Archie - 2 months later
Home.
The word sat wrong in my chest.
Russia hadn’t been home in four years. Russia had been the scene of the greatest betrayal. The last time I saw it was the day my world split open.
The day Bass dragged me out of the wreckage and put me on a plane to Italy before Viktor could finish what he’d started.
And now Viktor was dead too.
I should have felt something. Relief. Triumph. Closure. But all I felt was empty.
Tone stood in the doorway of the study, arms crossed defiantly across her chest, eyes heavy with concern.
I looked at her. And for a moment, I hated that she had become the first thing my eyes searched for when the world shifted beneath my feet.
Her jaw tightened. She had fought for days over me leaving for Russia. Not because I had to go—that, she understood—but because she insisted on coming with me.
“I’m coming.”
She walked into the room until she was standing in front of the desk.
“Let’s not do this now, Tone.”
Her chin lifted immediately.
“Archie—”
“No.”
I rose and walked around the desk, stopping in front of her.
“Russia is unstable. I’ve been gone four years. I don’t know who’s still loyal, who’s dead, who’s turned. I’m not taking any chances with you and our baby.”
Her eyes flashed, then softened at the words.
“I’m not as fragile as I look, Arch.”
I almost laughed.
Tone Cavalho fragile?
That would’ve been funny if the circumstances weren’t what they were.
“I know exactly what you are,” I said quietly. “That’s why you’re staying right here.”
Her mouth parted, ready to argue. But we were interrupted by an unexpected guest.
Raze walked into the room first, dressed sharply, his pace hurried, as though he were running on borrowed time and had somewhere else he needed to be.
Atlas followed.
Raze folded his arms.
“I’m going with you.”
Tone frowned. “Excuse me?”
Raze looked at me, not her.
“If Russia’s too dangerous for my sister, it’s too dangerous for my brother.”
Brother.
It was the first time he had used the word.
Raze stepped closer.
“I’m not letting her lose you.”
Silence stretched.
Then Atlas exhaled.
“He’s right.”
I looked at him.
Atlas adjusted the cuffs of his shirt, calm as ever.
“We take the jet and go together. We’ll be in and out in no time.”
He tilted his head.
“And after four years away, there’s no telling who you can trust.”
That was the problem. He was right too.
I looked back at Tone. Her eyes burned into mine.
She hated being left behind. But beneath the anger was fear. And that did something ugly to me.
I stepped closer, brushing my knuckles against her jaw.
“I’ll come back to you.”
It was a vow more than it was reassurance.
Her throat moved when she swallowed.
“You’d better.”
The jet was in the air within four hours.
A dozen Cavalho soldiers were scattered toward the back of the plane.
I sat with Raze and Atlas toward the front, where Raze drank whiskey and stared out the window.
Atlas worked on his laptop like we weren’t flying into the graveyard of my past.
And I sat there staring at my reflection in the glass.
It has been four years since I’d left Russia bleeding. Four years since Rasputin died.
Four years since I’d seen my father. And now I was going back to bury him.
The irony wasn’t lost on me.
By the time we landed, the sky over Moscow was grey and brutal.
The jet door opened.
Uncle Bass greeted us. He was standing on the runway in a black coat, older than I remembered him. Harder, too.
For a second, neither of us moved. Four years collapsed into nothing. Then I stepped off the jet. And he pulled me into his arms.
His hand gripped the back of my neck like he needed to make sure I was actually there.
When he pulled back, his eyes searched my face. He squeezed my shoulder.
“You made it home.”
Home.
There was that word again.
I looked past him, out across the runway.
Six black cars sat waiting in a neat line, engines running, exhaust curling into the bitter Russian air. Security stood beside them, rigid and watchful, hands folded in front of them, eyes scanning everything.
Like Bass had anticipated war, not a reunion.
My gaze shifted back to him.
“My mother?”
For the first time since I stepped off the jet, something softened in his face.
Bass nodded once.
“She’s flying back from London. She’ll be at the house in two days.”
Relief hit me, sharp and immediate.
She was safe. Safe all this time. And after four years, I was finally going to see her again.
I hadn’t been convinced when Bass split us up.
Hell—I’d fought him over it. The day he dragged me out of Russia, I’d wanted my mother beside me.
Needed her beside me. Everything had been burning down around us, Rasputin was dead, and Bass had looked me in the eye and told me that separation meant our survival.
At the time, it had felt like another loss. Another thing ripped from me.
He’d sent her to London. Sent me to Italy.
Different corners of the world. Different lives.
His reasoning had been cold, practical.
Viktor would look for us together. A mother and son on the run made sense. A scattered family was harder to hunt. Harder to erase.
I’d hated him for it then. For taking the last person I had left and putting an ocean between us. But standing here now, breathing the frozen air of Moscow, knowing she was alive because of it—I finally understood.
Bass must’ve seen something in my face because his hand came down on my shoulder, firm and grounding.
“She survived because we made hard choices.”
His voice was steady. Certain.
And maybe that was the burden of men like him.
To make brutal decisions and live with the fallout.
Bass gestured to the waiting cars.
“Come.”
Atlas and Raze slid into the second car with some of the others.
I got in beside Bass in the first.
A driver took us through Moscow.
The city hadn’t changed. That was the cruel thing about grief. The world kept moving.
Bass filled the silence, bringing me up to speed. Names. Alliances. Power shifts. Who had fallen. Who had risen. Pieces moving across a board I no longer recognized. But every time the conversation edged toward Viktor—he sidestepped it.
Cleanly. Too cleanly, I noticed. But I let it go. For now.
The estate came into view twenty minutes later.
The gates opened. The cars rolled through. The circular drive brought me face to face with the place I had sworn I’d never see again.
The car stopped. I stepped out and stood there.
I looked at the house. At the windows. The stone. The weight of it.
Nothing had changed. And somehow everything had.
The front door opened. The maid greeted us with lowered eyes and a stiff posture, like ghosts still lived here and she’d learned not to look at them directly.
She led us into the living room for drinks. I followed the men but didn’t stop.
My feet moved before my mind caught up. Down the corridor. Past the portraits. Past the memories in the walls. And onward toward my father’s office.
The door was still the same. It still had the same brass handle.
I stood there for a moment, staring at it.
Four years ago, my life as I knew it had ended behind this door.
And now, somehow—it felt like it was beginning again.
I turned the handle and stepped inside.