Chapter 1 – Jennie #2
Your half-brother, Logan Cartel, is accused of embezzling $3.7 million from the Rusnak Cleaning Consortium, a legitimate business under the Rusnak Bratva.
The punishment for this crime is death.
As his only living blood relative, you are being informed of his imminent execution.
Logan Cartel will be eliminated very soon.
You may decide what is to be done with his body.
I stop breathing.
My throat tightens, like something is caught there. I read it again, hoping the words might change—hoping this is some kind of mistake. But the ink doesn’t move. It just sits there, calm and cold.
They’re going to kill Logan.
No trial. No warning. No time.
They’re not asking me to save him. They’re telling me he’s already lost—and that I need to pick up the pieces. The Bratva doesn’t deal in maybes. I know enough to understand that.
“Jennie?”
I jump. Violet’s voice cuts through the buzzing in my ears, and I turn fast—too fast. The paper crinkles behind me as I slam my hand back against the door, hiding it like it’s contraband.
Violet stops a few steps away, her eyebrows drawn together. “Why are you standing here like a statue? What was that? Who were those guys?”
My heart thunders. I swallow hard and force a smile. “It was nothing. Just—delivery. Wrong address.”
“You’re lying.” She tilts her head, stepping closer. “And you’re pale. And weirdly sweaty. And acting like you just flushed a dead body down the toilet.”
“I’m fine,” I say quickly. Too quickly.
Violet crosses her arms. “Jennie.”
“I said I’m fine.” I try to smile again, but it feels broken at the edges. “I don’t know. I think I’m just not feeling well all of a sudden. Maybe something I ate. Or the banana bread was too sweet or something. I should turn the TV off and rest.”
She doesn’t look convinced, but she hesitates. “You want me to leave?”
“Yeah.” My smile drops. “I just need to rest, that’s all. I’ll take a nap or something. I’ll be okay.”
Violet frowns, still watching me like I might crack open. “You sure?”
I nod. “Yeah. Promise.”
“Okay. But call me if you need anything. Literally anything, okay?”
“Okay.”
She lingers for a beat longer, then finally turns and walks toward the door. I wait until I hear the apartment door close and lock behind her before I breathe again.
My knees buckle. I slide down to the floor, clutching the letter like it’s a lifeline and a loaded gun all at once.
I grab my phone and scroll to Zoe’s name, thumb hovering over the call button.
She’ll know what to do. She has to. She’s married to Lukin. She knows these people.
But then I remember—she texted me two nights ago. She went to France. Family trip. Just her, Lukin, and their son.
“Gone off-grid for a bit. Don’t text unless it’s life or death,” she said jokingly.
I almost laugh. This is both.
But I don’t press call. There’s no point. It was a joke, yes, but she really does need the vacation. She’s been working so hard, with raising a child and building her fashion business. She needs this break.
And suddenly, I feel very, very alone.
I look at the letter again. My hands are shaking now. The words don’t make any more sense than they did before. But they’re starting to feel real.
Logan.
What has he done?
A sharp, tight feeling grips my chest. I recognize it instantly. The quickening breath. The buzzing under my skin. The heaviness behind my eyes.
Anxiety.
Panic.
I press a hand to my sternum, trying to ground myself. I’ve studied this. I know what’s happening. That doesn’t make it any easier to stop.
All I can think about is Logan.
Where is he?
Is he already—
No. Don’t think it.
God.
Logan.
He’s all I have left.
The thought slips out of nowhere and wraps around my chest like barbed wire. I press my hand over my heart, but it doesn’t stop the ache. If they kill him—when they kill him—I’ll have no one. Not a single soul in the world connected to me by blood.
It used to be different.
My mom, Samantha, always said she made her first mistake at eighteen—falling in love with the wrong man.
He was charming until he wasn’t. A gambler.
A drinker. A walking disaster with a winning smile and a losing streak.
She got pregnant and married him because she thought that was what a good girl did.
That man was Logan’s father.
He fought her for custody when she tried to leave. And won. God knows how. Money? Intimidation? She never talked about it much—only that she lost her son and it nearly broke her.
She met my dad—Jim—when she was twenty-three.
He was calm where her first husband was chaos.
Steady hands. Steady heart. The kind of man who brought peace with him like sunshine.
They got married. They raised me. And for the most part, I had a happy, quiet childhood—except for the shadows Logan’s name always carried into the room.
He came back when he was seventeen. His father had died, and the courts sent him to live with us for a year.
I was twelve.
He was…difficult. Wounded. Angry in ways I didn’t understand then. Like he carried rot in his bones. Like the world owed him something, and he was just waiting to collect.
But I loved him. In the way little sisters do. Unconditionally, even when it hurt. Even when he was cruel or reckless or stone-cold silent. I kept trying to get close to him, to prove we were family—even if we didn’t come from the same man.
And for a moment—just a moment—I thought he wanted that too.
But Logan left at eighteen and never came back for long. He’d blow in like a storm, charm me with bad jokes and fast cars, then disappear again.
And then our parents died.
A car crash. Late night. Black ice. I was eighteen. Barely an adult. Everything I knew gone in a blink.
Logan didn’t come to the funeral.
He showed up a week later. Said he couldn’t handle it. Hugged me once. Put a stack of cash in my hand and told me to call if I ever needed him.
I didn’t. Because I knew there was no point.
We kept in touch through the years, but it was sparse, and for most of the time, I didn’t know where he was or what he was up to.
And now….
Now this letter is telling me the only person left in this world who shares my blood is going to die. Because he stole from the wrong people. Because he played too close to fire.
And I’m being told to decide what to do with his body.
I press my fingers to my temples. The anxiety tightens around my throat, wrapping tighter and tighter, and I can’t breathe.
He’s not perfect. He’s never been perfect.
But he’s mine.
My brother.
And if he dies….
I’ll truly be alone in this world.