Chapter 28
TERESA
Stone explodes in gritty shards as Vlad yanks me down.
My palms smack the ice-cold ground, the sting barely registering before another silenced shot chips the stair rail overhead. Marble dust blows across my face.
Vlad mutters coordinates, but the comms line goes dead. Dmitri can’t hear us. We’re alone.
“Come.” He pulls me to my feet and we pivot north, sprinting along the lake’s frozen rim. My lungs burn icy hot, breath raspy in my scarf.
A shadow leaps from behind an oak with a rifle.
Vlad fires twice without breaking stride.
Two soft pops and the man folds. Blood splatters the pristine snow, and I flinch at the wet thud of his body falling.
Vlad wipes his muzzle with a gloved thumb, dragging the body into the brush.
No hesitation, no wasted motion. Textbook elimination.
We charge on, weaving through skeletal trees until the bowels of Bow Bridge appear—arched stone throat, maintenance tunnel yawning beneath. The padlock hangs twisted, already cut. Vlad shoves me into a narrow alcove dark as a closet, cramming a discarded snow shovel across the door.
“You can’t seriously be shoving me in a freaking cage!”
“Safest place. Let me do my work.”
Through a knothole I watch him melt into the night, dark coat blending in with the shadows.
Work. I know what that means. Deadly work. Work he’s very good at.
Silence stretches on. Suddenly, I hear snow crunching, gunman number two creeping along the bank, scanning. I watch as Vlad drops from a boulder above, arm sweeping in a silver arc. Blade flashes, blood sprays.
A radio blips somewhere in the distance. I watch a man in a black parka rush past the entrance to the tunnel, Vlad following behind him silently, slowly, like a vampire. Then I hear a sharp snap—neck breaking like an icicle.
My attention turns in the other direction as boot steps pound on the stairs, coming toward me.
My vision tunnels. I grope in darkness, trying to find something, anything I can use to defend myself.
My fingers close around what feels like a rusted wrench.
The door rattles, jolting open. I raise the wrench, but Vlad’s there first. He catches the intruder’s trigger arm and twists, firing one muffled round.
Blood mists the frigid air as the body drops at my feet.
Steam curls from the wound, the metallic tang of gunfire burning my throat.
Our eyes lock over the corpse. He frisks the man, pocketing the radio and phone.
“All clear for now. Are you OK?”
“I think so.”
There’s blood spatter on his cheek. I try to wipe it away with my thumb, but my hand trembles so badly it smears instead of cleans. He kills with the ease I type spreadsheets, I think to myself, dizzy with fear and adrenaline.
He notices the tremor and gently encloses my wrist with his hand. Snowflakes settle on his lashes. He’s stoic, unblinking.
I’m scared. Scared of Volkov’s relentless hunger for revenge; scared of a war Vlad seems born to wage; scared of carrying a child whose father toggles between tenderness and lethal reflex like flipping a switch. I think I love him—God, I know I do—but the contrast is terrifying.
His earpiece crackles. Dmitri’s voice slices through static. “Two SUVs inbound west drive—thirty seconds.”
Vlad grabs my hand. “Extraction in two minutes. We need to move.”
He takes my hand and we break from the tunnel. Snow falls harder, muting the world. The bodies blur into vague mounds, red soaking outward like spilled ink. Dark silhouettes converge through the snowfall—Angeloff men or more hunters, I can’t tell.
I tighten my grip on Vlad’s hand and run.
Dmitri’s SUV fishtails onto the 79th Street traverse. Headlights slice through the trees. The rear door swings open mid-skid as Dmitri leans out of the driver’s side window, Glock sweeping.
“Inside, inside!”
Vlad half-pushes, half-throws me onto the leather seat, then dives in after. Dmitri slams the door and punches the gas. Tires spin on packed snow and we rocket east.
We drive approximately thirty yards before another shooter steps from behind a lamppost—sub-gun raised, muzzle flashes strobing.
The side mirror explodes and I yelp. Vlad yanks me down, braces his gun on the armrest, and pops three rounds through the spider-webbed windshield.
The shooter jerks back, red mist blooming.
Dmitri floors it, the SUV fishtailing again but finding traction, sending a tail of slush flying behind us.
The interior of the SUV smells like gun powder and leather. My heart’s battering against my ribs. I run shaking hands over Vlad’s torso, checking for holes. Only blood, and none of it his.
“You’re shaking,” he says, thumb rubbing my knuckles.
“I just watched you kill four men,” I whisper, voice cracking. “And I’m carrying your child.” God, it feels so strange to say out loud.
