“I’m not helping you,” I repeat.
Lorenzo studies me for another long moment, then straightens. “Your loyalty is noted. I hope Felix appreciates the cost you’re willing to pay for it.”
He leaves without another word, the warehouse door closing with an echoing finality.
***
The interrogation tactics shift after Lorenzo’s visit. Instead of physical threats or direct questioning, they show me images. Constantly. Rotating displays on tablets positioned where I can’t avoid seeing them.
Detained Rudenko personnel being processed by federal agents. Families of Sartore employees protesting outside frozenbank branches. News coverage of warehouse fires Felix allegedly ordered to destroy evidence before authorities arrived.
The message is clear: this war is my fault. Every casualty, every lost job, every family disrupted by escalating conflict between Rudenko and Sartore—all of it traces back to my refusal to cooperate.
The guilt is designed to accumulate until it breaks me.
I close my eyes and focus on breathing. On staying present instead of spiraling into manufactured responsibility for violence I didn’t choose and can’t control.
Hours blur together. The guards rotate. The images continue cycling. My wrists throb where zip ties have been cutting off circulation for too long.
Eventually, they cut the restraints and leave me monitored but not physically bound. I stretch my arms carefully, wincing at the pain of blood flow returning. The bruising around my wrists is dark purple, finger-shaped marks from the initial grab layered over linear cuts from the ties.
Felix is going to see these and lose whatever remaining control he’s maintained.
Night falls. The warehouse dims to emergency lighting that casts everything in harsh shadows. The guards change shift. I’m given water and food I force myself to eat despite the nausea churning in my stomach.
Alone in the dim warehouse, fear sets in fully.
Not fear of death. If Lorenzo wanted me dead, I’d already be buried somewhere Felix would never find. This is worse—being kept alive specifically to fracture the only alliance I have left. To prove that protecting me costs too much, that the marriage was a strategic mistake rather than sustainable commitment.
I pull my knees to my chest, wrapped in a blanket one of the guards tossed over me earlier, and let the fear wash through without fighting it.
Felix will come. I’m his now. He proved it by starting a war rather than negotiating my release.
“He’ll come,” I whisper into the darkness, barely audible even to myself.
When he does, Lorenzo is going to learn exactly what it costs to put hands on Felix Rudenko’s wife.
The warehouse settles into silence broken only by guards moving through scheduled patrols. I close my eyes and wait, conserving energy for whatever comes next.
Felix will come, and I need to be ready when he does.
Chapter Twenty-Three - Felix
The tactical team splits at the warehouse perimeter: Alpha through the main loading bay, and Bravo circling to the east entrance where thermal imaging showed the lightest guard concentration.
I’m with Bravo, body armor tight across my chest, the weight of the sidearm familiar despite years of delegating violence to men trained specifically for this work.
Pavel’s voice crackles through my earpiece one final time.“You should coordinate from the vehicle. Let the team handle entry.”
I don’t bother responding. The building in front of me holds Diana, and coordinating from safety while she’s restrained inside feels impossible.
“Cutting power in ten,”the tactical lead announces.
I check my weapon again—magazine seated, round chambered, safety off. The motion is automatic, muscle memory from training I completed decades ago but never stopped maintaining. You don’t rise to captain in the Bratva without understanding violence intimately, even if you prefer strategy to enforcement.
Tonight requires both.
The warehouse lights cut simultaneously with the street lamps, plunging the entire block into darkness broken only by distant city glow. Night vision activates across the team, the world shifting into green-tinted clarity that renders shadows into navigable terrain.
