Chapter 6
ROLAN
The meeting is about money.
It’s always about money. Construction permits for the development on West Randolph. Laundering timelines. A city alderman who’s getting greedy and needs to be reminded that his campaign contributions come with expectations.
Yuri drones through the numbers on my laptop screen while I sit in the back of the Escalade, saying “da” at the appropriate intervals and thinking about none of it.
My mind has been elsewhere all day, which is unusual. I don’t allow myself the luxury of distraction. That’s how men in my position end up dead.
My father taught me that. Then someone proved it by putting three bullets in him while he was reading the newspaper.
But today my mind keeps drifting north, toward the estate.
Toward the interviews I couldn’t attend. Because a Bratva Pakhan doesn’t sit in a room and ask schoolteachers about their qualifications.
That’s what Mikhail is for. He knows what I want. He’s conducted this process before .
Background checks so thorough they border on surveillance. Questions designed to reveal not only competence but character. A final assessment based on instinct as much as evidence.
Mikhail’s instinct has kept me alive for twelve years. I trust it.
And yet…
I check the time in the corner of the screen: 3:18 p.m. The interviews were scheduled to begin at two. Four candidates, fifteen to twenty minutes each. They should be wrapping up.
The intercom buzzes. Alexei’s voice, clipped.
“We have a problem.”
I don’t take my eyes off the screen. “Define it.”
“Warehouse seven. The one on Kedzie. Hit twenty minutes ago. Two men down. Ivan’s in surgery at Northwestern, a bullet through the shoulder. Pasha took shrapnel to the face, but he’ll keep his eyes. Inventory’s untouched.”
“They didn’t take anything?”
“Nothing. It was a message. I’ll be at the office in thirty.”
I hang up.
Half an hour later, we’re both in my office. Alexei’s face is the same flat terrain it always is, but the set of his jaw tells me the message was received clearly.
“Albanians?”
“Signature matches. Same entry pattern as the port job three weeks ago. Same surveillance blind spots. Which means?—”
“They have our security rotations.” I calmly finish. “Someone inside is still feeding them information.”
“But Viktor is dead.”
“Viktor was the courier. Not the source.” I stand and button my jacket. “He was a logistics man. He had access to manifests and schedules, not security rotations. Whoever gave the Albanians our warehouse layout has access to operational security. That’s a shorter list.”
Alexei nods. I can see the names already cycling behind his eyes, the mental roster of people with that level of clearance. It’s a list of six.
“Pull the security logs for the past ninety days,” I command. “Every access point, every login, every camera that went down for maintenance. Cross-reference with the timeline of Albanian intelligence. And increase the perimeter rotation at every property, not just the warehouses. The estate, too.”
“The estate?”
“If they know our warehouse layouts, they know where I live. They know about Anya.”
The name changes the air in the room.
Alexei’s jaw tightens. He’s known my daughter since the day she was born. Stood outside the hospital room while Katarina bled out. Held the door while I walked out carrying a baby so small and so perfect that the world was different on the other side.
He doesn’t love many things, but he loves Anya.
“I’ll double the team tonight,” he agrees. “And Rolan, the tutor candidates. If we’re tightening security, having a new person in the house?—”
“I know, I’ll talk to Mikhail soon.”
He nods and leaves the office.
I open the security application. A custom build. Encrypted, accessible only from my device and Mikhail’s. The live feeds from the estate populate in a grid. Sixteen cameras cover almost every angle.
The camera in the waiting room, where the interview is taking place, shows an empty room. Chairs neatly arranged. Water pitcher untouched. The candidates are gone.
Good. Done.
I’m about to close the app when a movement catches my eye. Camera nine in the main living room. The feed is sharp, high-resolution, and angled from the upper corner to capture the full breadth of the room.
And there, moving through the frame, is a woman.
She’s small. That’s the first thing I register. Not short, but slight, with narrow shoulders. Her frame seems like it would fold in a strong wind. She’s wearing a white blouse and a dark skirt, and her hair is loose, coming undone at the edges.
I can’t see her face. The camera angle catches her from behind and slightly above, showing her shoulders, the top of her head, and the way she moves through the room with caution.
