Page 3 of Prey of the Bratva

The hidden compartment slid open with a quiet mechanism, revealing what the rest of the house did not know existed. A separate laptop, stripped of anything traceable, already powered on. Files layered beneath files, all encrypted and precise. I sat down, fingers moving immediately. Shipping manifests appeared on the screen, dates and routes aligning in a pattern I had been tracking for months. I quickly cross-referenced them with grainy footage from the auction.

Ilana’s face flickered briefly on the screen, and my jaw tightened, but I refused to look away. Instead, I zoomed in on the background.

There it was. The symbol.

Subtle, embedded, and rather easy to miss unless you knew exactly what you were looking for. I had seen it again three nights ago on a crate being unloaded at the docks. I immediately knew it was not a coincidence. It was my first real clue at the network.

My phone buzzed softly on the table. Sera Anton. My Right-Hand.

“Tell me you have something,” I said, pressing the phone to my ear.

“I have enough,” the voice on the other end replied. “I hear all the Chernykhs are being watched more closely than usual.”

“Iosif and Avgust have been careful since Elisse’s kidnapping. They are insisting that all of us need to stay together and stay inside.”

“Then maybe we shouldn’t do this today.”

“No.”

“Misha—”

“No,” I repeated, sharper this time. “We are past the point of waiting. Tell me what you know.”

“They’ve moved another shipment. Same patterns and the same marking. The cargo has the symbol too that you first noticed in your sister-in-law’s auction video.”

“When is it arriving?”

“In a few hours at the south docks warehouse that we spotted earlier bearing the same symbols.”

Exactly where I expected. This was good. It meant I wasn’t guessing anymore.

“Who’s handling it?” I asked.

“Mid-level coordinator,” Sera said. “His name’s Elias Vance. He thinks he’s only selling routine information for some extra cash. But I am sure he knows more than he should.”

I allowed a faint smile. “Good. That means he’ll talk. I’ll meet him.”

A pause followed, quieter this time.

“You’re still going yourself?” Sera asked.

“Yes.” I leaned back slightly in my chair, my gaze drifting toward the screen again. “I need to see this in person, Sera. I need to know if he’s lying before he even opens his mouth.”

“You can do that from a distance.”

“Not well enough.”

Another pause.

“You’re taking a risk.”

“I’m taking control.”

I ended the call before the conversation could turn into something else. My gaze went back to the symbol flickering on my screen. While the men in my world continued to fight wars over territory and power, this was all happening quietly. Efficiently. Systematically. Girls were disappearing every day as if their lives meant nothing, and no one was stopping it. Not because they couldn’t. But because they simply were refusing to see the problem for how big it was.

That was the part that unsettled me. But not anymore. I would burn this entire network to the ground even if I had to do it alone. I reached for my primary phone and powered it off, leaving it on the desk. It was time to get going. My burner phone buzzed in my hand, and I picked it up.

“Tell me you’re not already outside,” I said, pressing it to my ear.