The city glows beneath me,a circuit board of light and shadow. From forty-seven floors up, the humans below are reduced to data points—predictable, mappable, controllable.
Unlike the chaos in my mind.
I press my fingertips to my lips, still feeling the ghost of Rafa’s mouth against mine. Hours later, the sensation refuses to fade, the unexpected heat, the way my body responded without permission from my brain. The glitch in my carefully constructed programming.
“Focus,” I mutter to myself, turning back to the screens that dominate my living space.
Red string connects printouts and digital displays, creating a physical manifestation of the connections my mind is tracking. Old school meets new tech, a technique Nicolai taught me years ago, when complex problems require engaging both hemispheres of the brain.
The numbers don’t lie, but they refuse to tell their full truth.
$37.4 million. Gone from the joint Petrov-Rosso accounts over eleven months. Not all at once. That would triggerimmediate alarms, but in a precise pattern designed to mimic natural financial fluctuations.
I’ve traced what I can, following digital breadcrumbs through shell companies and ghost accounts. But the trail goes cold in unexpected places, as if someone deliberately created dead ends that shouldn’t exist.
Someone who knows how both families operate. Someone from inside the Bratva’s buried past.
My fingers fly across the keyboard, searching for patterns in the microtransactions. Each withdrawal is fractionally different—$247,893 here, $315,624 there amounts specific enough to avoid triggering automated fraud detection but small enough to be explained away as legitimate business expenses if questioned.
Smart. Almost admirable, if it weren’t aimed at destroying my family.
I pull up the specific transaction dates and arrange them in chronological order. Something catches my eye—a pattern in the timing. Every third Tuesday, like clockwork. Except for February, when it was the fourth Tuesday. Why the deviation? I cross-reference information from news articles, business records, and other relevant sources to help explain the anomaly. What happened then?
My thoughts are interrupted by the security system’s alert. The elevator is ascending to my floor—unauthorized.
I quickly minimize my screens and reach for the gun hidden beneath my desk. Only three people have access to override my security: Nicolai, my father, and Alexei. The elevator doors slide open to reveal my father, his imposing figure filling the doorway. Alexei looms behind him, expression unreadable beneath his thick beard.
“Father,” I say, carefully setting the gun aside but within reach. “This is unexpected.”
“A father doesn’t need an invitation to see his daughter,” he replies in Russian, striding into my space as if he owns it, which, technically, he does.
I remain seated, a small act of defiance. “It’s late.”
“And yet you’re working,” he observes, gesturing to my screens with a knowing look. “Always working, ??? ????? ????.”
My smart daughter. A compliment that always precedes a test.
“The money concerns me,” I say carefully, watching his reaction. “The patterns are... unusual.”
“Patterns?” He picks up one of my printouts, studying it with feigned interest. “What have you found?”
A test indeed. Does he already know what I’ve discovered? Is he checking my loyalty or my competence?
I decide on a partial truth. “The thefts aren’t coming from the Rossos.”
Alexei shifts his weight, a subtle cue that I automatically catalog. He’s uncomfortable with this conversation.
My father’s expression hardens. “Nonsense. Of course it’s the Italians. Who else would have access to our joint systems?”
“Someone internal,” I reply, holding his gaze steadily. “The code structure contains Russian markers. Someone is trying to make it look like the Rossos, specifically Rafa, but it’s not him.”
“You sound very certain. Very... defensive of your fiancé.” My father says softly.
The implied accusation hangs in the air between us.
“I’m defensive of the truth,” I counter. “The evidence points to someone on our side. Someone who knows our systems intimately.”
“Evidence can be manipulated,” Alexei interjects, speaking for the first time. “Especially digital evidence.”
