6. Glass, Guns, and Grace
Glass, Guns, and Grace
Roman
Gunfire is never random.
It is message, measurement, or mistake.
This wasn’t a mistake.
I watch the security feed as Viktor’s men sweep the lower perimeter. Two shooters fled. One didn’t make it to the car.
He’s on his knees now in the underground garage.
Hands zip-tied. Face pressed against concrete slick with oil and rainwater.
Young. Mid-twenties. Nervous eyes trying to look brave.
He won’t look brave for long.
I descend without haste.
Rage wastes precision.
The garage smells like exhaust and blood when the elevator doors open.
Viktor steps beside me.
“One confirmed down. Two escaped in a stolen sedan. We have partial plates.”
“Alive?” I ask, nodding toward the kneeling man.
“For now.”
Good.
I remove my coat slowly and hand it to Viktor.
The captive lifts his head when my shoes stop in front of him.
Recognition hits him instantly.
His pulse jumps in his throat.
“Rizzi?” I ask calmly.
He doesn’t answer.
I crouch—not too close. Just enough that he has to meet my eyes.
“You fired at my building,” I continue. “That’s bold.”
He swallows.
“I—I didn’t shoot—”
I don’t slap him.
I don’t shout.
I simply take the knife from Viktor’s hand and slide the tip under the zip tie at his wrist.
He flinches.
“I dislike lies,” I say evenly.
The blade presses—not cutting skin, just enough to promise it could.
“Who sent you?”
Silence.
The knife shifts slightly. A thin red line beads where I let the edge kiss his forearm.
He gasps.
“Donny,” he blurts. “Rizzi—he sent us.”
I expected that.
“Why?”
“To test you.”
I tilt my head.
“Test what?”
“If you’d escalate,” he says, breath shaking. “If you’d panic.”
I lean closer.
“Do I look panicked?”
“No.”
“Then you miscalculated.”
His breathing speeds up.
“He said—he said the girl’s already marked. We don’t need her dead.”
The air in the garage seems to narrow.
“What do you need?” I ask quietly.
He hesitates.
The knife presses deeper.
“Taken,” he chokes. “Paraded. Broken on camera.”
Viktor’s jaw tightens beside me.
The man’s voice cracks.
“Make Bellini look weak. Make you look incompetent.”
Not death.
Spectacle.
Humiliation.
The kind of violence that lingers long after blood dries.
I feel something cold settle behind my ribs.
“You thought you could breach my perimeter?” I ask softly.
“We just needed to see the response time.”
“And?”
He doesn’t answer.
I stand.
“Response complete,” I say.
Viktor nods once.
I walk away before the next sound.
I don’t need to hear it.
When I step back into the penthouse, controlled quiet has returned.
But it’s different now.
Alert.
Charged.
A guard sits at the kitchen island, shirt stripped halfway down, blood seeping from a shallow graze along his shoulder.
Dr. Petrova is on her knees beside him, efficient as always.
Vera kneels opposite her.
Thread between her fingers.
Needle steady.
I stop walking.
She doesn’t see me at first.
Her hands move with practiced calm, guiding the curved needle through torn skin.
“Breathe,” she tells the guard softly. “In. Out. That’s it.”
He obeys her without hesitation.
No shaking.
No trembling fingers.
Gunfire just cracked through the building.
She’s stitching flesh like she’s been doing it all her life.
Her hair has slipped loose from its tie. A strand brushes her cheek, and she ignores it, focused entirely on the wound.
“This will scar,” she murmurs. “But you’ll keep full mobility.”
Dr. Petrova glances up at me briefly.
“She insisted,” the doctor says dryly. “And she’s good.”
I know she’s good.
I saw it in the alley.
But this—
This is composure under threat.
The guard winces as Vera ties off the stitch.
“Hold pressure,” she instructs him, placing gauze carefully. “No heavy lifting for a few days.”
He nods.
“Thank you, ma’am.”
Ma’am.
Not hostage.
Not collateral.
Respect.
Vera stands and only then notices me watching.
Her expression doesn’t soften.
“Is he stable?” I ask.
“Yes,” she replies evenly. “You should rotate your perimeter guards more frequently. Fatigue slows reaction time.”
The audacity.
I almost smile.
“Noted.”
She wipes her hands clean, then looks directly at me.
“How many?”
“One neutralized,” I say.
“And the rest?”
“Escaped.”
Her jaw tightens.
“They were testing you.”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“And they learned.”
She studies me, searching for something.
Maybe humanity.
Maybe regret.
“You interrogated him,” she says.
“Yes.”
“Did he tell you why?”
“He did.”
“And?”
“They don’t need you dead,” I say quietly.
Her eyes sharpen.
“Then what?”
“They need you taken.”
A flicker of fear passes through her before she controls it.
“Why?”
“To parade you,” I answer. “Break you on camera.”
The words land heavily between us.
Her throat works once.
But she doesn’t crumble.
Instead, she says, “Then your war isn’t just with my father.”
No.
It isn’t.
I watch her carefully.
She isn’t calculating her own survival.
She’s thinking about optics.
Community fallout.
Consequence.
It reminds me of someone.
Luka.
The memory presses in unwanted and unwelcome.
He used to argue that power meant protection.
Not domination.
Vera moves past me to wash her hands again.
She doesn’t shrink when she brushes my sleeve.
Doesn’t recoil.
Just steady warmth where our arms nearly touch.
“You’re wrong about my father,” she says quietly.
I don’t answer immediately.
Because for the first time since I returned, doubt slips into the edges of certainty.
If Bellini ordered the leak, his daughter is an extraordinary actress.
Or he doesn’t know.
Either way, the city is accelerating beyond subtle maneuvering.
They marked her.
They tested my walls.
They want spectacle.
Fine.
I turn toward the security room.
“Viktor.”
He appears instantly.
“Boss.”
“Prepare the press floor.”
His eyebrows lift slightly.
“You’re certain?”
“Yes.”
Vera’s head snaps toward me.
“What are you doing?”
I look at her.
Really look at her.
Marked.
Targeted.
Steady as a surgeon in a war zone.
“They want you paraded?” I say evenly.
Her breath catches.
I turn back to Viktor.
“Then we move first.”
Viktor nods once.
I feel the decision lock into place like steel sliding into a chamber.
“We’re going public tonight.”