Chapter Fifty-Three
Sabrina
By the time I returned to the warehouse, Vanya was already gone. She had her escape; now I had mine to finish.
I slipped the pistol beneath my jacket and continued down the corridor, the distant sounds of wedding preparations growing louder with every step. Sergei was getting ready for his bride, completely unaware that she was already moving freely through his warehouse.
A few minutes later, I found the security office with the door sitting slightly ajar. Inside, two guards sat behind a bank of monitors, neither paying much attention to the camera feeds. One was scrolling through his phone while the other leaned back in his chair, barely watching the screens.
If they were doing their jobs properly, they would have known I was already inside.
Instead, neither noticed me.
The suppressor was still fitted to my pistol. I raised it and fired. The first guard dropped before he could react. The second turned towards me, but I fired before he could reach his weapon.
Silence settled over the room.
I closed the door and turned towards the monitors. Dozens of camera feeds showed different sections of the warehouse: corridors, storage rooms, entrances and the room they'd transformed into a wedding venue.
I scanned the screens until I found Sergei.
He stood in one of the larger rooms with five men surrounding him.
And Yuri was there.
My fingers tightened around the pistol.
I'd expected to find Sergei first and hunt Yuri down afterwards, but they'd made things easier by putting themselves in the same room.
I studied the feed more carefully. The men were gathered near the centre, all facing away from the far wall. Near the opposite end, partially concealed in the shadows, was a large ventilation grate.
My eyes narrowed.
An entrance they hadn't thought to guard.
I leaned closer to the monitor, memorising the layout. The vent would give me a way into the room without walking straight through the men surrounding them, and with their attention directed elsewhere, I'd have the advantage before they even knew I was there.
My gaze returned to Yuri.
I hadn't forgotten his voice or the certainty with which he'd spoken about Dario. He had been part of the plan to take my little brother, and I'd promised Olga she'd see him again.
A slow smile touched my lips.
I intended to keep that promise.
I stepped away from the monitors and slipped the pistol back beneath my jacket.
Sergei, Yuri, five men and one vent.
It was time to reunite Yuri with Olga.
I found the ventilation shaft tucked behind a row of metal shelving, the grate almost completely concealed by years of dust and neglect. I crouched in front of it, loosened the screws and pulled the cover free before peering into the darkness beyond.
Perfect.
I slipped inside and carefully replaced the grate behind me, leaving the warehouse on the other side.
The space was barely wide enough for my shoulders, forcing me to crawl forward with my body pressed against the cold metal.
Every movement sent a faint scrape through the ductwork, so I slowed my pace, listening between each shift.
Something brushed my cheek.
I froze.
A spider crawled across the web beside my face.
“You've got to be kidding me.”
I pushed forward, brushing webs from my face as I crawled deeper into the shaft. More webs stretched across the narrow passage, catching against my sleeves and hair as I moved. Every few feet, another spider disappeared into a crack or scurried across the metal beneath my hands.
If Carlo were here, he wouldn't have made it ten feet.
The thought almost made me smile.
I brushed another web from my face and kept moving.
The vent seemed to stretch endlessly, each turn making it harder to tell exactly where I was beneath the warehouse. I relied on the layout I'd memorised from the security monitors, counting the turns and keeping track of the direction I'd taken.
Then I heard voices.
I stopped.
They were muffled by the metal around me, but close enough that I could make out the occasional word.
“You're finally getting your bride.”
Laughter followed.
Another voice spoke, louder this time.
“Tonight is going to be one hell of a night, Sergei.”
I moved closer, careful not to let my hands scrape against the metal.
“You've waited long enough for this,” someone said. “After tonight, the Morettis won't be able to touch you.”
More laughter.
I rolled my eyes.
Apparently, they had forgotten to mention that to me.
“To Sergei Volkov,” another man called, his voice carrying through the room. “The man who finally gets what he wants.”
A chorus of agreement followed.
I continued towards the voices until the faint glow of light appeared ahead. I slowed, lowering myself against the metal as I crawled the final few feet.
The voices were clearer now.
I heard Sergei laugh.
Then another voice.
Yuri.
