Chapter 34 - Oksana
That night…
Night in Caracas settles like a velvet noose. Still. Heavy. Waiting.
We stand in the jungle-dark perimeter around Valverde’s hillside compound, a sprawling villa tucked between cliffs and palms, lit by mirrored pools and armed arrogance.
Or at least, it was lit.
Until Sasha triggered the EMP.
A pulse ripples through the air, silent, invisible, but powerful enough to make every hair on my arms stand up. Within the blink of an eye, the entire estate goes black.
Lights die.
Cameras blink out.
Phones crash, all but ours, snug and safe in their little Faraday cases.
Security systems flatline.
Exactly like Aurelio did to Raf.
"Show-off," I murmur to Sasha.
He smirks behind his mask. "I learned from the best."
The darkness feels alive now. Predatory. A perfect veil for the storm we’re about to unleash. They know we're coming.
Behind me, Massimo checks a rifle that looks like it fell off the back of a military convoy. Raf cleans his knives with a quiet calm that should terrify any sane person. Stephano stands a few steps ahead—tall, still, focused—his soldiers forming a tight diamond around him.
I'm not mad at him any longer—how can I be when I won?—but we had a small… disagreement a few hours ago. Stephano wanted me behind a computer. He said I was so good at coordinating and directing.
Flatterer.
It didn't get him anywhere because we all knew what he really meant: Safe.
I told him no.
He said my staying back was non-negotiable.
I told him to stop trying to put me in a glass cage.
He told me he wasn’t putting me anywhere; he was keeping me alive.
As if I don’t keep myself alive.
As if I haven’t been keeping Grigori alive since he became Pakhan.
As if someone like me could ever be tucked away behind a screen.
But he said it with that quiet desperation that comes from loving someone he knows he could lose.
And damn him, it softened me. It still softens me now, standing beside him in the dark as the night holds its breath.
That was our compromise, we stay close to each other.
The compound below us is now fully blind.
No lights.
No alarms.
No chatter on radios.
They know we're coming.
We know they know.
Perfect.
We turn our night vision on. The little device sits tightly on my forehead.
"Positions," Massimo murmurs after we all pull out our radios from our Faraday cases.
The Vegas Don is terrifying when he’s serious, and right now, he’s carved from stone. He moves to cover our flank, rifle raised. Raffael is already gone, a shadow slipping into the leaves. Sasha signals with two fingers: path clear ahead. Stephano gives a single nod, jaw tight with resolve.
Then we move.
The descent down the ridge is silent except for the faint scuff of boots and the distant hum of generator backup systems struggling to reboot.
My breath fogs in the humidity. The air smells like wet metal and tropical rot.
I stay close to Stephano’s left, mercifully quiet as I keep eyes on his blind spot.
I’ve seen him fight before—I’ve seen him bloodied, feral, furious.
But tonight? Tonight, he’s something else.
Cold.
Precise.
Silent as a blade sliding out of its sheath.
He isn’t unleashing himself; he’s containing himself. Somehow that's worse. Because I know what full fury looks like. This isn't it, this is contained fury, this… this is wrath.
We approach the north ridge patrol, where we find four guards, bright halos on my night vision, scrambling in the dark, tapping useless radios.
Stephano lifts two fingers. Our soldiers split around him like he’s water and they’re trained to flow.
He doesn’t hesitate. One moment, he’s standing beside me.
Next, he’s gliding forward, a shadow swallowing another shadow.
He snatches the first guard by the collar, a hand over the man’s mouth, and drags him into the shrubbery with a crack of vertebrae.
The other three whirl, guns up, panicked. They never get a chance to fire. Stephano is on them like a hurricane, slitting their throats before I even have a chance to step forward. He turns back to us, moving without anger. Without flourish. Without even breathing hard.
And I…
I admire him.
Not the brutality, that's familiar. No, what steals something from my chest is the utter control with which he moves, the calm. The exactness. This isn’t rage. This is craft.
"Holy fuck," Massimo mutters behind me. "You married that?"
"Jealous?" I whisper.
He snorts. "Terrified."
Stephano wipes his blade on a guard’s sleeve without looking back. Sasha meets my eyes and nods once in a show of respect toward my husband. That’s rare. He respects few men, none outside Russia.
But Stephano earns it with every lethal inch he moves.
Raf reappears from the dark, as casual as a man emerging from a shower. "One guard tower down. Two left."
Stephano nods. "We take the west side first. They’ll bottleneck there once they realize we’re inside. Sasha, left flank. Oksana—" I raise a brow. He corrects himself before finishing what he was about to say. "Right flank."