Not trespassing, but not comfortable either. She seems lost.
My thumb hovers over Mikhail’s number.
And then she stops and turns her head slightly toward the windows. Toward the curtains.
My chest tightens.
The living room curtains are Anya’s second favorite spot to hide. She likes the weight of the velvet.
The woman takes a step toward the curtains, followed by another.
I sit forward in my seat.
She reaches out. The curtain shifts. And there, in the gap between the velvet and the window, caught in a slice of pale light, is my daughter.
“Don’t you dare touch her,” I growl, bearing my teeth.
My hand grips the phone. A stranger is near my child. An unvetted, unknown woman is standing two feet from the most important thing in my world.
I should call security. Now. Immediately. Have them in that room in thirty seconds. Remove the woman. Lock the house down.
But I don’t. And it takes me a moment to realize why.
Anya isn’t hiding or pulling back behind the curtain like she does when strangers approach. Instead, she’s sitting still. Mr. Whiskers is clutched against her chest, which means she’s alert, guarded, but not panicking.
She’s watching the woman.
I switch to camera eleven, the secondary angle for the living room, positioned lower and closer to the window wall. I still can’t see the woman’s face clearly.
My pulse is hammering harder than it has in years, which means it’s probably beating as fast an average person’s on an average day. But I’m not an average person. My pulse is always slow and steady… except when it comes to my daughter.
“Who are you?” I lean in closer, my voice still gravelly.
The stranger is turned toward Anya, crouched low, her back partially to the camera, but I can read her posture. She’s not leaning in or reaching to touch my daughter. She’s keeping distance and talking.
Her hands are moving, gesturing in a fluid, animated movement that suggests she’s telling a story rather than asking questions.
I can’t hear what she’s saying. The cameras are visual only; audio surveillance in the private rooms is a line even I wouldn’t cross.
I watch Anya’s face. She’s still guarded, but her head is tilted. That means she’s listening.
The blank, disconnected stare she gives the governesses when they try to engage her — the one that says, I hear you, but I’ve decided you don’t exist — is absent.
This is different. She’s tracking the woman’s hands as she follows the story.
The stranger gestures broadly in some kind of pantomime, arms spread. Performing a joke, maybe, or an impression.
And then I see it.
Anya’s mouth moves at the corner. The faintest twitch. So small that on any other child it would mean nothing .
But this is my daughter. And I know she doesn’t smile at strangers.
Until now.
That twitch. That almost-smile.
I’m already dialing.
Mikhail picks up on the second ring. “Yes.”
“I’ve chosen the new governess.” A beat of silence.
“The woman in the living room.” My voice is flat. Final. But my pulse is still spiked. “The one who’s still in the house. She’s the one.”
Another silence. Longer this time.
“That’s not possible,” Mikhail says carefully. “All candidates have been dismissed. The selection?—”
“Camera eleven.”
I hear the faint click of keys as he accesses the feed.
“Shit,” he grumbles. “She asked to use the bathroom. She must have gotten lost.” His tone shifts to the professional assessment voice. “Rolan, that’s the Calloway woman. She’s the highest risk profile...”
“She’s also the one Anya chose. She made my daughter smile.”
“What about her background?” he asks.
“It’s as clean as someone in her situation could be. No criminal record, no affiliations, no connections to anyone on our watch list. She’s not a plant. She’s just…” I search for the right word. “Desperate.”
“Desperate people are unpredictable.”
“Desperate people are loyal. They don’t have the luxury of alternatives.”
A sigh.
“I’ll process the paperwork,” he concedes. “Start date?”
“Saturday. She moves in. Sunday for orientation. Monday, she starts.”
“That’s fast. ”
“Anya’s been alone for weeks. That’s too long.
” I pause. “And run a separate check on the lender. Landon Webb. I want to know his operation, his network, his exposure. Not for Calloway. For us. If he’s running predatory finance on the South Side, his operation might intersect with networks we’re already watching. ”
It’s a lie, and we both know it. I don’t care about Landon Webb’s business model or his network intersections. I care about the fact that my daughter’s soon-to-be tutor owes half a million dollars to a man who operates in the same gray economy I do.
That’s a loose thread, and I don’t leave loose threads.
