Just because I didn’t like getting dirty doesn’t mean I don’t know how.
But this—this knot under my ribs is different. Sasha is the cause of it. She’s the first thing that’s managed to make my chest tighten and my breath shallow, the first person whose absence makes the air in a room feel wrong. Every plan I’ve ever run wasbuilt around keeping the family safe, the ledger balanced, the perimeter unbreeched. Never before did a single person make me want to break the balance for them. For her.
I turn from the window. The reflection of my face in the glass looks like a man I barely recognize: hard lines, a hurt that tastes like iron. If I stop thinking about her—if I shove this ache back down—I can sharpen my mind again. I can stop being the man who watches and flinches and become the one who moves. Precise. Cruel if necessary. Efficient.
Sasha is the reason I feel this fear, but she will not be the reason I lose. Not today. Not ever. I let the heat of that resolve replace the cold in my chest. I will be ruthless. For her.
When the door opens, I turn, expecting Mikhail—but it’s not just him. He’s flanked by Niko, Kaz, and Roman, all of them stepping into the study with a grim air.
My brows pull together. “How the hell are you all here at once?”
Roman shrugs, closing the door behind them. “Ran into these two just as I was pulling up. Figured whatever’s going on must be big if we all got summoned.”
Kaz drops onto one of the armchairs, sprawling like this is a regular afternoon instead of a possible declaration of war. Niko, on the other hand, looks tense—his sharp eyes cutting to me, then to Mikhail. “Why the urgency, Lev? You sound like you’re planning something reckless.”
I glance from one to the other, weighing how much to tell them, then exhale slowly. “Because I am.”
That gets their attention. The room stills. Even Kaz stops slouching.
I move from the window to the table, bracing my hands on its edge. “Roman just confirmed it—Petropoulos’s men plan to contact me soon. They’ll give me a deadline to hand Sasha over, or they’ll come for her themselves.”
Niko swears under his breath. Mikhail looks down, already expecting it. Roman just watches me, expression unreadable.
I straighten. “We’re done waiting for them to make the next move. From this point forward, we take control.”
I watch them all for a beat, measuring the air in the room. Niko’s jaw is tight; Roman has that closed-off look he gets when he’s calculating angles rather than emotion. Kaz—predictably—leans forward, eyes bright, already tasting the fight.
“What do you mean, ‘take control’?” Niko asks, voice clipped. He always gets to the heart of things quickly, and I respect that. He’s thinking about consequences I can feel in his tone: families, alliances, blood on pavements that will not wash off easily.
“We go on the offensive,” I say. The words leave the table like a thrown knife. “We fly to Greece. We confront the Petropoulos family directly. We don’t wait for them to choose their terms. We make them pay attention on our terms.”
Roman’s hand tightens into a fist at his side. “You’re proposing we invade someone else’s backyard, Lev? That’s political suicide. The Greeks will see it as escalation, not defense.” His voice is low, controlled—dangerously calm.
Kaz snorts. “Or we show weakness and get carved up. Let them come knock on our door with threats? Please. If Lev wants to go take the fight to them, I’ll go with him.” He slams a palm on the arm of his chair like he’s punctuating the sentence.
Niko’s eyes flash. “This is bigger than you, Lev. There are consequences. Allies, trade lines, police attention. You fly into Greece with a squad, and you risk open war—straight into their hands. We can’t just burn diplomatic bridges because you’re angry.”
Roman adds, quiet but sharp, “And there’s the leak. If someone inside our house is feeding them intel, landing inAthens with guns only confirms what they already think. It plays into their narrative and gives them cover to retaliate harder.”
Silence. Their argument—or warning—lands heavier than any threat.
Mikhail folds his hands, expression tight. “We can’t ignore that either. Security has to be locked down here first. If we go, we leave the home front vulnerable.”
I let their points sit for a beat, then push back, because I’ve already run the numbers in my head a thousand times. “If we do nothing, they’ll escalate until they get what they want. A deadline to hand her over isn’t bargaining; it’s an ultimatum. Waiting makes us reactive; attacking makes us dangerous. We’ll fracture their confidence, and maybe the rat reveals themselves when the pressure’s applied.”
Roman holds my gaze for long seconds, then glances at Niko. “You’re not thinking politically, Lev. You’re thinking emotionally.”
“Maybe,” I admit. “Maybe I’m thinking with blood in my veins instead of the ledger. But look at it this way: If we go to Greece, we do it smart. We don’t paratroop in like fools. Roman, you said you could move in Europe with less notice—use that. You act as liaison. Mikhail, you secure our perimeter here and scrub any traces. Niko, you handle domestic fallout—contacts, legal cover, everything that keeps the business lines sealed. Kaz, you lead the operations team. I’ll sit down with Petropoulos and Markovic directly. We take the ledgers, or we break the men protecting them.”
Niko breathes out, a low, disbelieving sound. “You want me to sanction an overseas op with our name on it? We could be painted as mercenaries.”
“We’ll make it look like a recovery—intelligence-driven, surgical,” I say evenly. “Not a war party. And before we move, weclose the leak. We root out who’s feeding them. That’s Mikhail’s first job.”
Roman’s face doesn’t soften, but he nods slowly. “If we do this, we do it surgically. No theatrics. No bodies left where they can be pointed at us without a good story. We’ll need clean intel, deniability, and a show of force that doesn’t drag European politics into our backyard.”
Niko remains unconvinced, but he looks at me then—really looks. “You’re doing this for Sasha, not the family ledger,” he says. No accusation in it, just an observation.
“Yes,” I say. “I’m doing it for Sasha.”