My grip tightened around the pistol.
Two men I wanted dead were standing in the same room, surrounded by only a handful of others, completely unaware that I was already above them.
I reached the vent opening and carefully angled myself towards the gap.
Below me, Sergei stood with Yuri beside him and several of his men gathered around them, their backs turned towards the vent.
None of them looked up.
A slow smile touched my lips.
They'd spent so much time preparing for the wedding that they never thought to look above them.
Sergei turned away from the men surrounding him and walked towards the tall windows overlooking the dark grounds beyond the warehouse. The others gradually fell silent, their attention following him as he rested one hand against the glass.
For a moment, he simply stared outside.
Then he spoke.
“My father always had a weakness for beautiful women.”
A few of the men chuckled.
“Bianca Moretti should have been a Volkov. She should have carried our name instead of theirs.” His voice hardened with something that sounded almost like resentment. “My father wanted her, but she chose Rafael Moretti. She chose their family, their name, their life.”
He shook his head slowly, a humourless smile touching his mouth.
“But perhaps it was never meant to happen that way.”
Above them, I adjusted my position inside the vent and raised my pistol.
Sergei continued speaking, completely unaware of me.
“Because now I'll have what my father couldn't.”
I aimed at the first guard.
The suppressed shot barely made a sound.
He dropped before anyone noticed.
Sergei continued his speech.
“Sabrina Moretti will become my wife. She will carry the Volkov name, and through her, the Morettis will finally become part of something far greater than they could ever have imagined.”
I shifted my aim to the second guard.
Another muted shot.
He collapsed beside the table.
A few men glanced towards him, but Sergei was still facing the windows, too absorbed in his own words to notice the movement behind him.
“Her mother should have been a Volkov,” he continued. “But if Bianca wouldn't take the name, Sabrina will.”
My finger tightened around the trigger.
The third guard stood closer to the vent than the others.
I lined up the shot.
The suppressed gun fired.
This time, the guard didn't fall quietly.
His chair scraped violently across the floor as his body hit it, and one of the men nearest him turned towards the sound.
His eyes travelled across the room.
Then stopped.
On the open vent.
His expression changed.
“Up there!”
Sergei spun around.
I didn't wait.
I pushed the grate aside and dropped from the vent, landing hard on the floor as the room erupted into chaos.
The men reached for their weapons.
I was already moving.
The first guard barely had time to clear his gun from its holster before I fired. The suppressed shot struck him in the chest, sending him stumbling backwards into the table behind him. Before the others could react, I turned towards the next man, firing again as he raised his weapon.
Chaos erupted across the room.
Chairs scraped violently against the floor as the remaining guards scattered, shouting over one another while reaching for their guns. I dropped behind one of the tables as a bullet tore through the space where my head had been a second earlier.
So much for keeping things quiet.
I fired from behind the table, catching another guard in the shoulder. He staggered, giving me enough time to close the distance and drive my elbow into his throat before ripping the weapon from his hand.
Someone came at me from the side.
I ducked beneath his swing and drove my knee into his stomach. He doubled over, and I brought the butt of my pistol down against the back of his head. He collapsed at my feet.
The room fell silent for half a second.
Then Sergei spoke.
“Morana.”
I turned.
He stood several feet away, his face drained of colour as he stared at me. The confidence he'd carried into the room was gone, replaced by something far more satisfying.
Fear.
Yuri stood beside him, frozen in place.
His eyes widened as he looked at me, recognition dawning across his face.
I raised the pistol slightly.
“Hello, boys.”
Sergei took a step backwards.
“You...”
A smile pulled at my lips.
“Did you really think I'd make it this easy for you?”
His gaze flickered towards the bodies scattered around the room before returning to me.
“You're supposed to be afraid.”
“I was.”
I tilted my head.
“Just not of you.”
Yuri finally found his voice.
“Sergei, we need to–”
“Shut up.”
Sergei never took his eyes off me.
For the first time since I'd entered the room, I could see the truth in his expression.
He finally understood.
The woman he'd dragged into his basement wasn't Sabrina Moretti waiting helplessly for her wedding day.
