Chapter 9
Anton
Midnight smells like rust and bleach.
The warehouse is old Bratva property—off Charleston, tucked behind a decommissioned meat plant where the bones used to pile higher than the walls. We haven’t used it in years, not since Lev decided he didn’t like the acoustics for torture work. Said the echoes ruined the pacing.
Tonight, it’s good enough.
The lights buzz overhead, throwing yellow halos onto the concrete. I check the corridor again, then the padlock on the far door. It’s reinforced, welded shut from the inside. No plumbing. No vents. No way for Viktor Kozlov to off himself before I get what I need out of him.
He’s locked up tight.
Still breathing. Still bleeding.
And for the next forty minutes, still alive.
I walk the length of the corridor again, silent. Cement crunches under my boots—dust from the last crew who used this place for something messier. Could be blood. Could be plaster. Doesn’t matter. It’s clean enough for tonight.
I check the time. 12:09.
Igor’s reply still hasn’t come in.
I texted him thirty minutes ago with the address. Not the full location—just a block radius, with the entry code for the gate. I expected a thumbs-up, maybe a brief order.
Instead, I got nothing.
Well… not nothing. He read it.
I saw the status change. Read. 23:38.
And then silence.
The kind that scratches at the back of your neck.
I don’t like this.
Igor doesn’t ghost me. Not unless he’s trying to make a point… or something’s already happened he doesn’t want to say yet. Either way, the quiet is too long. Too surgical. It feels arranged.
I pull out my phone again, double-check the signal jammer. Working. Comms are clear. Dima’s posted at the door. Lev’s checking the roofline.
And Boris is parked three blocks out, engine running, armed to the teeth with a burner laptop and a Glock that’s seen more war zones than most men in this city.
If this goes wrong, it won’t be for lack of preparation.
But quiet like this never means safe.
Quiet means planned.
I put the phone away.
Lev comes down the stairs from the upper catwalk, rifle strapped across his back, chewing the last bite of a protein bar like this is any other Tuesday. His boots thump across the metal steps, then fall silent when they hit the concrete. He doesn’t speak until he’s close.
“All clear. No movement on the east side. Crows scattered fast when I climbed up. Nothing else.” He eyes me. “You get a reply?”
I shake my head once.
Dima shifts near the rear exit, his back to the wall, hand resting loose near his holster. He’s listening, even when he pretends not to be. I see it in the way his chin tips every few seconds. Marking the noises that aren’t supposed to be there.
I glance toward the holding room.
Viktor’s still in there. Alive, pacing.
He’s quiet now, but Lev heard him throw up earlier. Said it sounded wet. Not nerves—fear. Real, chest-hollowing terror. The kind of fear that doesn’t come from a beating. It comes from knowing you walked into something bigger than you understood.
I check the time again.
12:13.
Then the phone buzzes in my jacket. I pull it fast, thumb over the screen.
Igor Vetrov: I’ll meet you there. Don’t move him.
Nothing else.
No acknowledgment, no threats, no ETA. Just seven words and a full stop.
Lev leans in to peek. “So he is coming.”
“Apparently.”
“Alone?”
“Doubt it.”
Dima doesn’t say anything. He moves back toward the corridor, slower now. Hand fully around his weapon.
We’ve been in this world too long to assume anything. If Igor shows up in person—and didn’t call ahead to bark orders like usual—it means two things:
Either he wants to see Viktor’s corpse with his own eyes.
Or he’s coming to see who the traitor is before the kill.
Regardless of the reason, it means I don’t control what happens next.
I nod to Lev. “Prep the entry hall.”
“You want him down on his knees?”
“No. Not yet. Keep him restrained. Visible. Nothing else.”
Lev disappears toward the room, rolling his shoulders. I head back toward the table we set up by the old meat scale—scattered with paper copies of the ledgers, timelines, offshore trails, names tied to the payments Viktor authorized under ghost accounts.
The evidence is clean.
Meticulous.
It proves what I already know: this isn’t just Viktor pocketing chips from the casino skim.
This is bigger.
This is Timofey’s play.
And it’s wrapped in enough false trails and bribes that if Viktor talks, the whole thing burns.
I spread the pages again.
Put the most damning one on top—the Cayman account tagged under Volkov Holdings LLC, linked directly to a side-branch out of New York. It’s been bouncing funds for thirteen months. A full year of slow siphoning under Igor’s nose.
He’ll see it. He has to see it.
This isn’t a theory anymore. It’s not a hunch.
It’s a pattern.
A betrayal.
And I’m ready to hand him the proof on a silver tray.
My phone buzzes again.
Not Igor.
A different number.
I click it open.
