Chapter 20
Dmitri
It was strange to see my brother standing there, framed in the light of a warehouse that reeked of iron, oil, and criminal intent. He had his hair slicked back, jaw set, and a gun at his hip he hadn’t bothered to draw. Every inch of him looked carved from the kind of confidence I usually wore.
“Well,” he said, spreading his hands slightly, that damn half-smile ghosting across his face. “There you are.”
I said nothing. There were a dozen men around us—Viktor Dragunov, his right-hand man Grigor, their tech guy Demyan, their soldiers, ours—each one a heartbeat away from turning this standoff into a massacre. I’d been in worse stalemates than this, but not by much.
Roman took a slow step forward, his eyes flicking over me, then to Kara, standing just behind my shoulder. “You doing alright?” he asked her, his tone a little bit too casual.
“I’ve been better,” she said, her voice hoarse, but remarkably even.
His gaze lingered on her a second too long. Viktor Dragunov noticed, of course.
“Touching,” Viktor said, flicking ash from his cigarette. “You two planning to kiss or shoot someone first?”
“That depends on who keeps talking,” I said.
Roman’s eyes cut back to me. “Still bossing everyone around, I see.”
“Somebody has to,” I said, my tone even.
He smirked. “You look terrible, by the way.”
“I could say the same about your manners.”
The tension between us was familiar, an old rhythm we’d danced a thousand times before. Except this time, there was something different about him.
“You took your time,” I replied. “As usual.”
He smirked. “I was busy cleaning up your mess.”
I stepped forward just enough to remind him who he was talking to. “My mess?”
“Yeah,” he said. “You’re the one who got yourself tied to a chair, brother.”
“You came charging into a situation without thinking,” I said coldly. “As usual.”
He grinned, but there was nothing playful in it. “Somebody had to.”
Before I could answer, Viktor Dragunov’s voice cut through the tension like a hot knife through butter.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” he drawled, leaning casually against a container, cigarette dangling between two fingers. “Why don’t you two just get your dicks out and measure them? Save us all some time.”
Roman turned his head slightly, glare sharp. “You’ve got a lot of opinions for a man standing between two Markovs right now.”
Viktor smiled, smoke curling from his lips. “Oh, I like watching you two. It’s like theater: tragic on occasion, but entertaining all the time.”
Roman’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t answer right away. His eyes flicked toward Kara again.
Viktor saw it too. His grin widened. “Ah. That’s why you’re so tense.” He tipped his chin toward Kara. “You’ve been staring at the girl since she walked in. I was beginning to think you’d forgo your brother entirely and just take her.”
Roman didn’t look away. “He can take care of himself, but she’s ours, whether you like it or not.”
Kara shifted beside me but didn’t speak. Her gaze was locked on him, unflinching, though her hands trembled slightly where they rested at her sides.
Viktor let out a low whistle. “A family of criminals adopting strays. Touching.”
“Careful,” Roman said quietly.
Viktor’s grin turned almost genuine. “You’ll make me blush.”
Demyan stayed quiet, just observing the scene around him.
Grigor stepped between them before the tension snapped. “Enough. Save the posturing for someone who cares. There are larger problems at stake here.”
Roman sighed and turned back to me, his voice icy cold. “Fine. Listen. We need to figure all this out. Quickly. I’ve got too much on my plate to argue with you further. I don’t know why you took Dmitri and Kara, but I need them more than you do. My younger brother Lev has been taken too.”
That changed the air immediately. I started. Kara stiffened, and her eyes went wide. Grigor’s brow furrowed, Viktor straightened, and Katya—who’d been standing slightly behind them—stilled completely.
“Taken?” Kara repeated.
“By ARCHEON,” Roman said, glancing in her direction. “They have him and they’re using him as leverage to get to her.” He nodded toward Kara.
At that, Kara’s chin lifted in surprise.
I exhaled through my nose. “You’re certain?”
“I got the message myself,” Roman said, turning to me, his tone brooking no argument. “A British voice. Polite enough but threatening all the same. Said they’d ‘temporarily taken custody of him.’ I don’t do well with polite threats; you know that, brother.”
Viktor dragged in another breath of smoke, then exhaled slowly. “ARCHEON,” he said the name in a low snarl, almost like a curse. “They always did have a flair for the dramatic.”
“They don’t care about you,” Katya said suddenly. Her accent was thicker when she was angry, apparently; Eastern European maybe. “They don’t care about any of us. They want control. They always want control.”
Roman’s attention snapped to her. “You seem to know a lot about what they want.”
Her jaw tightened. “I run into them from time to time.”
Viktor turned his head slightly toward her. “Careful, kotenok. You’re saying more than you mean to.”
Katya’s gaze didn’t waver. “I know exactly what I said. Maybe it’s time someone spoke up.”
Roman crossed his arms, watching her closely. “Then talk.”
She hesitated, just long enough for Viktor to step closer, his tone softer now, though still edged with amusement. “Don’t make her. She’s not your enemy.”
Roman’s eyes narrowed. “You seem to have an awful lot of faith in her.”
Viktor smirked. “Let’s just say I have good instincts.”
Katya shot him a look that was half warning, half affection. “You have terrible instincts,” she said, “and worse timing.”
Viktor chuckled. “I have excellent timing. You’re still alive, aren’t you?”
She rolled her eyes but didn’t deny it.
I glanced between them, piecing it together. The familiarity in the way they stood near each other, the way his voice softened when he spoke to her. “You two are involved. With each other,” I said flatly.
“Not your business,” Viktor said easily.
“Right now, it’s every bit of my business,” I said.
