Chapter 9 #2
“Copy that.” I lie back, arms behind my head, staring at the ceiling. The vodka’s a warm fog in my veins.
Her breathing evens out, but I know she’s not asleep—same way I know the exact number of steps from bed to door, same way I know how to break her neck with one twist.
I roll to my side, facing the pillows. The scent leaks through—marshmallows and wet hair and something metal underneath, like storm rails. I breathe it in until it hurts, then force myself to stop.
“How old are you?” I ask.
Silence.
Long enough that I think she’s gone to sleep. Long enough that my jaw tightens. Then the mattress shifts. Fabric whispers.
“Twenty-one.”
“You lie badly.”
“I’m not lying,” she says. “I am twenty-one.”
“I turned thirty-two in December.”
She doesn’t respond.
I don’t know why I said it. I don’t do that—offer information unprompted. The dark makes me careless.
“Who taught you how to shoot?” I ask.
“None of your business.”
“You shoot like you’re in the game.”
“I don’t even know what that means,” she says.
Too fast.
I smile to myself. She’s lying.
Silence settles again. Thicker now. Heavier.
“Were you always like this?” she asks finally.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re waiting for something bad to happen.”
I don’t hesitate. “I’m not waiting. I know it’s coming.”
“That’s the life,” I add.
She goes quiet.
“Do you sleep?” she asks.
“Yes.”
“Who’s the liar now?”
A corner of my mouth lifts. “I rest.”
The room breathes. The building hums. Somewhere outside, a siren wails and fades. I hear her inhale. Slow. Measured.
“So,” she says, “do you ever dream?”
The question hits wrong. Sharp. Uninvited. I stare harder at the pillows like it might answer for me. I haven’t dreamed since I was sixteen. Not really. Everything after that got buried. Flattened. Turned into noise. I shove the thought away.
She doesn’t ask again.
“You’re calmer in the dark,” she says instead.
I shift onto my back, the sheets rustling.
“The dark doesn’t ask anything from me,” I say.
“And the light does?”
“The light demands a performance.” My jaw tightens. “People need me to be what I am.”
“What do they want you to be?”
I exhale through my nose. “A weapon. A leader. The Juggernaut.”
I hear her swallow. It’s soft, but it’s there.
“So what are you,” she asks, “when no one’s looking?”
The answer comes before I can stop it. “Awake.”
The mattress shifts. She settles back, finally still.
“I need you to know, I’m not afraid of you, Maksim Korsakov,” she says into the dark. “I just don’t like you.”
Something twists. Annoying. Unnecessary. I close my eyes.
“I don’t need you to.”
The silence after that doesn’t fade.
It stays.
***
She’s gone when I wake. Pillow barrier down. My shirt folded and placed in the spot she occupied.
The apartment is too quiet. No drip of coffee, no creak of floorboards, no scent of marshmallows clinging to the air like smoke.
She even took the rain with her.
I check my phone.
3:47 AM.
I scoff.
She walked out in the dark, through Bratva streets, and didn’t leave a trace. I should be impressed.
I’m not.
I shower.
I trace the knot of the sutures she left days ago with my thumb, the way her fingers moved, quick and cold, like she’d done it a hundred times.
She probably has.
I dress in black. Knife at my hip. Gun at my back. I grab my phone and text Vaska.
Need a tail on someone.
Vaska
Who?
New girl from the bakery, Ayla.
Vaska
Ah, yeah, Ivan told me. The mouthy one. Not on schedule today.
I know. Find her.
Vaska
She steal something? Her address is with Ivan.
Just find her.
I shove my phone in my pocket.
I head for the door. The hallway smells like mold and old paint. I take the stairs two at a time, boots echoing like gunshots.
Outside, the city’s already awake. Sirens in the distance. Traffic crawling. Normal.
My bike’s where I left it, untouched. No bullet holes. No scratches. Just chrome and black and the faint scent of gasoline.
I swing on, start it up. The engine growls, low and steady. I sit there for a moment, staring at the street.
Meetings not for another hour.
My phone buzzes.
Vaska
Found her. Then lost her.
Lost her. Vaska never loses anyone.
She managed to get away from you?
Vaska
She like a little ghost.
I pocket my phone.