Better.
I move.
The closer we get to the villa, the thicker the tension becomes, like humidity pressing against my bones. Gunfire crackles somewhere below, followed by shouts and footsteps scrambling for higher ground.
"They’re regrouping," Massimo whispers.
"They’re panicking," I correct.
"Good."
We round the terrace garden, a narrow choke-point lined with bougainvillea vines and decorative stone pillars. Perfect place for an ambush.
Stephano slows. I know that stance. He’s sensing something.
Suddenly, a single guard charges out of the dark, blade raised.
I barely lift my gun before Stephano steps in and disarms the man with a wrist twist so clean it looks choreographed. A palm strike to the sternum.
The guard collapses, wheezing. Stephano knocks him out with the butt of the gun, silent as a ghost.
"Not bad, Conti," I whisper.
He glances at me over his shoulder.
"Trying to impress you," he murmurs back.
My stomach flips. "It's working," I admit.
Massimo groans. "Please shoot me."
"Keep talking," Raf says, "I might."
We keep moving.
The inner courtyard opens before us, moonlit, vast, lined with tall arches and broken fountains. A perfect kill zone. And waiting at the far side, stepping into the moonlight with a rifle slung over his shoulder, smirking like a man standing in his living room, is Silvestre.
Gunshots, yelling, and screaming can be heard in the back, our soldiers hashing it out with what's left of Silvestre's crew. He spreads his arms, mock-grand. "Welcome, friends."
Stephano stiffens. Massimo snarls low in his throat. Raf’s eyes go flat. Silvestre’s gaze slides to me. He stands under the moonlight with his rifle lazily pointed our way, like this is a negotiation instead of an execution waiting to happen.
Before Stephano or Raf can speak, Massimo pushes past all of us, fury radiating off him in waves.
"Where is my son?" he demands.
Silvestre lifts his gun; the barrel holds steady as it settles against Massimo’s chest. His men tighten around him, metal whispering from holsters, safeties clicking off. The night compresses, breath held by too many killers in too small a space.
"I have no beef with you, Manetti." Silvestre narrows his eyes.
Massimo’s smile is gone. Whatever calculation he walked in with burned off the second Silvestre spoke.
"You have my son," Massimo snaps.
Silvestre blinks. Not the fake kind. Real confusion creases his brow, the momentary slack of a man blindsided by a language he didn’t know he spoke. "Your… what?"
Massimo steps forward, uncaring that the muzzle presses harder into his chest. His jaw is clenched so tight I can hear his teeth grinding. "Senator Kingsley’s grandson," he spits. "And his son-in-law."
The air shifts. I watch the truth land in Silvestre’s eyes in stages: confusion, then recognition, then something dangerously close to horror.
"Massimo," Silvestre pronounces carefully, each word laid like a brick meant to reinforce a collapsing wall. "I swear to you, I had no idea."
Gunfire rattles somewhere deeper in the compound: short, sharp bursts. A reminder that time is bleeding out around us.
Massimo waits until the echo fades. Then he laughs. Once. Low. Empty. "Why the fuck would that matter to me?" he growls.
The movement is sudden. Massimo draws, fast and violent, the barrel of his gun slamming against Silvestre’s forehead hard enough to snap his head back an inch. No hesitation. No warning. Just raw intent.
"You took my son," Massimo snarls. "That’s the only part of this story that counts."
Stephano moves at the same time.
"Don’t," he snarls, stepping in, his gun coming up, pressed tight to the side of Massimo’s head. "He’s mine."
Oh shit. Here we go. I knew the truce was too good to be true.
I just thought it would last longer than five minutes.
My weapon comes up, sights locking on Massimo’s chest. Raf mirrors me instantly, his gun trained, expression carved from stone.
Across the room, Massimo’s men react on instinct—Gabe, one of his capos, first, then the others—barrels swinging our way in a deadly, synchronized arc.
The air goes razor-thin. One twitch. One breath too loud.
And this area becomes a slaughter ground.
Silvestre stands frozen between guns and gods, sweat beading at his temple where Massimo’s barrel kisses skin. "Everyone," he starts, voice tight. "Everyone—"
"Shut up," Massimo snaps, never taking his eyes off him. "You don’t get to talk your way out of this."
Stephano's finger tightens, a tremor of rage he barely reins in. "You pull that trigger," he says coldly, "and you die with him."
Massimo doesn’t flinch. "Then we all bleed."