Katya ignored me, her voice calm as she spoke to Roman. “You want your brother back? Then let’s work together.”
Roman tilted his head slightly. “And why do you want that?”
She studied him for a long second, like she was weighing whether or not to open up more, and then her jaw flexed, just the tiniest twinge of movement.
“I work for the Revenant Group, yes?” she began.
I narrowed my eyes in her direction, trying to see what she was getting at.
“I assumed you did,” Roman countered.
“They aren’t what they pretend to be,” she said finally, voice hushed.
“I thought they were the good guys. You see, I grew up in Eastern Europe under a government that ruled with fear and an iron fist. When the chance came to fight back, I signed on with Revenant because they promised change. Real change. We wanted to topple the old regime, not trade one cage for another. But after the dust settled, the new rulers they installed were even more crooked. I stayed because I told myself I could do more from the inside. In the end, I was just a tool for them… Useful until I wasn’t. ”
Silence descended like a thick fog. I watched Roman’s face carefully. He never reacted quickly, never let a muscle betray him, but his fingers curled at his sides, knuckles going white.
“And ARCHEON?” Kara interjected. “What do you want with them?”
Katya’s jaw tightened as her gaze shifted to Kara.
“I don’t like ARCHEON either. They’re no good.
In my years with Revenant, I learned their name the hard way.
They’ve killed people I cared about, then rewrote the story so it looked like an accident or a necessary casualty.
I want Revenant broken for using me and betraying my people, and I want ARCHEON exposed for what they really are. ”
Roman’s eyes narrowed until they were slits. “So, you want to burn both houses down,” he said. “Use arson as diplomacy.”
“Means to an end. Or ends, as the case may be,” Katya answered. “But targeted. Strategic. You take back Lev, and we work together to hit Revenant where it hurts. Between all of us, we have extensive networks. We have access. Together, we would be unstoppable.”
Viktor laughed softly. “Our families could work together,” he said, spreading his hands. “We make some noise, you grab your boy, we all walk away with a smile. Then you help us against the Revenant Group.”
Roman didn’t blink. “What’s in it for you besides vendetta?”
Katya’s eyes flicked to Viktor. He stepped forward and, for a moment, the casual grin on his face was all charm.
“Revenant’s been using us to move their drone shipments—military tech dressed up as civilian toys.
They think the Dragunovs are just their couriers, the muscle to keep the ports quiet while they sell war to the highest bidder.
I don’t mind getting my hands dirty from time to time, but I don’t like being treated like the na?ve delivery boys for someone else’s apocalypse. ”
He paused and his face tightened with more than just bravado. “I want my hands clean,” he said quietly. “Or at least less bloody. Katya wants revenge. You help us, we help you; we can both scratch each other’s backs and deal a little damage to those two groups together.”
Roman looked at me then, asking my opinion without words.
The Dragunovs weren’t saints, but they were rarely liars. In the few deals I’d brokered with them, they’d kept their word when it mattered. They were ruthless, yes, but predictable in a way most men in our world weren’t. Honorable, by criminal standards. Still, this was different.
I studied Viktor’s face, the easy grin that never quite reached his eyes, and Katya’s heated conviction.
They could be telling the truth, or they could be cornered, spinning a story just to buy some time.
Right now, though, if Roman was ready to stake our future on this alliance, I had to decide whether to back him or pull him back.
With a deep breath, I decided to back him.
I nodded.
Roman exhaled, considering the trade like a man weighing a sword in his hand. “If we do this, help you take down Revenant, I get Lev back. Alive. Unhurt. No surprises. No games.”
Viktor’s eyes glittered. “That part was never in question.” He glanced sideways at Katya—there was a softness in the look that was almost private—then back to Roman. “The real question is whether you’re capable of following through once you get what you want.”
I felt my jaw tighten.
Roman’s jaw worked. I watched the calculations going on behind his eyes. He’d never been the one to make decisions like this. This was new for him.
I stayed silent, just to see what he would do.
“You’re acting like I’m the one who needs convincing,” Roman said finally. His voice was calm, but there was steel in it now. “You’re the ones coming to us. You want our reach. Our intel. Our manpower.”
Viktor smiled like the possibility amused him. “Careful, Markov. Confidence is cute, but it doesn’t replace experience.”
Roman’s hand went to his hip, brushing against his gun.
He never drew unless he had to. Instead, he looked at me—really looked—and for the first time in a long time I felt the old hierarchy shift.
Roman’s role in our family was fundamentally changing right before my eyes.
He stood, not as the fuck-up eldest son, but as someone who could handle the kind of authority that my life had always centered around.
The life I’d been forced into because he’d never stepped up.
Until now.
Honestly, I was a little bit impressed.
“We do this deal together. You get what you want. We get what we want and that’s that,” Roman said confidently.
Viktor laughed then—not the airy sound from before, but a harsher, louder thing. “Fine. We’ll help you get Lev back. Then we get your cooperation to fuck Revenant over.” He flicked his cigarette as if sealing the deal with ash.
“You help us bring Lev back without harm, or there won’t be a desert big enough to hide what we’ll do to you,” Roman warned.
Viktor met the stare and tipped his chin. “Wouldn’t expect anything other than a threat from you, Markov. Very theatrical. Consider it acknowledged.”
I could feel Kara’s gaze on me, her fear and confusion a palpable weight in the air. I knew she wanted to ask questions, but I gave her a subtle shake of my head. Not now. It wasn’t the time for that. Her jaw tightened, but she stayed quiet.
“Then it’s done,” I said. “Let’s move.”