"Who's injured?"
"No one yet." I watch the city blur past. "But they will be."
"Alexei…" His voice is careful. "I heard about your mother. And about Kaz taking the girl."
"And?"
"Nothing. Just… be careful. Grief makes men do stupid things."
"This isn't grief." Though it is: grief for my mother, for Mikhail, for the woman who ran from me. "This is calculation. Kaz made his move. Now I make mine."
The convoy takes the exit toward the warehouse district. Forty-three vehicles now, based on the count in my mirrors. Men who've chosen my side in what's about to become a family civil war. Some for loyalty, some for fear, some because they think I'll win.
They're right. I will win. Because I have nothing left to lose except her.
The warehouse looms ahead, surrounded by Kaz's vehicles. He's probably inside explaining to Sofia how justice works in our world. How blood demands blood. How the guilty must pay.
He's not wrong. Blood does demand blood.
But she's already mine. Her blood, her body, her lies, her truths. Mine to punish or forgive. Mine to keep breathing.
The convoy stops. I step out into Chicago morning, glass crunching under my shoes from the shattered window. Blood still drips from my knuckles, leaving a trail as I walk toward the warehouse.
Behind me, doors open. Weapons check. Magazines sliding into place. The sound of men preparing for war.
I don't know why she ran. Don't know what memory those bracelet halves unlocked. Don't know what she told Marco that made him shatter glass.
But I know this: she's in that warehouse, probably thinking she deserves whatever Kaz has planned.
She's wrong.
The only thing she deserves is me. My fury, my obsession, my broken promises, my violent love.
Time to remind my cousin why they call me pakhan.
Time to paint that warehouse red.
Time to take back what belongs to me.
Even if she spends the rest of her life hating me for it.
26 - Sofia
The warehouse is cold. Industrial cold, the kind that seeps through skin and settles in bone marrow. The metal chair bites through my thin dress where they’ve tied me, zip ties cutting into my wrists behind my back. Standard restraints. My thumb finds the joint automatically. Thirty seconds to dislocate, slip free, have Guard Two’s gun. The Weapon inside me whispers the moves like a lover’s promise.
But I force my hands still. What's the point of surviving when living means facing what I've done?
Kaz circles me like I'm something fascinating, his footsteps echoing off concrete walls stained with rust and darker things. The warehouse reeks of old blood and machine oil, fear that's soaked into the foundation. The metallic taste coats my tongue even though I haven't been hit yet. Perfect place for an execution.
"Sofia Rosetti," he says, voice bouncing off metal rafters. "Do you know why you're here?"
I stare at nothing. There's a crack in the floor six feet away. I focus on that while the Weapon notes exits. Roller door to the left, emergency exit behind Kaz, windows thirty feet up. Useless information. I'm not going anywhere.
"Your crimes against the Volkov family." He stops in front of me, designer shoes polished to mirror shine despite the grime of this place. His cologne is sharp, chemical, nothing like—I stop that thought before it forms. "Should I list them?"
Silence. My silence. Empty as the place where my heart used to beat.
"You seduced Mikhail Volkov." His voice gains an edge. "Fed him information about your family's operations. Made him weak. Led him to his death."
