Chapter 19
DROGO
They didn't let me leave their side.
Not that night. Not the next morning. Not at all.
They called it protection. I called it a cage.
"Boss wants you safe," one of the guards said when I tried to walk toward the elevator. Big Russian with a scar running through his eyebrow and eyes that never asked questions, only added numbers. He stepped in front of me, hand resting casually on his belt where I knew a gun sat holstered.
"Safe from what?"
"Everyone." He smiled without warmth. "Including yourself."
They moved me that same night. Black SUV again, different driver, same silence. We drove out of Manhattan, through the tunnel, into Brooklyn. The streets got narrower, the buildings older. Row houses and corner bodegas and graffiti tags I didn't recognize.
The safe house was a brownstone tucked between two others that looked abandoned. Anonymous. Forgettable. Exactly the kind of place you'd never look twice at.
Inside was different. Clean. Functional. Furniture that looked expensive but uncomfortable—leather couch, glass table, flat-screen TV mounted on the wall. Kitchen stocked with food I didn't want. Two bedrooms upstairs, both with locks on the outside.
Prison with nice countertops.
Two guards stayed. Shifts rotating every twelve hours. They didn't talk much. Didn't need to. Their presence said everything: You're not leaving. You're not calling anyone. You're ours now.
He didn't just cage me. He caged my voice.
No way to reach Alena without a phone. No way to tell Marcus and Lucy to stay the fuck away from places that would put them in danger. To get Alena somewhere safe. No way to warn anyone.
They gave me a burner instead. Cheap flip phone with one number programmed in. No name attached. Just digits. The moment I hit it I imagine myself dialling her number. Shit. I couldn’t call anyone. And fuck believe me I tried. Text also were unable to be sent.
A leash that just rang.
"For emergencies," the guard said, handing it to me like it was a gift. "Or when he calls."
Klaus called the first morning.
Six AM. The burner buzzed on the nightstand next to my head. I'd been awake for hours, staring at the ceiling, my ribs screaming every time I breathed wrong.
She thinks I left.
The thought had been circling for days now, vultures waiting for something to die.
Three days of silence. She'll think I chose it.
I answered.
"Good morning, son." His voice was hoarse, wet—cancer eating his lungs one cell at a time. "Did you sleep?"
"No."
"Good. Means you're thinking. Preparation is everything." He coughed—deep, rattling. "Your handler will arrive in one hour. Follow his instructions exactly. Understood?"
"Yeah."
"And Drogo?" A pause. "She's still safe. For now."
The line went dead.
My hands shook.
Not from fear.
From picturing her waiting for a call that wouldn't come.
The burner buzzed again immediately. Text message. A photo.
Alena.
In her London flat—kitchen window, wine glass in hand, moonlight catching her dark hair. She looked small. Alone. Waiting.
The angle was close. Too close. Whoever took this had been standing right there. Within reach.
I deleted the photo.
As if that would erase the fact that someone had stood close enough to breathe her air.
It didn't matter. It was burned into my brain now—proof that they could reach her anytime they wanted.
· · ·
The handler arrived exactly one hour later.
Tall. Mid-forties. Shaved head. A face that didn't belong to someone who apologized. Eyes that had stopped feeling things a long time ago. He didn't introduce himself. Just handed me a manila folder and said, "Read."
I opened it.
Photos of the target. Different angles, different days. Leaving his brownstone in the Upper East Side. Getting into a black Mercedes. Walking his dog—some small yapping thing on a designer leash.
Behind the photos: his routine. Morning runs. Office hours. Mistress twice weekly. Thursday nights—private poker game, illegal, rotating locations.
Everything I'd need to kill him.
"Today we watch," the handler said in accented English. "Tomorrow we plan. Friday night, you execute."
You execute Friday.
The words landed like stones in my gut.
"What if I say no?"
He pulled out his phone. Showed me another photo.
Alena again. Different angle. Closer. This one taken through her window in London—zoomed in on her face, the thin blue of early morning soft on her cheek.
"You won't," he said simply.
· · ·
We left an hour later. Different car—nondescript sedan, New York plates. He drove. I sat passenger side, the folder heavy in my lap.
