Chapter 6 – Lev
The blinds are drawn, the air thick with smoke and silence. Numbers crawl across the projector screen, the kind that could topple empires if placed in the wrong hands.
I sit at the head of the table, back straight, eyes on the ledger Igor Petrov has laid out. He’s old Bratva, steady even with his hands gnarled from age, and if he’s flown to Chicago personally, it means the situation is bleeding serious.
Niko lounges across from me, deceptively relaxed with his chair tipped back.
Kazimir is more obvious, arms folded like a coiled spring, his attention flicking between me and the figures on the screen.
Mikhael stands at my right shoulder, silent as a blade but sharp enough to cut through the tension.
“I’ve reviewed the transfers three times,” Igor rasps, sliding his glasses lower on his nose. “And they all lead back to one name—Vassilis Marino.”
The name hits like a stone dropping into still water. Greek shipping magnate. Greedy bastard. A man I’ve done business with before, usually under the table—fees for discreet cargo, goods no government needs to know about. He paid; I looked the other way. Clean. Simple.
But the accounts Igor shows me are anything but simple. Shell companies in Cyprus, transfers through Luxembourg, cash bleeding into hands I don’t recognize.
“Marino’s either gone sloppy,” Niko mutters, tapping the table, “or someone is using him as a cover.”
I don’t answer. My jaw tightens as I read the last page again, slower this time. The numbers don’t lie. Money’s vanishing, and someone thinks they can siphon off Bratva channels without me noticing.
Fools.
The table is silent. I can feel their eyes on me—Niko’s impatient, Kazimir’s flat and cold, Igor’s rheumy but calculating.
Mikhael hovers at my shoulder, waiting, as he always does, for my word.
They all know what I am to this family. Not the soldier, not the enforcer, not the street muscle.
I’m the surgeon with a scalpel, the one who sees through the blood and dirt to the arteries that keep us alive.
Ten years in London taught me the difference between crude laundering and real finance.
While they broke bones in alleyways, I was turning millions of black money into portfolios, trusts, and shell companies clean enough to pass through European banks without a second glance.
I built pathways so smooth even auditors couldn’t trace them.
And now, someone’s bleeding us dry through those same arteries.
I drop the page onto the table and lean back. “This isn’t random. Whoever’s behind this knows our routes. They’ve slipped into Marino’s channels like a parasite, siphoning piece by piece. Clever enough to bury it under Greek shells and Luxembourg trusts, but lazy enough to leave fingerprints.”
I tap the Hamburg transfer, the flaw that caught my eye. “Here. Outdated routing code. It doesn’t match the new systems I set up. That means whoever’s skimming doesn’t have direct access to me. Which means Marino is either complicit—or being used.”
The silence grows heavier. They’re waiting for the verdict, the strategy, the kill order. I returned to take this rotten system and drag it into the twenty-first century, to make it untouchable. Uprooting thieves and greedy bastards is an important step.
My eyes snag on a page that doesn’t belong. The ink is faded, the handwriting old-world neat, not the sterile spreadsheets I’m used to. Igor must’ve dragged this out of some basement vault.
I smooth the paper flat. A debt agreement. Dated fifteen years ago.
Vassilis Marino borrowed five million from the Rusnaks to cover a shipping disaster that nearly gutted his fleet. Standard enough—except it was never repaid.
I skim the terms once, twice. Then the words stop me cold.
Collateral.
In the event of death or failure to pay, Marino’s debt would be covered not only by tangible assets—ships, properties, accounts—but also by family.
My pulse ticks hard as I trace the line again. A name written with almost casual finality:
S. Marino.
For a moment, the room fades. The voices, the stale cigar smoke, even the weight of everyone watching me. All I see is that single initial, that surname, that possibility.
It can’t be.
But the numbers, the ink, the damn signature—they don’t lie.
Hold on.
I flip back through the file, searching for anything that proves I’ve misread, that “S. Marino” isn’t what I think it is. My fingers still on a thin, half-crumpled photograph tucked between brittle pages.
The pier is unmistakably Greek—blue sea, whitewashed railings, sunlight like glass. And there she is. Younger, hair longer, smile wide. Sasha. Her arm looped through a woman’s I can only assume is her mother.
My blood spikes hot in my veins.
It doesn’t make sense. It shouldn’t make sense. A girl—her—used as collateral in the twenty-first century? Ridiculous. Absurd.
Except it isn’t. Not here. Not in this world. The Rusnaks don’t discard old-world arrangements. A debt is a debt, and when it carries the family’s name, it’s honored—no matter how brutal the terms.
“Lev?” Niko’s voice cuts in. “You okay?”
I lift my head, school my face into something flat, neutral. I nod once. My hand, though, is still locked tight around the photograph, crumpling its edge.
I force myself to keep reading, scanning the margin notes until the truth slams into me.
Vassilis Marino has been dead for years.
And Sasha’s mother—she told me herself—gone when Sasha was eighteen. Cancer.
Which leaves one name. One asset.
Her.
My gut knots so hard I have to steady my hand on the table. Not because the ledger shocks me—I’ve lived my whole life knowing how debts like these are repaid. Women passed off, traded like currency until balance is restored.
It’s not the rule that burns.
It’s that it’s her.
Sasha.
I can already see the path this would take if anyone else at this table connected the dots. And I know what the Bratva does to women marked as collateral. How they’re used, where they end up. A beautiful woman like Sasha…no!
My chest feels like it’s caving in. I can’t—won’t—let that happen to her. I barely have time to tuck the photograph back into the file when Niko’s hand shoots out. Quick, sharp. He snatches it before I can stop him.
