31
ALEKSEI
Eight months later…
By the thirdshattered glass of the morning, no one knocks before entering my office anymore.
They send emails. They send assistants. They send each other.
No one wants to be the man who steps in front of me when I’m like this.
The boardroom still smells faintly of coffee and fear from the meeting I ended ten minutes ago by throwing a printed report hard enough to crack the screen behind Sergei’s head. Not at him. Near him.
A courtesy. He knows the difference.
A warehouse in Queens was hit this morning. Not enough damage to cripple us, but enough to send a message. Another shipment vanished overnight. Two men switched to my father’s side last week. Ever since he made my grandfather’s will public, people have stopped whispering and started choosing sides.
And I still don’t have a wife. Or an heir. Or Zatanna.
It has been eight months since she left.
Eight months since that email hit my inbox. Short. Formal. Final.
I have looked for her. Quietly at first. Then harder. I put people on her old apartment, old contacts, the studio she recorded at, even the part-time places she worked before us. Nothing.
That alone makes me angrier than it should.
I throw a file across the table. “Explain to me how this keeps happening.”
No one answers fast enough.
Sergei finally says, “Your father is hitting the weak points. Small strikes. Fast exits. He wants pressure, not chaos.”
“I know what he wants.”
“Then you also know this is working,” Anton says.
I stare at him until he looks down.
A knock comes at the door. Only one person still knocks like that.
“Come in.”
Ilya walks in, takes one look around, and says, “You’re being an ass again.”
“No one asked you.”
“No, but someone has to say it.”
He drops a folder on the table and looks at the others. “Out.”
They leave without argument.
The second the door shuts, he turns to me. “This is getting worse.”
“I noticed.”
“Did you?” he asks. “Because from where I’m standing, you’re still acting like you can brute-force your way through this.”
