“One that ends with the Orlovs and Morozovs destroyed,” Dmitri continued. “You Albanians have always wanted a permanent foothold here. Influence. Routes. Ports. Help me—and the Ferraros align with me. Chaos follows. Chaos you know how to exploit.”
Silence crackled again.
“And why this war?” the woman pressed. “Men don’t burn empires without reason.”
Dmitri’s jaw tightened—just slightly.
“That,” he said flatly, “is none of your concern.”
He leaned forward, voice lowering, hardening. “Name your price for the woman.”
The lake wind stirred, brushing cold against my skin. Ricci’s hands trembled where they clasped together, knuckles white, eyes locked on the phone like it held his last breath.
Finally, the woman exhaled audibly.
“You play a dangerous game, Volkov.”
Dmitri’s lips curved—not in a smile, but something sharper. “I always do.”
“My husband’s grandfather was enslaved by the Ferraros,” the Albanian woman continued through the speaker, her voice calm in a way that made it infinitely more dangerous. “Worked to death in their ports generations ago. Chains. Hunger. Beatings. Some debts are inherited.”
Dmitri’s patience snapped. “I don’t care about ancient vendettas,” he cut in, voice hard. “History doesn’t interest me. Your price does. Name it.”
The terrace seemed to hold its breath.
Muted voices filtered through the line—rapid Albanian, hushed and urgent, as if a council were convening just beyond the speaker. Ricci hadn’t moved. He sat rigid, spine locked, hands gripping his knees so tightly his knuckles had gone bone-white. His gaze never left the phone. Not once.
Finally, the woman spoke again.
“The lady you seek—”
Ricci surged to his feet. “Is what?” His voice cracked, raw and uncontained. “Say it!”
“She has been passed from man to man,” the woman said without inflection. “You should understand this before we bargain. She is no longer... untouched.”
The words landed like a gunshot.
Ricci staggered back as if struck, one hand flying to his mouth. His eyes went glassy, unfocused. “My wife?” he whispered. “The woman I waited for—since we were children. Since high school.” His breath hitched violently. “I didn’t touch her before our wedding. I wanted it to be sacred. I wanted—”
His voice collapsed into a hoarse scream.
“And now savages—animals—have had her?” His body shook as rage detonated through him. “I will erase every Albanian breathing on this earth! I will burn your villages, your ports, your children’s futures—”
He swept his arm across the table. Chess pieces scattered like shrapnel, clattering against stone. The phone slid dangerously close to the terrace edge; Dmitri caught it one-handed without looking.
Ricci turned away, slamming his fists into the balustrade, then the wall—again and again—until skin split and blood smeared the ancient stone. At last, he slid down, forehead pressed against the wall, shoulders heaving.
He screamed her name.
Not words. Not threats. Just her name—over and over—torn from him in broken sobs that echoed across the terrace and into the dark lake below.
Dmitri said nothing. He didn’t move. He waited.
The woman on the line waited too.
When Ricci’s cries finally reduced to ragged breaths, when his body stilled in exhausted ruin, Dmitri spoke—calm as ever.
“What’s the price?”