“Niko—” I start, but it’s too late.
He studies it, his brows snapping together. Recognition flickers in his eyes like a blade catching light. Then his mouth parts in shock.
“It’s Sasha,” Niko says slowly.
My blood goes cold.
Kaz clears his throat, a slight frown on his face. “Care to fill us in?”
The room stills, every pair of eyes turning toward us. Niko places the photo down flat on the table, his voice steady, but I can hear the disbelief threaded in it.
“The Greeks defaulted. The agreement is binding. And per Bratva law….” He looks straight at me, as though testing my reaction. “…Sasha Marino now belongs to us until the debt is satisfied.”
The words hit like gunfire.
I force my face into a mask, but inside, everything riots. Belongs to us. No. No fucking way. Sasha belongs to no one but me. I meant it that night when I told her she was mine. If I can’t have her, no one can. I swear on my life.
“She’s not part of this world,” I bite out, sharper than I intend. My hands curl into fists on the table, veins straining as if I could crush the papers into dust. “She doesn’t know anything. She never asked for this.”
Niko doesn’t flinch. His expression hardens, his tone matter-of-fact. “Neither did half the sons and daughters pledged before her. Vassilis knew exactly what he signed. Collateral is collateral, Lev. Doesn’t matter if she’s aware of it or not—the paper stands.”
The truth stings because he’s right. I know the law, the precedent. We’ve all watched lives swallowed by old debts.
Igor clears his throat, his voice dry as parchment. “There’s a clean solution. Sell her into marriage. A transactional match with a Greek ally. It clears the ledger, restores balance, and avoids unnecessary…complications.”
The words aren’t even cold before my temper explodes.
“No.” The word slams from my chest, low and final. Every head turns toward me. “She’s not merchandise. Not for sale. Not to be handed off to some Greek bastard who sees her as a bargaining chip.”
My pulse hammers. I can feel Niko and Kazmir’s eyes drilling into me, studying too closely.
Possessiveness claws at my ribs. I don’t want her in this world at all—but the idea of her being tied to another man, chained by this debt, makes me want to put a bullet through the wall.
I could clear the debt myself. One transfer, a dozen shell accounts, and it’s gone. But the thought of putting my own money on the table for her—for Sasha—would smell of weakness. Favoritism. And weakness in front of Bratva wolves is blood in the water.
So I do the only thing that keeps her safe and keeps my power intact.
“I’ll take her.”
The words fall like a blade on the table. Every man in the room looks up.
“I’ll marry her.” I let my voice flatten, all business, though my blood runs hot beneath the surface. “The debt is absorbed back into the Rusnak line. The collateral stays in the family. The Greeks get their ledger closed, and no one else touches her.”
The silence is heavy. Igor blinks, slow and calculating, then gives a curt nod. “It has precedent.”
Kazimir whistles low under his breath, like he can’t believe what he just heard.
Niko’s stare is sharp, searching me, but he doesn’t challenge it. He knows as well as I do—this solution is ironclad. Binding. Traditional enough to hold up under scrutiny.
And most importantly, it keeps her out of enemy hands.
No one objects. The matter is settled.
The meeting wraps, papers pushed aside, ledgers closed, and yet I remain silent. Everyone files out slowly, murmuring their agreements and confirmations, but I stay planted at the head of the table, hands gripping the edge.
I can’t stop thinking about her. Sasha. Her laugh in Milan, light and unrestrained, the way her eyes roamed the canal as she talked, the way her gaze sparkled when she let herself be unguarded.
And then—Noelle’s kitchen. That look she shot me.
Pure loathing. Disgust. I can still feel it crawling under my skin.
I tell myself it’s business. The Rusnak way. The ledger demands it. Protection, preservation, control. The family.
But even as I recite the rules to myself, I know it’s not just business. I don’t want her bound to the family—I want her bound to me. Possessively. All-consuming. And the thought of forcing her into this, even for her safety, twists something deep inside me.
I lean back, jaw tight, trying to swallow down the heat curling through my chest. It’s just business.
But my heart doesn’t listen.
I hear a throat clear and look up to find Kaz and Niko watching me with those narrowed eyes that mean they’re trying to read me like an open ledger. They’re both close—closer than cousins, closer than friends. Brothers in everything that matters. I can relax with them and be myself.
“What is this about?” Kaz asks, voice clipped. He leans forward, folded hands on the table. “I find it unbelievable that you would shackle yourself to any woman, Lev. Especially not in a transaction. What’s the plan?”
Niko snorts, the sound loose and dangerous. “He knows the lady. He’s fucked her before.”
My hands twitch in my lap. I keep them curled into fists because I won’t give them the sight of me unraveling. How dare Niko speak of her like that?
He doesn’t know I’m seething. He’s laughing, filling Kaz in with all the juicy details like it’s gossip.
Kaz whistles under his breath when Niko finishes, an odd little sound that could be amusement or warning. “Well. Best of luck,” he says finally, and there’s real warmth in it. “I hope you don’t regret your decision.”
I don’t answer. I can feel the heat behind my ribs—possession, shame, something that tastes like fear and hunger all at once. I stand, the chair scraping back like a verdict, and I walk out before anyone else can dress the moment up in questions they don’t need answered.
Outside, the Chicago air hits me and clears my head enough to think. As I cross the parking lot, Mikhail falls into step at my shoulder—one of the only men who knows how far I’ll go and what I won’t tolerate.
We reach the car, and I don’t bother with pleasantries. “Bring her to me,” I say, voice low and final. “Tonight.”