We parked across from the target's brownstone. Fifth Avenue, near the Met. Old money neighborhood. Trees lining the street, doormen in every building.
"There," the handler said, nodding toward the door.
The target emerged at 9:43 AM—exactly on schedule. Mid-forties, expensive suit, smug face I recognized from the photos. He looked ordinary. Successful. The kind of man you'd see at charity galas or business conferences and never think twice about.
The kind of man who hurt children and got away with it.
A black Mercedes pulled up. He got in. We followed.
Watched. Waited. Four hours sitting in that car, eating shitty deli sandwiches, saying nothing.
The handler pointed out patterns. Routines. Weaknesses.
"Thursday is poker night," he said quietly. "Warehouse in Red Hook. Perfect."
"Perfect for what?"
"Robbery gone wrong. You go in during game. Shoot him. Take the cash. Leave. Maybe that will be the plan. But we think Friday, at home is better. Even though there might be people at his house."
I stared at him. "And the others?"
"Depends. If they see your face..." He shrugged.
"Jesus Christ."
"No Jesus here." He smiled without humor. "Only business."
· · ·
We followed the target through his day. Office. Lunch. Mistress apartment in Chelsea. Back home by eight.
Normal fucking life.
I used to have one of those. Or tried to.
Now I was sitting in a car, planning murder, becoming exactly what my father wanted.
The handler drove me back to the safe house in silence.
Inside, he handed me another folder. "Study this. Memorize exits, timing, backup plans. I'll be outside during execution. You fuck up, I clean it. Understood?"
"Yeah."
He left. Guards took his place at the door.
I sat on the couch, opened the folder.
Floor plans. Photos of the warehouse. Escape routes marked in red. A Glock with suppressor wrapped in cloth—clean, untraceable, ready.
Everything I needed to become a killer.
My phone buzzed. Klaus.
Another photo. Alena sleeping now—taken through her window in London. City glow on her face. Peaceful. Unaware.
Text below: Remember why you're doing this.
I stared at her face for a long time.
She thought I'd abandoned her. Thought the sex meant nothing. Thought I woke up, realized what we'd done, and decided silence was easier than facing her.
She didn't know I was locked in Brooklyn, learning how to kill, damning myself to keep her breathing.
I closed my eyes and saw her on that kitchen floor from the surveillance feed—broken glass, wine on the walls, crying alone because I couldn't tell her the truth.
My mother's voice echoed: You killed me by being born.
Maybe she'd been warning me all along.
This was always who I was meant to be.
Klaus's son.
Born from death. Destined for it.
But then another thought crept in.
Cold. Calculating. The kind of thought that came from years fighting in pits where the only rule was survive.
Klaus had men watching her. Men who could reach her anytime. Men who answered to him.
But Klaus was dying.
And when he died, someone would inherit. Someone would command those men. Someone would hold the leash on every gun pointed at everyone I loved.
The only way out was in.
I wouldn't just complete this hit and hope Klaus kept his word. Hope was for people who had options.
I would take his place.
I would take the surveillance teams that surrounded her. Make them answer to me. Me only.
I would command the gun.
So the gun would never—ever—have the fucking audacity to be pointed at her again.
The plan crystallized in my mind like ice forming on glass.
Earn Klaus's trust. Complete the hit. Prove I was his son in blood, not just genetics. Learn the organization from the inside—who commanded what, where the power sat, which men were loyal and which could be turned.
And when Klaus finally stopped breathing—when cancer finished what it started—I'd already be positioned to inherit. Or maybe, the cancer was too slow. Maybe I was faster.
Not because I wanted his empire.
Because I wanted to burn it to ash before anyone could use it against her.
I opened the folder again and started memorizing.
Exits. Timing. The quickest way to end a life I didn't want to take.
And I made a promise to myself:
I would become whatever monster he needed.
I would take his throne.
And then I would use every ounce of power he'd given me to make sure no one—not the Bratva, not his lieutenants, not death itself—could ever touch her again.
She could hate me for it.
As long as she lived to do it.
Yeah, I am faster than the cancer.