She gives it to me, and I commit it to memory. That means they’re in the yard or beyond it, and the yard is a web of private lots and blind space. It’s where someone can hide a vehicle for hours without being noticed, especially if they pay the right guard at the gate.
I look down the block at the bay door, and I let the cold sharpen my focus rather than numb it. Rowan is in this city. Not in theory. Not as a possibility. She’s here, and she’s being held by men who made choices they don’t yet understand.
I step closer to the bay door and run my hand along the frame. The metal is cold enough to sting. There’s a thin, fresh layer of grease near the latch, which means this door has been opened recently.
“Karp,” I murmur.
He steps in close, sets his shoulder against the door, and leans his ear to the metal. After a moment, he eases away and looks at me once.
“Empty,” he tells me.
“Or quiet,” I reply.
“Quiet,” Mikel echoes, and he lifts his hand, signaling the men to reposition.
We don’t break in right now. We don’t rush a building we don’t control, not when Rowan could be inside, and a bad entry could turn leverage into a casualty. Instead, I step back and make the decision that matters.
“Seal the district,” I tell Mikel. “Not with obvious blockades. With eyes. Every exit route watched. Every gate noted. Anyone moving out tonight gets followed.”
“And Arkady?” Mikel prompts.
“Not yet. We tighten his perimeter without revealing we’ve begun. We make his world smaller until he makes a mistake.”
Mikel nods once. He understands restraint, and he understands it won’t last.
We step back from the door and return to the street, the cold already in our lungs. The district goes quiet again as if we werenever there, indifferent to the fact that a war has resumed in its shadows.
The estate is lit like a place that expects danger, not one that expects guests. Security is doubled at every gate, men are posted more closely than usual, vehicles are parked to provide clear lines of sight, and no blind corners are left open. The driveway is clean where snow has been cleared, but the cold remains in the stone and in the iron fences, and it follows me inside.
The foyer smells faintly of wood polish and the smoke of the fireplace. The warmth should feel like relief. It doesn’t. Warmth is a comfort for people who can rest, and I’m not resting.
A guard meets me near the base of the stairs.
“Pakhan,” he begins.
“Later,” I reply, and I walk past him because the status report can wait.
I’m halfway down the corridor toward my office when the front door opens again and closes. The footsteps that follow aren’t a guard’s.
My sister doesn’t announce herself. She never has.
Anya steps into the hall with her coat still on, hair pulled back, and her expression composed in the way of someone who grew up where panic wasn’t allowed. Her eyes move once across the room, noting the extra men, and the tighter positions, and she doesn’t ask for context.
She meets me near the archway leading into the sitting room.
“What happened?” she asks.
It’s not dramatic. It’s direct, and it requires a direct answer.
“Rowan was taken,” I tell her.
Anya holds still, and then her eyes narrow slightly, not from shock, but as she quickly works through what it means.
“From where?” she asks.
“Two blocks from the hospital. They hit the SUV and pulled her and Lila into a van.”
“Leo?” she continues.
