Chapter 22 MAKSIM
MAKSIM
Chicago sprawls beneath me like a kingdom I rule.
I stand at the wall of windows in my office at Nova Star Shipping, watching the city pulse and breathe forty stories below. From this height, the cars look like toys. The people are invisible. The whole world feels small and manageable and under control.
The illusion is a lie.
Nothing feels under control right now. Not the threat closing in from shadows I can't identify. Not the woman who's dismantled every defense I've spent twenty-five years constructing. And certainly not what I'm about to do.
I'm going to betray Victoria's confidence.
The thought sits in my chest like a stone. Heavy. Sharp-edged. Impossible to swallow or spit out.
She told me her darkest secret in the dark of my bedroom, her tears soaking into my skin, her voice barely a whisper. She trusted me with the worst thing that ever happened to her. And now I'm going to share it with my brothers.
Not carelessly. I'll protect the details she gave me in confidence. But the essential truth, the piece of information that changes everything, that connects her past to ours in ways we don’t yet understand, I have to share that.
Because by sharing it, I can protect her.
That's what I tell myself. That's the justification I've been constructing since I left her sleeping in my bed this morning. Protection. Strategy. Necessity.
It doesn't make the betrayal feel any smaller.
The door to my office opens. I don't turn around. I know the sound of my brothers' footsteps the way I know my own heartbeat.
Alexei enters first, his energy preceding him like a weather front. I can hear the particular cadence of his walk, the restless rhythm that never quite settles.
Zakhar follows. Quieter. More contained. The silence around him dense enough to feel.
"Brother," Alexei says, and I hear him throw himself onto one of the leather couches. "Your message sounded serious. What's happening?"
I allow myself a moment before turning to face them. A moment to remember.
The first years we became a family. Three boys against the world, surviving Moscow's streets through cunning and violence and an unshakeable bond that transcended blood. We had nothing but each other. No money. No power. No future except the one we carved with our own hands.
We built an empire from that nothing. Built it together, brick by bloody brick.
And now everything is about to change.
Either the attraction we all feel for Victoria will tear us apart, or it will unite us. Either we become four against the world, or we fracture into pieces that can never be reassembled.
I don't know which outcome frightens me more.
I turn from the window. Cross to the cabinet where I keep the good vodka. Pull out the bottle and three glasses.
Zakhar's eyebrow rises slightly as I pour. It's not even noon.
"If you're bringing out the Beluga this early," Alexei says, watching me with sharp eyes despite his casual posture, "this is more than a status report."
"It is." I hand them each a glass, then settle into the chair across from the couch. The leather is cool against my back. "But let's handle the pressing business first."
I look at Zakhar. "Eryan Nis. Any progress?"
He shakes his head, taking a measured sip of vodka. "No chatter on the streets. The Albanian hit was the last known operation. Whoever he is, he's gone quiet."
"Or he's planning something bigger," Alexei offers.
I turn to him. "The warehouse thief. The one with the Valkov tattoo. Any leads?"
Alexei's expression shifts. More serious now. "I have something. Following up on it. Nothing concrete yet." He pauses, swirls the vodka in his glass. "Could be random. Guy sees a cool tattoo somewhere, decides to copy it. Doesn't know what it means."
We all share a look. The same thought passing between us without words.
It wasn't random.
The man in our warehouse wearing Valkov's mark. Ramiz Krasniqi's trying to ambush us in his house. The stolen shipments. The increasing pressure on all sides.
These pieces are connect. We just haven't found the pattern yet.
"Put pressure on the streets," I tell Alexei. "Now more than ever, we need to understand what's happening. Because this is no longer just about us."
Zakhar goes still. That particular stillness that means his full attention has locked onto something.
"What do you mean?" he asks quietly.
I look down at the vodka in my hand. Clear and cold and burning. Like the truth I'm about to speak.
My throat tightens. The words feel like glass shards.
"Victoria told me something last night." I have to stop. Breathe. Force myself to continue. "Something that happened to her when she was a child."
Both of them are watching me now. Alexei has gone still for once, his usual restless energy suspended.
"I'm not going to share details." My voice rough an angry. "It's not my story to tell. If you want to know more, Victoria has to be the one to share it."
I take a drink. Let the vodka burn a path down my throat.
"But there's one piece of information I have to tell you. Because it changes everything."
Zakhar leans forward slightly. Alexei's hand tightens on his glass.
