I've had weeks to plan this moment—weeks of careful intelligence gathering from across the border, bribing guards for newspapers, trading cigarettes for information about my old life, piecing together what Moscow has become in my absence.
What she has become.
Kira Markov.The Ice Queen. The woman who rose from my ashes and built an empire on my grave.
The woman I loved more than my own life.
The woman who had me killed.
My hands curl into fists inside my pockets. I feel the pull of scar tissue across my knuckles. The Georgians were creative with their torture—I'll give them that. Every mark on my body tells a story of a different day, a different method and another lesson in exactly how much pain a human being can endure before breaking.
They never broke me.
But they came close.
I know these streets. Walked them a thousand times when I was the golden prince of the Barinov bratva. Back when my future was golden and certain. Back when I believed I was untouchable because of who my father was.
I believed them. Believed in destiny and love and all the pretty lies people tell themselves.
Never again.
Semyon's building is exactly where I remember it. I don’t know if he’ll remember me. The crumbling apartment complex looks abandoned but isn't. Third floor, corner unit. That was where we always said to meet if shit went sideways.
I take the stairs two at a time, my body protesting every movement. Six years of prison rations and torture haven't been kind, but I've spent the past three months rebuilding my strength. Getting ready.Planning my revenge.
I knock. Three times, pause, twice more. The old signal.
Silence. Then footsteps, cautious and slow. The peephole darkens.
The door doesn't open. I count the seconds. Ten. Fifteen. Twenty.
"Semyon." My voice comes out rougher than I expect. I haven’t spoken much in the last few years. It was pointless. I refused to scream when they tortured me. I barely recognize my own voice. "It's me."
More silence. “You’re dead."
"Clearly not." I lean closer to the door. "Remember Prague? The job that went sideways, and you ended up in that bathtub with the Austrian diplomat's wife?"
The locks click. All five of them.
The door opens, and Semyon stands there looking like he's seen a ghost. Which, I suppose, he has.
He's aged. There are new lines around his eyes. But it's still him. My best friend. The man who was supposed to be my second-in-command when I took over the bratva.
"Maksim?" His voice cracks. "It's really...fuck, I think I'm having a heart attack."
He sways, and I catch him before he hits the floor. The contact—human touch that isn't designed to cause pain—nearly undoes me. I hold him steady, and his hands come up to grip my arms like he needs to confirm I'm real.
"I knew it," he whispers. "I knew you weren't dead. Everyone said I was crazy, but I knew. I fucking knew."
Then he pulls me into a hug that would crush a smaller man, and for the first time in six years, two months, and seventeen days, I let myself feel something other than rage. There’s no pain in his touch. Something else that will take me a long time to get used to.
It lasts approximately three seconds before the armor slams back into place.
"Inside," I mutter, pushing past him into the apartment. "Before someone sees me."
Semyon closes the door and just stares at me. I know what he's seeing—a man who looks like Maksim Barinov but harder, colder, carved into something sharp enough to cut. The scars are visible even through my clothes. The ones on my face are impossible to hide.
"Jesus Christ." He reaches out like he wants to touch me, then thinks better of it. "What did they do to you?"
