"I loved him," I admit, the words scraping out of my throat. "As a brother. As the father I never had."
Alina's hand finds mine, her fingers threading through mine. The simple gesture steadies me enough to continue.
"We worked together for years. Built the Morozov family into something powerful. But Mikhail's ambition grew. He started making moves that threatened the entire Bratva structure, deals with foreign cartels that would have brought federal attention down on all of us. He was willing to sacrifice everything for more power."
I remember the arguments, the late nights trying to talk sense into him. The way his blue eyes would go cold when I questioned his decisions. The moment I realized the man I loved like a brother had become something monstrous.
"The other families came to me," I continue, my voice flat. "They said if I didn't stop him, they would. There would be war. Hundreds would die. So I made a choice."
"You testified against him." Alina's voice holds no judgment, just understanding.
"Yes. I gave the authorities everything they needed to put him away. Financial records, witness statements, evidence of his crimes. He got twenty-five years." I touch the eight-pointed star tattoo on my chest through my shirt, feeling the weight of what that mark represents. "He looked at me in that courtroom, and I saw the exact moment he stopped seeing me as a brother and started seeing me as a traitor."
The memory is vivid. Mikhail's face across the courtroom, his silver hair perfectly styled even in prison orange, his blue eyesburning with hatred and something worse. Betrayal. The kind that cuts deeper than any knife.
"Five years into his sentence, there was a riot. Mikhail was killed, or so we were told. I saw the body myself at the morgue. Attended the funeral. Watched them lower the casket into the ground." I laugh bitterly. "Except it wasn't him, was it? It was all staged. He's been out there for five years, planning this. Planning to destroy everything I built, everyone I care about."
Why is my family trying to destroy me? The people I loved, admired, and looked up to? First my uncle Lorenzo, and now Mikhail. My heart bleeds with the knowledge.
Alina is quiet for a long moment, processing. Then she asks the question I've been asking myself since I saw that name on the screen.
"The church attack. My father's betrayal. The frame job with the Kozlov murders. It's all him?"
"Yes." The certainty settles into my bones like ice. "It's all revenge. Mikhail is a strategist, always thinking three moves ahead. He orchestrated everything to bring me to this moment. Isolated. Vulnerable. Watching everything I've built crumble around me."
I think about the precision of it all. How Viktor was approached, his ambition exploited. How the Kozlovs were manipulated into the church attack. How evidence was planted to frame me for murders I didn't commit. It's brilliant and brutal, exactly Mikhail's style.
And Lorenzo. “Although my Uncle Lorenzo acted out of rage and jealousy, I bet Mikhail helped him along that path. Without Mikhail, maybe Lorenzo wouldn’t have lost his damned mind.”
I take a deep breath and run my hand through my hair, the weight of such betrayal almost too heavy to bear.
"Mikhail wanted me to suffer first," I say, the pieces falling into place. "To lose Sergei, to be accused of crimes I didn't commit, to watch the Bratva families turn against me. And then, when I was at my weakest, he'd reveal himself and take everything."
Alina's face has gone pale, but her voice is steady. "Except he didn't count on me."
I look at her, really look at her. My wife. The woman who's changed everything. Her red hair catches the lamplight, and I see the strength in her green eyes, the steel beneath the softness. She's right. Mikhail's plan didn't account for Alina, for what she's become to me.
"No," I agree, pulling her closer. "He didn't count on you. On us."
She leans into me, and I breathe in the scent of her hair, jasmine and something uniquely her. For a moment, I let myself feel the fear I've been pushing down. Fear of losing her, of watching Mikhail destroy everything I love.
Then I push it away and become the Pakhan again.
"If Mikhail is alive, where is he?" Alina asks, her voice muffled against my chest.
"I don't know. But I have resources." I pull out my phone and start making calls. First to Alexei, then to my network of informants across the city. I offer a substantial reward for information on Mikhail Volkov's whereabouts. Half a million dollars to anyone who can give me a location.
The response is immediate. My phone starts buzzing with incoming messages, calls, tips. Most are useless, people tryingto claim the reward with false information. But some are promising.
Alina sits in the leather chair by my desk, watching me work. I'm aware of her presence, of the way she's studying me with those perceptive green eyes. She's learning to read me, to see past the cold exterior to the man beneath.
"You're afraid," she says softly.
I want to deny it, to maintain the façade of the ruthless Pakhan who fears nothing. But I've promised her honesty, and I won't break that promise now.
"Yes," I admit. "Mikhail knows me better than anyone. He knows my weaknesses, my strategies, how I think. Fighting him is like fighting myself."
"But you're not the same man you were five years ago," Alina points out. "You've changed. Grown. You have things to fight for now that you didn't have then."
