Chapter 11
DMITRI VOLKOV
The garden behind the villa had become my prison.
Once, it had been a sanctuary—a place where the sun bounced off gravel paths, rose trellises sagged with blooms, and the fountain sang in soft, meditative tones in the afternoons.
I had walked here countless times with Penelope, watching her fingers trail along jasmine vines.
Now, it was a ruin.
Weeds tore through flower beds, a blanket of green algae coated the fountain’s stagnant basin, and the stone benches were cracked and brittle, littered with dead leaves.
The air smelled of damp earth and decay, sharp and biting.
No birds came here anymore.
Only silence—thick, oppressive silence—and the occasional rustle of the wind through overgrown cypress trees that loomed like sentinels around the perimeter.
I sat on the same wrought-iron bench every day, elbows on my knees, staring at nothing.
Pretending I hadn’t remembered everything. Pretending I hadn’t failed in every possible way.
Each day was another exercise in endurance. Another day pretending that I could live in this villa without her, without the family I had destroyed.
The memories had returned in shards at first—fragmented, jagged, cutting deep into the core of me.
I could no longer ignore them:
Penelope at fifteen, under that Brooklyn oak, laughing as I stole kisses she barely knew she wanted.
Penelope at twenty-five, eyes wide with terror, when I dragged her across the border to Lake Como.
Penelope in a hospital bed, blood blooming across her chest as she took the bullet meant for me.
Penelope in Greece, raising our son alone while I mourned a ghost.
Every insult I had thrown at her.
Every door I had locked. Every choice I had forced upon her—all of it haunted me in relentless replay.
I’d hired the best specialists money could buy—neurologists from Zurich, psychologists from Boston, hypnotherapists from Tel Aviv.
Every session had been designed to strip away the lies I’d told myself, to reconstruct the man who had become something monstrous.
They had rebuilt me, piece by piece.
And I remembered everything now. Every unforgivable thing. Every lapse of judgment, every cruelty I had ever inflicted on Penelope.
And I knew Penelope would never forgive me.
She had been here four weeks—breathing the same air, living under the same roof—and yet she treated me as though I were a stranger she was forced to endure.
My presence made her tense, cautious, silent.
My attempts to bridge the distance had been endless and futile.
I had tried everything I could imagine:
I cooked breakfast every morning—eggs sunny-side up exactly the way she had always liked them, toast cut into triangles, fresh figs sliced just thin enough to balance sweetness and tart.
Each morning, I left the plate on the kitchen table, perfectly arranged, and watched her walk past without a word, ignoring it entirely.
Every evening, I left white roses on her pillow—her favorite flowers, hand-selected and always fresh.
She tossed them in the trash without acknowledgment.
I searched for her old loves: rare editions of Greek poetry, cashmere throws dyed the precise shade of the Aegean at dusk, handmade olive-wood jewelry from the artisans she had once adored in Crete.
I left them at the edge of her path. She left them in the hallway. Still wrapped. Untouched.
I spent hours outside her door at night, leaning against the wall, hoping for a crack—any sign of acknowledgment, even anger, even a yell.
She never opened the door. Never once.
Each night, I read to Vanya from the books she had read him in Greece—my voice careful, soft, repeating the stories she had once told with warmth and laughter.
I glanced at Penelope across the room each night, hoping, praying she would join us. She never did.
I had the garden replanted in secret: her favorite jasmine along the walls, the lavender she used to dry and stuff into sachets.
Every path, every flower bed, every bench restored.
She walked past it without comment.
I realized, bitterly, that no gesture could force her forgiveness. No gift, no act of contrition, no declaration of love would erase the damage I had done.
She would come to me on her terms—or she would not come at all.
And yet, in spite of it all, I could not stop trying. I would not stop.
I rose from the wrought-iron bench and ran my hand along the cracked stone edge of the fountain.
I imagined the water running again, I imagined her kneeling beside it as she once had.
I imagined her smile—not forced, not polite—but real. And I swore to myself that I would see that smile again. Somehow.
Penelope was unbreakable now.
Not in the way the Albanians had tried to break her—with fists and needles and fear—but in a quieter, far more devastating way.
She no longer needed me. No longer depended on my approval, my protection, my love.
She existed beyond my reach, self-contained, whole.
And that terrified me more than hatred ever could.
My only hope was Vanya.
Our son bound us.
She could not leave him behind. And I would never let her leave me—not truly, not permanently.
I would kneel if I had to. Beg. Crawl. I could endure her contempt. I could endure her silence. But her absence—
That would kill me.