"When she was twelve, a man violated her at her father's house." The words taste like ash. Like betrayal. Like necessity. "She doesn't know who he was. He wore a mask. But she remembers one thing about him."
I meet my brothers' eyes. First Zakhar. Then Alexei.
"A tattoo. Wolf with a dagger between its teeth. On his hand."
The silence that follows is absolute.
Zakhar's jaw ticks. Once. Twice. His breathing goes shallow, controlled. His hand on the armrest has gone white-knuckled.
Alexei reacts differently. He's on his feet before I finish speaking, pacing the length of the office with barely contained fury.
"That's impossible," he says, voice sharp. "The only person who wore the mark on his hand was—"
"Ivan Valkov," Zakhar finishes. His voice is quiet. Deadly. "The man we killed."
"The man who ordered my parents murder." I set down my glass because my hand is shaking and I refuse to let them see it. "The man we hunted for years before we finally ended him."
"He's dead," Alexei says, still pacing. "We watched him die. We burned the body. He can't be the one to—"
"He was." I cut him off. "When Victoria was a child, Ivan Valkov was at her father's house. At a party. And he drugged her and violated her while her father hosted his business associates downstairs."
Alexei stops pacing. His face has gone pale beneath the anger.
"Arthur Ainsley," Zakhar says slowly. "He's not just a banker who made bad investments with Albanian money."
"No." I stand, unable to sit with this weight pressing down on me. "He was connected to the Valkovs. Which means Victoria has been in danger since long before she married me. And we need to protect her from her own father."
"I'll kill him," Alexei says. Simple. Factual.
"No." I hold up a hand. "Not until we understand the full picture. Not until we know how deep his involvement goes and whether he's still connected to whoever is reviving the Valkov symbol."
"The warehouse thief," Zakhar says. "The tattoo."
"Yes." I meet his eyes. "Someone is using that mark again. Someone is recruiting. And Arthur Ainsley is somehow involved."
We're quiet for a long moment. Processing. Planning. The vodka sits untouched now, forgotten.
"We don't tell Victoria," Zakhar finally says. "Not about our connection to the Valkovs. Not about our suspicions regarding her father. Not until we know more."
I nod. The decision sits heavy on my conscience, another secret layered on top of secrets. But he's right. We can't burden her with this until we understand what we're dealing with.
"She trusts us," Alexei says quietly. "All three of us."
The words hang in the air. Loaded with meaning that goes beyond strategy and protection.
Zakhar shifts in his seat. Alexei stops pacing. I feel the energy in the room change, sharpen, become something else entirely.
"We should discuss that," I say.
More silence. But not uncomfortable. This is the silence of men who've survived together, who know each other's thoughts before they're spoken.
"I kissed her," Alexei admits first. His voice is different now. Softer. Uncertain in a way I've never heard from him. "I couldn't help myself."
"I did more than kiss her." Zakhar's jaw tightens.
They both look at me.
"Last night," I say simply.
We sit with that truth. Three men, bound by decades of brotherhood, all caring for the same woman.
"This could destroy us," Zakhar says. Stating the obvious. The thing we're all thinking.
"Or make us stronger." Alexei drops back onto the couch, some of his usual energy returning. "Think about it. The three of us found each other. We built everything we have because we stood together."
He leans forward, eyes intense.
"Victoria fits," he continues. "I don't know how to explain it, but she fits with us. Maybe the same way we fit with each other. Not conventional. Not normal. But real."
I think about that. About the way she looked at me this morning, vulnerable and fierce at the same time. About the way she kissed me, inexperienced but hungry to learn. About the way she told me her darkest secret and trusted me to hold it.
"Three against the world," I say slowly. "Becoming four."
Zakhar is quiet for a long moment. Then he nods, just once.
"We don't pressure her," he says. "We don't force anything."
"Agreed," Alexei says immediately.
Zakhar takes a slow breath. "Agreed."
I reach for my vodka. Raise it.
"To Victoria," I say. "And to whatever comes next."
They lift their glasses. We drink together, the way we've done a thousand times before. But this time feels different. This time feels like a beginning rather than a continuation.
We are united. In protection. In purpose.
The threat is still out there. The ghosts of Ivan Valkov still haunt us. The mystery of who's reviving his legacy still demands answers.
But we'll face it together. The three of us, and the woman we've all chosen.
Four against the world.