Dmitri’s speaking on comms. “Bodies at Bethesda. Paint fake MS-13 tags, dump casings from a Hi-Point. NYPD will chase ghosts ‘til Easter.”
And with the simple orders, another murder scene is sanitized.
We cut off the main avenues and take side streets until stopping at an old brownstone on West 62nd.
“Angeloff property,” Dmitri explains.
Inside, a fire is going. Candles are lit. A med kit waits on the console table. Vlad goes straight to the kitchen and scrubs his knuckles. I go with him, watching as pink water spirals down the sink and disappears.
Then I drop onto a velvet sofa. Baby, blood, baby, blood. I can’t turn the loop off.
Dmitri comes in and plops on the couch across from me.
“Four this time,” Dmitri says flatly. “Next wave will be twenty. Volkov isn’t bluffing. If he’s willing to make a move like that in Central Park…” his voice trails off.
I look at Vlad. He’s stone-faced, drying his hands on a clean white towel.
“We don’t know if this is Volkov yet. But make sure our angels of death are ready for war. If this is indeed Volkov making his opening attack, it’s the last offensive he’s going to get. We’re going to make him pay tenfold.”
I’m barely listening. Four bloody bodies strewn in the snow keep stealing my attention.
Dmitri heads downstairs to coordinate teams. The room goes quiet except for the crackling of the fire.
I stand and face Vlad. “Is this our future? You killing, cleaning it up, me hoping each time isn’t the one when you run out of luck?”
His jaw tightens. “It’s always a possibility.” He doesn’t sugarcoat it. “But I will make the world safe for you and the baby.”
“I need more than that, Vlad. Does this end? Ever?”
He hesitates, then looks at my stomach. His hand cups me there, a hand that only a short time ago was snapping a neck. “I promise everything I have,” he says, softer than I’ve ever heard him speak, “that I will keep you and our child safe.”
My eyes sting. I nod. I don’t know what else to say.
Live news plays on the TV behind us. A reporter stands at Bethesda Terrace talking about “unidentified gang violence.” Vlad’s people shaped the story so efficiently it’s scary.
I hold one of the sonogram pictures. “Our baby will know love. Not just security from violence.”
He meets my eyes, nodding once. He doesn’t argue.
The basement door bangs open as Dmitri comes back, expression cold and serious. “We’ve got a line on a few targets. If we want to take this war to the next level, we’ve got options.”
Vlad doesn’t even glance at him. He looks at me instead. “You’re staying in the penthouse. No leaving. Not for work, not for coffee, not for anything.”
Heat rises in my chest. “Excuse me?”
“It’s not a request.” His tone is quiet, immovable. “Full detail on the door. If you need anything, it’s brought to you.”
“I have a job,” I shoot back. “A life. A baby on the way. I can’t just—”
“You can,” he cuts me off, “and you will. I’ll move the office to you if I have to. But you don’t step onto a sidewalk without me.”
A blowing branch taps the tall windows like an ominous omen. “So I’m a prisoner now.”
“You’re protected.” He takes a step closer. “Targeted but protected.”
I cross my arms, angling away. “Protected feels a lot like controlled.”
“Control is how I keep you breathing,” he says, softer but no less final. “No subway. No solo elevators. No errands.”
I open my mouth to protest, but nothing comes out. He’s right. The whole city is unsafe for me now. If I’d been alone in Central Park… God, I don’t even want to think about it.
Dmitri clears his throat, drawing my attention. “Boss is right. You are a target. And the penthouse is the safest place in the city for you. It’s like a damn bunker.”
“I don’t want to live in a bunker,” I mutter.
Vlad’s jaw flexes. “I know what I’m asking. I also know what you saw tonight.” His gaze drops to my stomach. “One mistake, one bit of bad luck, and I lose both of you.”
Both of us. It’s no longer just me I have to think about.
The fire cracks, the sound making me jump.
I think about the four bodies on white drifts, about the clean, efficient way he erased them in less than thirty minutes.
I think about Maxim on ballroom marble, my parent’s names in a headline under the word accident.
I think about the baby inside me who didn’t ask for any of this.
“I hate this,” I whisper.
“I know.” He doesn’t reach for me. He just waits.
I look at Dmitri, already planning in his head.
“Fine. I’ll stay put. For now.”
Vlad nods once. “Nika will divert your calendar. Dmitri will rotate a four-man team. You don’t open the door to anyone but me.”
I nod because there’s nothing else to do. The decision settles over my shoulders, heavy as a winter coat.
Outside, the storm howls. Inside, the fire throws gold on Vlad’s face, and for a second I see two men within one—the king built for war and the man I love.