And she was.
I watched her through quiet reports and the occasional photo. She went to school, worked, sang, and even dated once or twice but never seriously. Never long enough for any man to leave a mark. Every time I got word she’d gone out, something inside me twisted until I made sure it didn’t happen again. A subtle warning. A whispered rumor. The men left her alone after that.
My brothers joked about it, of course. They said I was obsessed. Maybe I am. But obsession is all that’s left when love rots in your hands and turns to something you can’t wash away.
When I told them my plan to come here and bring her back to New York, they laughed. But none of them dared tell me not to.
The rain thickens as the car slows. The traffic light in front of me turns red. I glance at my watch. It's early evening, still quite early in a city like London.
The neighborhood she lives in is quiet, respectable—a far cry from the dangers I’d feared when she first moved here. But even in safe places, she’s too trusting. Too unguarded. I should probably feel guilty for barging into her life like this and the selfish plans I have for her, but I'm not a man who indulges in trivial emotions like conscience. I've crossed worse lines than this.
I mean…I killed my own father.
The night I learned the truth still replays like a film loop, each detail sharper than the last. His slurred confession. The stink of whiskey seeping from his pores, the white powder still dusting his nostrils. The casual way he told me about the people he’d destroyed, as if he were reading a grocery list.
He told me about Ivan first—my older brother. He was just a sixteen year old who caught his father with a mistress… He was foolish enough to threaten Yuri. He was going to rat Yuri out to Natasha, our mother.
So Yuri staged a car accident.
He cried at the funeral.
But that night, he’d smiled, proud of himself.
Something broke in me then.
He bragged about killing Natasha, too, years later, when her father died, and there was no one left to protect her. He admitted to murdering Anya’s father, Petr Petrov, just to clear the way for Katarina. Then he took her, ruined her, discarded her, and killed her too.
Every wife. Every lover. Dead by his hand.
I was horrified to realize how much more depraved my father was than I’d ever imagined. The monster I’d feared as a boy was nothing compared to the man who bragged about murder like it was sport.
That night, when his words finally sank in, I decided he wouldn’t live to see another year.
But in the bratva, killing apakhanisn’t a decision a man makes lightly—or without consequence. It’s treason. Even if it’s righteous, even if it’s deserved, it must be sanctioned, or the bullet turns back on the shooter.
So I planned. Quietly. Patiently. I built alliances with men who hated Yuri more than they feared him. I gathered evidence, proof of the things he’d done. When the time came, I would go before thevoryat the nextskhodkaand lay everything bare. The council would give me permission to act.
That was the plan.
Until Yuri lost control.
He’d been in negotiations with an Italian, Giovanni Marino, for a marriage alliance. The bride was to be Elena Marino, Giovanni’s daughter. But when the deal soured, Yuri did what he always did when he didn’t get his way. He took what wasn’t his.
He kidnapped her.
If he’d hurt her…if he’d killed her, it would’ve started a war. One that would have burned the bratva and the mafia alike to ash.
There was no time to consider the rules. So I acted.
I didn’t have the council’s blessing or the time to ask for it. All I had was a gun, my brothers, and a lifetime of fury waiting to break loose.
When I found him, he was laughing. High. Drunk. Proud of what he’d done. He thought no one would dare touch him.
He was wrong.
I didn’t hesitate this time. I pulled the trigger. His end was quieter than I expected—for the end of an empire. It brought me no joy. Only silence.
But silence was better than the noise he’d made.