Mary: Please be careful.
That’s all.
Just those three words.
My jaw tightens.
She doesn’t know this world. Not really. But somehow, she understands enough to know tonight isn’t routine.
I stare at the text longer than I should.
No one’s ever told me that before.
Not in this life.
Not when I left Brighton Beach. Not when I put a bullet through a man’s teeth at sixteen. Not when I got my first kill order. Not even when my mother was dying and I left her to bleed in a hospital bed while I cleaned up someone else’s mess.
Be careful? That’s not something you say to the Reaper.
It’s something you say when you don’t want someone to disappear.
I shift my jaw, but the clench won’t ease. The warehouse feels smaller now. Like the walls moved in without permission. Like something’s circling just outside the line of sight, waiting for a slip.
I lock the screen and shove the phone into the inside pocket of my coat.
Focus.
Back to the room.
Something’s off. My gut twists, a knife-sharp instinct screaming trouble, but I can’t pin it down. A deal going south? A tail we missed? Something’s breathing down my neck, and I’m blind to it.
My fingers flex, itching for the weight of my gun, but I keep still, every muscle coiled, ready to move. I’m the Reaper, not prey, but this feeling— Fuck, it’s like the air’s too thick, pressing in.
I roll my shoulders. Breathe once. Then go still.
A low rumble breaks the silence outside.
Tires.
I move toward the windows on the west wall, peel back one of the boarded slots we carved years ago for lines of sight.
Two SUVs slow as they approach the gate. Clean black, armored, lights off. No logos. No plates.
They pull up to the entrance like they’ve done this a hundred times—which they have. We’ve used this place for cleanups, interrogations, shit we bury deep. Only the inner circle knows it exists.
The gate stays shut until Dima confirms the licenses via radio. It grinds open, heavy and slow, and the vehicles roll through.
My back straightens.
Lev moves closer to the side wall, hand sliding toward the rifle on his back, eyes sharp now.
The vehicles stop, engines humming low, cutting through the warehouse’s stale air.
Doors swing open. Bodyguards step out first, heavy builds, Slavic, ex-military, boots crunching gravel.
They scan the perimeter, hands near holsters, and one opens the back door of the lead SUV.
Igor steps out, black wool coat, red-lined, cashmere, custom.
His scarf’s tight, movements deliberate like always.
But it’s the third figure stepping out behind him that shifts the air in my lungs.
Timofey.
Perfect coat. Impeccable shoes. Hair swept back with too much product. And a fucking smile on his face like this is a holiday dinner.
“That fucking suka,” Lev mutters under his breath, glancing at me. “Guess he’s got the Pakhan’s balls in a drawer.”
He doesn’t laugh.
Neither do I. Because now the clock’s ticking.
Timofey being here wasn’t part of the plan. Which means he’s either inserting himself into something he knows… or something he’s afraid of.
Either way, the weight of this just doubled.
I glance toward the evidence table. The ledgers. The Cayman trail. Volkov Holdings LLC—his name, even if buried.
He knows.
He’s here to see what I know. To gauge how much I’ve pieced together before Igor does.
Lev shifts his weight like he’s ready to mouth off again. Dima’s still a statue by the door, hand hovering too close to his weapon.
I don’t need to say a word. Just one look at both of them.
Not tonight.
Because this isn’t the hill I’m dying on.
I swallow it down—the rage, the proof, the urge to put a bullet where it belongs. Later.
For now, my men walk out of here alive.
Even if it means I choke on the silence.
The main warehouse door opens.
Two men enter first—broad-shouldered, silent, built like they’ve spent their lives carrying bodies instead of bags. One veers left, the other sweeps right, clearing the space with methodical precision.
My Pakhan walks straight toward the table. He doesn’t wait for greetings. Doesn’t acknowledge me or my men.
He heads for the ledgers first.
That’s my cue.
I take a step forward. “We’ve secured everything. Evidence matches what Boris traced. The account movements start—”
He raises a hand. Just enough to shut me up. It’s not rude. It’s worse. It’s paternal. Like I’m the soldier being reminded of my rank.
Behind him, Timofey moves slowly, but makes sure to look around. Smirking. Clocking Lev. Clocking Dima. Clocking me.
Then he plants himself just off Igor’s shoulder; a fucking smile spreads across his face.
“Didn’t think I’d miss this little reunion, did you?” he says, voice smooth, like he’s walking into a party.
I step forward instead—measured, steady—placing myself between them and the table we set up by the old meat scale. The pages are still there. The evidence. The reason we’re all standing in this forgotten corner of Vegas tonight.
Igor taps the table once.
Then looks up at me. “Where is he?”