I twist the throttle harder than necessary, and the bike lurches forward.
A ghost.
That word sits wrong in my chest, heavy and sharp. I don’t like it. Don’t like that she slipped past Vaska like smoke through fingers. Don’t like that she’s somewhere in my city, breathing my air, and I can’t find her.
I weave through traffic, taking corners too fast, letting the engine scream. The cold bites at my face, clears my head. I need to think.
She’s not random. Can’t be. Girl shows up at my bakery asking for work the same week we hit the Turks shipment? Girl who shoots like a pro and patches bullet wounds like a field medic?
No.
She’s someone.
The question is—who?
My phone buzzes again. I ignore it. Pull into the warehouse district where we’re meeting. The building looms ahead, gray concrete and rust-stained metal. Angelo’s Ferrari is already there. Good. I need answers, and he’s been digging into the Turkish supply chain for weeks.
I kill the engine, swing off. My boots hit gravel with a satisfying crunch.
Inside, the warehouse is dim. Fluorescent lights flicker overhead, casting everything in sickly yellow. Angelo leans against a stack of crates, phone in hand. He looks up when I enter.
“You’re early,” he says.
“Surprise, surprise.”
He pockets his phone, straightens. “I need you to stay away from Adriana.”
At the mention of his wife, I almost smile.
Forced marriage. Old flame. Woman too smart to play along quietly.
He gives orders and calls them options, then acts surprised when she goes silent.
I’ve been undoing some of that damage. He doesn’t know.
“Why would I?”
Angelo’s jaw tightens.
“Don’t fuck with me, Maks.” He steps closer, hands clenched at his sides. “Whatever you’re saying to her—stop.”
“I’m not saying anything she doesn’t want to hear.”
His face darkens. “She’s my wife.”
“Then act like her husband instead of her warden.”
The silence between us crackles. I watch him process it—the anger, the shame, the truth he doesn’t want to swallow.
Finally, he exhales. “You done playing marriage counselor?”
“For now.”
He runs a hand through his hair, looks away. “We got intel on the Turks.”
Good. Back to business.
“Talk.”
***
Gold light. Velvet booths. The low, predatory hum of money moving hands.
“He is just an asshole all the time!”
Adriana’s voice cuts through the noise like broken glass.
I don’t look at her right away. I watch the dealer rake in chips, the flick of his wrist precise, practiced. Control. Everyone here pretends they have it.
“Lower your voice.”
She laughs—sharp, humorless, and drains her drink. “Why? So whoever he has watching me doesn’t hear while he’s brooding and making unilateral decisions about my life?”
I finally turn. She’s flushed, eyes bright with fury, red dress clinging like it’s making a point. Not drunk. Just done.
“You married him.”
She slams the glass down. “He forced that. Him and my brother! That’s not the same thing.”
Fair.
From Cartel princess to the Queen of Cosa Nostra and she refuses to take the throne because it was forced.
Stubborn woman.
Too hot for Angelo. Too sharp for the role he wants her to play.
A waitress appears. I give a single nod. Another drink lands in front of Adriana without her asking.
She exhales, scrubs a hand through her hair. “He doesn’t ask. He doesn’t explain. He decides and waits for me to… comply.” Her mouth twists. “So I stopped giving him anything. Silence is the only thing he can’t control.”
I study her. The way she holds herself tight, like she’s daring the world to shove first.
“He thinks silence is punishment.” I shake my head once. “It’s not.”
Her gaze locks onto mine. Really locks. “Then what is it?”
“A warning.” I take a slow sip. “And one he’s not listening to.”
She huffs. “You sound like you’ve seen this before.”
The empty bed flashes through my head.
The folded shirt.
“I have.”
Adriana leans back, eyes narrowing. “Uh-oh. Who is she?”
I hesitate half a second too long.
Her grin spreads. “Oh, I knew it. You don’t get that look over a bad investment.”
I take a sip of my drink. “She’s trouble.”
Her smile softens, just a notch. “The dangerous kind?”
“The quiet kind.” I tilt my head. “Those are worse.”
She raises her glass. “God help her.”
I clink mine against it. “He already did, when she slipped out of my bed this morning.”
Adriana gasps, a smirk curling across her crimson lips as she leans in.
“Give me the chisme.”