Both families arrive with heavy security. Everyone is armed, suspicious, with barely contained hostility crackling in the air.
The Volkovs line one side of the table. I don’t recognize many faces but an older, portly man scowls so deeply I’m surprised he doesn’t start growling. A younger man with a buzz cut (maybe around my age) looks like he wants to start shooting immediately.
The Ashfords line the other side. My father is at the center, looking grim. Uncle Marcus is on his right, arms crossed while various cousins and associates keep glancing at me with confusion, like they can’t figure out what I’m doing here.
And at the head of the table, Dimitri and I sit side by side.
His hand rests on the table near mine—not touching, but close enough to be deliberate. When he speaks, I lean slightly toward him. When I shift in my seat, his attention flickers to me briefly before returning to the room.
While we’re trying to be discreet, the intimacy between us is obvious, going by the stunned looks on both sides. I can see my father’s shock, too at how Dimitri turns protectively towards me.
He looks like someone just told him gravity works sideways.
“Thank you all for coming,” Dimitri begins, his voice cutting through the tense silence. “I know this is unusual, but what I’m about to tell you requires both families to hear it together.”
“Get on with it,” the portly scowling man growls. “Some of us have business.”
Dimitri doesn’t react. Instead, he pulls out a tablet and projects an image onto the screen behind him.
“I couldn’t agree more, Boris,” he tells the man before turning to the screen. “Three months ago, Alexei Volkov was murdered.”
Nods around the table. My father’s jaw tightens.
“Except he wasn’t,” Dimitri continues.
The room erupts with shouts in Russian and English. Chairs scrape against the floor and hands move toward weapons.
“Lies!” Boris roars. “We buried him! We had a funeral!”
“Bullshit,” the man with the buzz cut spits. “The Ashfords started this war by killing him?—”
“We did no such thing!” Uncle Marcus surges to his feet. “Yourfamily started this war!”
“You shot first! At the peace meeting!”
“Becauseyourpeople provoked us!”
"LIES!"
“Manipulated us?—”
“Ashford scum?—”
“Volkov dogs?—”
The security teams move in, creating barriers. Hands are actually on weapons, and it’s seconds from becoming a bloodbath. I stare at Dimitri in alarm. I really hope he knows what the fuck he’s doing.
But Dimitri doesn’t raise his voice or do anything, except stand there and somehow the authority in that simple action makes people hesitate.
“Watch the screen,” he says quietly.
The mall footage plays. It’s time-stamped from three days ago.
And there’s Alexei clear as day, his baseball hat pulled low but his face is still visible.
The room goes silent.
“That’s…” Boris stammers, his face white. “That’simpossible. He’sdead, Dima. We buried him.”
