Chapter 28
Dimitri Morozov
The office on the upper floor of the building felt smaller than it should have.
I stood at the long table, phone pressed to my ear.
Rei had left hours ago with the bodyguards. I had wanted to go with him and had almost insisted on it, but the look he gave me stopped me.
I told myself it was fine. The bodyguards were the best we had. They would keep him safe outside the house. Still, the decision sat wrong in my gut, a low-grade burn that only grew hotter the longer he was gone.
My father’s latest demands were stacked on the desk behind me.
Territories to secure. Men to remind of their place.
The usual endless cycle of power that never slowed.
I handled it because I had to. Because the empire did not stop turning just because I had someone worth protecting now.
But every report, every order I gave, felt like background noise compared to the silence from my phone.
Ilya was supposed to call any minute with the final piece.
The one thread that would pull the whole thing apart.
When the phone finally rang, I answered before the second tone finished.
“I got a name,” Ilya said. His voice was flat in a way that did not match the usual manic edge he carried. There was something off underneath it, something tight and careful that made the back of my neck prickle. “You’re not gonna like this.”
“Speak.”
A pause stretched on the line.
“The last proxy,” Ilya said. “The final one we’ve been chasing through all the layers. It traces back to Daniel Walker.”
The words landed like a blade sliding between ribs.
“Are you sure?”
“100%,” Ilya answered without hesitation. “We cracked the last encryption this morning. The money trails, the ghost servers, the pressure on the school, the rumors. It all loops back to accounts he controls.”
I was out the door before the next breath. My focus narrowed to the car waiting below, to the distance between here and that house. Every second that ticked by was another second Rei was under the same roof as the man who had been orchestrating his downfall.
My mind raced through logistics. How many men I could pull without drawing attention.
The fastest route through midday traffic.
The layout of the house I had studied months ago when I first started watching Rei.
I should have gone with him. Should have ignored that look in his eyes and planted myself at his side like the possessive bastard I was.
Instead I had stayed to handle my father’s endless list of problems while the real threat sat across the dinner table from the boy I had claimed.