I was lost in that thought, staring at the dead fountain, watching algae ripple faintly across stagnant water, when footsteps crunched over the gravel behind me.
“Boss.”
I sat upright, spine snapping straight as if struck. Giovanni stood a respectful distance away, shoulders squared, face drained of color. I knew before he spoke.
My body knew.
“What is it?”
He swallowed. His Adam’s apple bobbed once. “She’s gone.”
The words landed without sound. Without meaning.
The world tilted sideways, the garden blurring at the edges as if someone had struck me hard in the chest.
“What do you mean,” I said slowly, dangerously, “she’s gone?”
“Penelope left Lake Como,” Giovanni continued, voice tight. “With Vanya. Ruslan Baranov helped her.”
For a moment, I simply stared at him. The sentence refused to arrange itself into sense. Then—
Rage detonated.
I surged to my feet and grabbed Giovanni by the collar, hauling him forward until our faces were inches apart. “How could you let that happen?”
“She said she wanted to take Vanya for a walk in the gardens,” he rushed out, panic cracking through his discipline. “She told the guards to stand down. Said it was safe. Normal. I didn’t know—”
“Wait.” My grip tightened, fingers biting into fabric and skin. “She left with Vanya?”
Giovanni nodded. Once. Mutely.
The fury drained out of me in a single, violent rush—replaced by something worse.
I released him slowly. My legs buckled.
I staggered backward, caught myself on the iron bench, then sank onto it hard.
The garden spun. The sky pressed down. Everything I had built—the power, the victories, the fragile hope that she might one day turn toward me—collapsed in a single breath.
Giovanni lunged forward, hands out. “Boss—”
I shoved him away and forced myself upright, though my knees shook beneath me.
My fists clenched until skin split over bone.
I welcomed the pain.
“Get the plane ready,” I said, my voice low and razor-edged. “I leave for Greece today.”
Giovanni’s eyes widened. “You want to wage war on Ruslan Baranov?”
“Ruslan has my family.” I turned on him, teeth bared. “Do you expect me to sit here while he keeps my wife and son inside his empire? No. I will burn Greece to the ground if I have to.”
“Boss—listen.” Giovanni stepped closer, careful, steady. “If any aircraft enters Ruslan’s airspace without clearance, his defenses will shoot it down. Anti-air batteries. Fighters on standby. Everyone knows his territory is a no-fly zone. You won’t even reach Athens.”
I stared at him, chest heaving, vision tunneling.
Giovanni exhaled slowly. “Call him. Threaten him if you want. But do it from here. From safety. He might listen. He owes you nothing—but he respects strength. And he’s the only one who can give you your family back.”
The truth of it hit harder than any blow.
I collapsed back onto the bench, suddenly exhausted, hands trembling openly now. Rage warred with terror, pride with desperation. I had conquered nations. Broken empires. And yet—
I had lost her in a single morning.
“Get me my phone,” I said hoarsely.
Giovanni nodded and hurried away.
I sat alone in the ruined garden, legs bouncing against the gravel in a furious, uncontrollable rhythm.
My jaw ached from how hard I clenched it.
Rage burned through my veins—hot, corrosive, demanding release.
I wanted blood. I wanted Ruslan Baranov torn apart with my bare hands, his empire reduced to ash. I wanted to storm Greece, kick down his gates, and take back what was mine by right.
But I couldn’t.
That truth sat heavier than the stone bench beneath me.
Ruslan wasn’t some petty warlord or regional crime boss I could intimidate with force or money.
He didn’t operate on fear alone. He was the fear—structured, global, untouchable.
His reach spanned continents, his defenses layered so deeply that even governments hesitated before crossing him.
Giovanni was right.
For the first time in my life, brute power wouldn’t save me.
Footsteps crunched on gravel. Giovanni returned, face set, eyes wary. He didn’t speak—just handed me the phone.
I stared at it for half a second longer than necessary, then dialed the number I’d kept memorized for years. Ruslan’s private line. The one you never called unless the world was ending.
It rang.
Once.
Twice.
My grip tightened. “I knew that bastard wouldn’t—”
The line clicked.
“Son.”
The single word detonated something feral in my chest.
“Do not fucking call me son,” I snarled, leaping to my feet, pacing now like a caged animal. “How dare you take my wife and my child from me?”
Silence.
Not dead air. Calculated silence. The kind that reminded you who truly held power.
Then Ruslan spoke—low, measured, lethal in its restraint.
“You will speak to me in a calm tone, Dmitri.”