Chapter 2 #2
“A woman and two children on a stone terrace. The frame was silver with an engraved date.”
The photograph showed Mama, Angelina, and me.
Angelina was three in the photograph, sitting on Mama’s lap with her sandals dangling over the edge of the terrace chair, and I was standing behind them with one hand on Mama’s shoulder.
The frame was a gift from my uncle Grigori, engraved with the date of Angelina’s christening years before the photograph was taken.
I kept it in the study because I wanted it where I worked, not where I slept.
The idea that someone carried it out of this house and sold it to a collector who doesn’t know the names of the people in the photograph, who doesn’t know that Angelina kicked off her sandals three seconds after the picture was taken and ran barefoot across the flagstone, hits me harder than I expected.
“I can get it back,” she says, and her defiance drops half a notch. “The buyer was a collector in Manhattan. I kept records of every sale, including contact information, because I planned to do follow-up authentication if any pieces were questioned. I have the receipts in my bag.”
“You kept receipts.”
“I kept everything. I’m a professional.” She says it without irony, as if forging marriage certificates and looting estates is simply a career that demands good recordkeeping.
Under different circumstances, and if she hadn’t sold Mama’s photograph to a stranger in Manhattan, I might respect the discipline.
My father’s ledgers documented every transaction, legal or otherwise.
Piper Voss operates on the same principle, just from the other side of the transaction.
I should be furious. I should have Platon restrain her while I call Adrian and begin the process of unwinding every forged document she filed.
Instead, I’m standing in a room I haven’t entered in four years, and I keep noticing details about this woman that have nothing to do with the damage she caused.
She lifts her chin before every sentence like she’s bracing for a hit that never comes. There’s a small scar near her left ear that her hair almost covers, and I make myself look away from it, then find I’ve looked back.
“Give me your phone,” I say.
“Why do you need my phone?”
“You’re sitting in my bedroom surrounded by evidence that I’m alive, and I need to know who else has that information.”
She stares at me for a long five-count and then reaches into her bag. The perfume trapped in the collar of her sweater smells clean and sharp against the stale air of this house. She holds the phone toward me by its edges, and I take it without touching her.
The lock screen shows three notifications before I hand it back for her to enter the passcode.
A text from Maren asks Piper to confirm that she left the mansion. A voicemail notification from Celine appears beneath it. Once the phone unlocks, the open thread with Callum still shows his most recent apology.
“Who is Maren?” I ask.
“My partner for tonight’s sale. She left before you arrived.”
“Who is Celine?” I ask.
“Celine is my mother.”
“Who is Callum?”
She loses the anger for one unguarded second, and fear shows before she can hide it. “Callum is my brother. He’s the reason I needed the money.”
I scroll through the thread. Callum’s messages are polite, grateful, and increasingly desperate.
He mentions a lender, a deadline that keeps moving, and every other text contains an apology.
He knows his sister is trying to cover his debt, and if I’m reading the apologies right, he hates needing her help.
Piper Voss forged a marriage certificate to an officially dead bratva boss, infiltrated a secured estate, and sold pieces from my family’s private collection in eleven separate sales to keep her younger brother out from under a predatory lender.
Her scam has compromised every safeguard I built to keep my family hidden. Good recordkeeping and a forged notary stamp have undone my cover, Platon’s operation, Vera’s position, and Angelina’s safety in less than three months.
Downstairs, Platon’s voice is low and controlled on the phone, briefing Vera on a situation he doesn’t fully understand yet because I haven’t decided what to do with the woman still sitting on my floor.
She watches the pocket where I put her phone instead of checking the door. When I shift my coat, she leans forward before stopping herself. Her brother is the real pressure point, and knowing that changes the entire situation in ways I haven’t worked through yet.
I lock the phone and put it in my coat pocket. “You’re not leaving this house tonight.”
Piper starts to argue, and I hold up one hand.
“You filed a document that connects your name to mine. A buyer connected to Rahil Shilov photographed the Rusakov crest on a piece you sold from this estate. In approximately twelve hours, Shilov’s people will begin tracing that sale back to the estate-access records, and when they find your marriage certificate, they will come looking for you.
The theft is secondary to them. Your certificate suggests I might still be alive, which makes you useful to Shilov. ”
She glances toward the bedroom door, then faces me again. “I’m a hostage, then,” she says, her voice wobbling only a little.
“You’re a liability.” I pick up the inventory binder from the floor and close it. “Whether you’re a hostage depends entirely on what you do next.”
Platon’s footsteps return on the staircase and stop on the landing.
“Nikita, the broker trace just updated.” Platon gives my name without inflection, which means the news worsened while he was downstairs. “Tonight’s buyer uploaded the crest photographs to a private server that Shilov’s people use.”
The timeline just collapsed from twelve hours to now.