At least, that’s what I tell myself. Loose threads. Professional due diligence.
“One more thing,” I say. “The offer. Don’t send it yet.”
“When?”
“Send the rejection first.”
He’s silent again, probably waiting for an explanation. “You want to reject her before you hire her?”
“I want the agency to send the standard rejection email. Automated. The same one that the other two hundred applicants received. Then, four hours later, a text from a private number with the offer. Different channel, personal, direct.”
“Why?”
I could explain the logic and psychology behind it.
But the truth beneath the logic is simpler and uglier.
I want her grateful. I want the relief to be so overwhelming that it drowns out the questions she should be asking and the red flags she will probably notice.
I want the yes to be so big that it swallows the doubt.
I want her to walk into my house on Saturday morning already owing me, even if the debt is only emotional.
“It’s a persuasion technique,” I offer. “Standard.”
“I’ll handle it. ”
I hang up and stare at the screen one more time.
Calloway is gone. The living room is empty now, except for the little girl behind the curtain.
I close the app and set the phone face down on my thigh.
To my surprise, my pulse hasn’t settled. But it’s not a protective rush anymore. This is something else entirely — though, perhaps just as primal.
Possessiveness.
Calloway’s debt is leverage. Her desperation is insurance. Her warmth is a resource to be allocated toward my daughter’s well-being.
And just like that, my veins freeze over again.
This is what Katarina taught me. Every human connection is a transaction, every kindness is a strategy, and the only way to survive intimacy is to control it.
I learned the lesson well. Too well.
Elizabeth Calloway won’t know what hit her.
At 8:32 p.m., I arrive home and go straight to Anya’s room.
She’s in bed, not sleeping yet, just lying on her side with Mr. Whiskers tucked under her chin. Eyes still wide open.
“Hi there,” I smile, sitting on the edge of the bed. The mattress dips under my weight, and she shifts toward me. “ Malyshka . Did you eat dinner?”
“Yes.”
“What did Angelina make?”
“Chicken.”
One-word answers. That’s what she gives when her mood is low.
“You’ll have a new tutor on Monday,” I explain calmly, hoping to inject some excitement back into her.
Anya is quiet for a long time .
“What’s her name?” she finally asks.
“Elizabeth.”
Anya considers this. “Is she old?”
“No.”
“Is she boring?”
“I don’t think so.”
“The last one was boring,” she mutters. “She read the math problems in the same voice as the stories. Everything sounded the same. You can’t read a story about a bear the same way you read seven times eight, Papa. Those are completely different situations.”
“I agree.”
“When will I meet her?”
“You met her today, when you were drawing behind the curtain.”
Her eyes light up. My heart brightens right alongside them.
There’s my girl.
“Oh! That was Ellie.” She bites her lips. “Will she stay?”
The question is small, but it carries a heavy weight. Storm clouds move in to block out the ray of sunshine in my chest.
Not will she come , will she stay .
Anya has had tutors who arrived and lasted weeks, who learned the hallways and memorized her schedule and settled into the routine of this house and then left.
The German woman who discovered a gun in Alexei’s coat resigned by email. Even the one who remained longest, who was closest to permanent, also left. They all left.
Everyone disappears eventually.
“I’m going to do everything I can,” I tell her.
She studies my face.
“She better not be afraid of Mr. Whiskers,” she huffs. “Mrs. Hoffman said he was creepy. He’s not creepy. He has a handsome face.”
“He does. ”
“And she has to read the bear voice properly. If there’s a bear in the story, I need to hear the bear.”
“I’ll make sure she understands the requirements.”
“Thank you.”
I reach down and pull the blanket over her shoulder. My hand brushes her hair gently and she leans into the touch for a half-second before settling back against her pillow.
“Goodnight, malyshka .”
“Goodnight, Papa.”
I stand and walk to the door. My hand is on the frame when her voice reaches me again, softer now, thickened with the first edges of sleep.
“Papa?”
I turn.
“I hope she stays.”
“Me too, malyshka.”
I turn off the light and walk toward my office, carrying the weight of those four words down the hallway.
She’ll stay, malyshka , I silently vow.
I’ll make sure of it.