She was Morana.
And he'd brought her exactly where she wanted to be.
The room had barely fallen silent when a deafening crash reverberated through the warehouse.
Sergei's head snapped towards the door as another explosion followed, rattling the windows and sending a tremor through the floor beneath our feet.
Distant shouting rose above the noise, followed by the unmistakable crack of gunfire.
“They've breached the warehouse,” Yuri said, his voice suddenly tense.
“The guards will handle it,” Sergei replied, though the slight hesitation in his voice told me he wasn't nearly as certain as he sounded.
I couldn't help the small smile that touched my lips.
“Your guards?”
His gaze shifted back to me as another burst of gunfire sounded somewhere beyond the room.
“What's so funny?”
“You still don't understand.” I lowered the pistol slightly, watching the realisation begin to form across his face. “That's my family.”
Silence fell between us.
Yuri's expression tightened while Sergei simply stared at me, as though he couldn't quite process what I'd said.
“My family is here.”
For a heartbeat, Sergei said nothing.
Then he laughed.
It started quietly, almost disbelieving, before growing louder until it echoed around the room. He dragged a hand through his hair and shook his head, looking as though he couldn't make sense of what was happening.
“I can't believe this.”
His laughter became almost manic.
“I can't believe I'm being defeated by a little girl.”
I straightened, holding his gaze.
“You're not being defeated by a little girl. You're being defeated by the very person Ivan spent years trying to destroy.”
Whatever amusement remained on his face disappeared.
Beside him, Yuri went completely still. His eyes locked onto mine, and for the first time since I'd entered the room, I saw genuine fear settle across his features.
He stared at me as though he were trying to find someone else beneath my face, someone he could understand, someone who was supposed to be dead.
“No,” he whispered.
The word was barely audible, but I heard it.
His gaze moved over me again, searching for something that might prove him wrong. Instead, the realisation only grew stronger until the name finally left his lips.
“Diabola.”
I said nothing.
I didn't need to.
He knew exactly what the name meant. He knew what Ivan had created, what he had spent years searching for and what he had believed was gone forever.
Another explosion shook the warehouse, and Sergei glanced towards the door before looking back at me. The confidence he'd carried into the room had begun to fracture, leaving something far more uncertain in its place.
“You think you've won?”
A faint smile touched my lips.
“I know I have.”
I turned my attention towards him.
“You'll both be reunited with the people you've lost. Sergei, you'll be reunited with Ivan very soon.”
Something changed in his expression, but before he could respond, I looked towards Yuri.
“And you...” I let the silence stretch between us. “...you'll be reunited with Olga.”
The reaction was immediate.
Yuri's face flushed with rage, his jaw tightening as he stepped towards me.
“What did you do to her?”
His voice had lost every trace of control.
“Where is she?”
I remained still, watching the anger build behind his eyes.
“What did you do to Olga?” he demanded again.
I let the silence linger for another moment before giving him a faint smile.
“You'll see her soon enough.”
Yuri lunged.
I moved before he could reach me, stepping aside and catching his arm. I twisted sharply, using his momentum to send him stumbling past me before driving my elbow into the side of his head.
He staggered but remained upright, turning towards me with fury twisting across his features.
I didn't give him the chance to recover. The butt of my pistol connected with his temple, and when his knees buckled, I struck him again.
His body went limp and crashed against the floor.
Sergei stared at Yuri's unconscious body before slowly lifting his eyes back to me.
For once, he didn't laugh.
“You wouldn't.”
I stepped towards him, the pistol hanging loosely at my side.
“No. I won't.”
His gaze flickered towards the weapon, and understanding flashed across his face just before I raised it and struck him across the side of the head.
He stumbled backwards, catching himself against the table. I hit him again, and this time his grip slipped. His knees gave way beneath him, and he collapsed beside Yuri.
I stood over them for a moment, watching for any sign of movement.
Neither stirred.
Outside, the sounds of my family taking the warehouse grew louder, the fight drawing closer with every passing second.
Sergei Volkov and Yuri were finally unconscious at my feet.
I lowered my pistol and looked towards the door.
My family was here.
I was going home.