-smile, half-grimace from Shane, because Ilya meant it. Lai was yelling again and Ilya was red in the face, and Yuren finally pointed his gun at Ilya and told him slowly and clearly in Russian to put it the fuck down.
Shane updated his prediction: he and Ilya would both die tonight.
Time slowed down. Lai had nothing but hate on his face. Yuren was getting angry, Ilya was apoplectic. Shane wondered with a sort of detached curiosity how much the Song family would pay Grigori to smooth over killing Ilya. They couldn’t risk an out-and-out war, so it’d most likely be a permanent cut of their business. Pretty good deal for Grigori, actually, probably the best possible outcome of the night.
Shane turned to face Ilya. He wasn’t yelling anymore but he wasn’t lowering his gun, either. Something in Shane’s chest twisted when he noticed tears welling in Ilya’s eyes. He wanted to brush them away. Ilya saw Shane looking, they made eye contact briefly.
God, he was beautiful! His curls, his chin, the slope of his shoulders. He was angelic and prideful and wrathful and for a split second Shane pictured him with wings and a flaming sword, falling from heaven because of his own vanity.
“Lyubimyy,” Ilya whispered.
“Mon cœur,” Shane answered.
Lai glanced at Ilya for the first time since he’d pulled his gun. Shane took the half-second advantage. He attacked.
There were three or four gunshots, one right by Shane’s ear as he forced Lai’s gun wide, the rest came from Ilya’s gun. Yuren was dead, probably. Half his face was missing from what Shane could see out of the corner of his eye. But he didn’t have time to really look. Shane’s knees were on the ground, on either side of Lai. Somehow, he had Lai’s right wrist pinned above his head. He tried to duck around Lai’s left hand coming in wide. It caught Shane somewhere on the back of the skull but didn’t have enough force behind it to throw him off balance.
Shane had better position but Lai was strong. And he was pissed.
“Not bad for a Japanese faggot, yeah?” Shane mocked as they grappled.
Lai was twisting and fighting for his goddamn life and Shane tried to meet him with all that fury. The gun was gone, it'd been knocked free at some point and the two men were writhing, trying to gain leverage over the other, trying to scramble for a gun. Shane took a punch to the throat and his sides screamed out from the body shots Lai had pummeled into him. Somehow, by some miracle, he still had most of his bodyweight on Lai, who twisted beneath him. Finally Lai bucked Shane and snapped around, reaching for Yuren’s gun.
Ilya fired once into the air. “Stop.” He pointed the gun at Lai’s head.
Lai froze, hands raised. Shane stood up and moved wide around him, picking up Yuren’s gun. He pointed it at Lai. Lai’s own gun was another three or four yards away, Shane scooped that up too and slipped it into his waistband.
Ilya leaned down, gun in hand, and looked at Yuren, confirming he was dead. As if missing half his face and a quarter of his blood wasn’t confirmation enough.
“Wipe your prints and give me the gun, Ilya.” Shane still had Yuren’s gun on Lai. “You, get up. To your knees, slowly.”
“Faggot cop, loves to see men on their knees, I’m sure. Gonna arrest me, rat-fucker?” Lai spat out.
Ilya looked at Shane with mild interest. All the rage from earlier was gone. He wiped his gun down with a handkerchief and held it loosely. “Shane, do you want—?” Ilya nodded toward Lai, offering to finish it.
“No.” Shane would never have believed how steady his voice was if he wasn’t there to hear it himself. “Give me the gun.”
Ilya tilted his head to the side, like he was considering another course of action. Fuck! If Ilya believed Lai, if he figured out Shane was a Fed…but after only a few seconds Ilya handed his gun over and pulled out a cigarette. Shane didn't bother to throw him a disapproving look. He just thought hard for a few breaths. Really, the only thing to do was to tell Ilya to get to his knees too.
He needed to pull the plug on everything, right now. He needed to call for backup and arrest them both. And once he did that Shane could finally be out of this bullshit life. Fucking years, years, living like this. One call and it would be over. He could see his parents again, he could call his grandma. He could finally tell people who he really was. He thought about the case. They had plenty for the RICO against the Rozanovs and some promising casework on the Songs. Shit, Bennett already gave Shane a hard deadline to end it in the next two months. Brass was pulling him out soon, one way or another.
All Shane had to do was turn to Ilya, point his gun, and tell him to get on the fucking ground. Five words and it would be over.
Ilya looked relaxed, calm. The usual predatory glint he had when he watched Shane was gone. He wasn’t feeling lust, or desire, or admiration. He watched Shane without any hunger, without any anger, or even the fond sense of competition that he sometimes wore. His body, his breathing, it was all…easy. He just looked at Shane and waited to see what he’d do.
“Fuck it.” Shane tucked Ilya’s gun into his waistband, too. “Stand up.” He waved Yuren’s gun at Lai. “Get over there.”
Lai followed Shane’s instructions, moving backward into the spot where Ilya stood when he killed Yuren. He moved with an ugly grin on his face. Shane stepped over Yuren’s body, avoiding the pooling blood.
“A faggot but not a pussy, huh?” Lai said with a nasty laugh.
Shane aimed at Lai’s throat. For a second, his eyes darted over to Ilya, and now there was that familiar hunger. Shane squeezed the trigger.