But this time, I wasn’t facing it alone. I had my husband. My family.
Chapter 22 – Kirill
The basement-level control room of Andrei’s compound was a cathedral of surveillance technology.
Screens flickered across my face in rapid succession—security feeds, satellite imagery, intercepted communications, heat signatures. The low hum of servers filled the space with white noise I found comforting. This was my element. Code and electronics and digital footprints that people thought they’d hidden but hadn’t buried deep enough.
Timur sat next to me at the main console, his massive frame somehow fitting into the ergonomic chair as he leaned forward to watch my fingers fly across the keyboard. We’d been at this for three hours, piecing together Sebastian’s movements, his connections, his network of safe houses and burner accounts.
Finding a ghost required patience. Persistence. And the willingness to dig through thousands of hours of footage looking for that one frame, that one mistake, that one moment when the target got careless.
“There.” Timur’s voice cut through my focus. He reached across and dropped another security feed onto my screen—grainy footage from a bugged hotel lobby. “That timestamp. Two days ago. Downtown location.”
I pulled up the feed, enhancing the image quality with algorithms I’d written specifically for this kind of work. The footage showed several men in the lobby, all of them carrying themselves with the particular swagger that came from cartel affiliation. Los Zetas ink was visible on at least two of them, tattoos peeking out from collar lines and sleeve edges.
“Switch to audio,” Drew said from behind us. I glanced back to find him standing with his arms crossed, coffee in hand, his steel-gray eyes fixed on the screen. “I know Spanish. Let’s hear what they’re saying.”
I pulled up the audio feed, letting it play through the speakers. The conversation was heated—rapid-fire Spanish punctuated by curse words and what sounded like threats. Urgent. Angry.
Drew’s expression shifted as he listened, going from focused to surprised to something darker.
“What are they saying?” Timur asked, his hand already moving toward the notepad where he’d been tracking leads.
“They’re discussing Sebastian.” Drew’s voice was tight with barely controlled amusement—or maybe fury. Hard to tell with him sometimes. “Our friend Douglas. Seems he’s not just Bratva’s problem. He’s a walking target for Los Zetas too.”
I stopped typing, my full attention shifting to Drew. “What?”
“He conned them as well.” Drew’s lips curved into something that wasn’t quite a smile. “Classic Sebastian move. They’re pissed. Really pissed. Talking about what they’re going to do when they find him. It’s…creative. And anatomically improbable.”
Timur shook his head, leaning back in his chair with a low laugh. “Los Zetas isn’t even the main cartel anymore. They’re the rogue faction. The ones who went ghost after that Yucatan bloodbath last year.” He paused. “The ones nobody’s heard from since. If they’re resurfacing now, it’s because they’re desperate.”
“Desperate enough to be hunting Sebastian,” I added, my mind already racing ahead. This changed things. Changed the calculation. If Los Zetas wanted him too, we could use that.
Drew moved closer, setting his coffee down on the console. “Sebastian sold them fake crypto data packages through a shell company. Promised them access to encrypted wallets, secure communication channels, the whole package. They paid him”—he whistled—“a lot. Millions, from what I’m hearing. Then he torched the offshore account and disappeared.”
“Classic Sebastian,” I muttered, fingers already pulling up financial records. Shell companies. Offshore accounts. The digital trail he thought he’d erased but hadn’t quite managed to completely delete.
Timur let out a low whistle. “That guy’s got balls. I’ll give him that. Conning the Bratva is one thing. Conning a rogue cartel faction that has nothing to lose? That’s suicidal.”
I clenched my jaw, rage simmering beneath the surface of my control. “The same balls I’m about to cut off.”
The words came out flat, emotionless. Statement of fact, not threat. Sebastian Davis—Douglas Maclanden—whatever name he was using—had made the fatal mistake of thinking he was smarter than everyone else. Of thinking he could con both the Bratva and Los Zetas and somehow escape unscathed.
He’d forgotten that eventually, all debts come due.
I pulled up a shared screen on the table, fingers flying across the keyboard as I opened a secure communication channel. “I’ve opened a line to Los Zetas,” I said, not looking up from my work. “Told them we want the same man for different reasons. They want their money back. We want our money”—I paused, meeting Timur’s eyes—“and blood.”
Timur’s expression went cold and calculating. “You made a deal with them?”
“Preliminary contact.” I pulled up the message thread, showing the back-and-forth negotiations I’d been conducting over the past week. “Told them Sebastian Davis stole from the Bratva four years ago. That he’s also connected to someone under our protection. That we have a shared interest in finding him.”
“And they agreed?” Drew asked, reading over my shoulder.
“They’re desperate enough to work with us temporarily. Enemy of my enemy and all that.” I switched screens, showinga map of Chicago with several locations marked. “They’ve been tracking him through street-level contacts. We’ve been tracking him through digital footprints. Combined, we’re close. Very close.”
Timur studied the map, his dark eyes scanning the marked locations. “So maybe we don’t have to chase Sebastian ourselves,” he said slowly, the idea taking shape. “Let the Zetas find him. We wait. When they make contact, we move in.”
“And take him from them,” I finished. “They get their money back. We get Sebastian. Everyone wins.”
