Chapter 2 – Roman
“Who the hell are you?”
The words leave my mouth before I even think. My voice bounces off the steel and marble, low, sharp, filling the storage room with something heavier than sound.
I freeze in the doorway, staring at the woman half-swallowed by shadows.
She shouldn’t be here. No one should.
According to intel, the museum was supposed to be empty. This was a clean run—get in, intercept the stolen art pieces tied to David Chang’s laundering network, and ghost out before anyone knew I existed. No noise. No witnesses.
Yet here she is.
A woman in a luxurious coat, her hair messy like she’s been running her hands through it, her chest rising and falling too fast. There’s something clutched in her hand—papers, maybe—and her eyes are wide, flicking toward the crates behind her.
She’s not security. And she’s definitely not one of Chang’s men.
So who the hell is she?
She looks like she’s in shock at first—frozen, pale, eyes wide.
But the moment I shut the door behind me and step closer, the air shifts. The fear in her gaze burns away, replaced by something sharp and stubborn. Defiance.
My instincts flare instantly. I’ve seen too many operatives wear that same look before pulling a gun or pressing a detonator.
I move before she can react—three strides, quick and precise. My hand clamps around her wrist just as she tries to shove the papers into her coat pocket. Her skin is warm against my palm, her pulse hammering so fast I can feel it through my gloves.
“What are you stealing?” I demand, my voice cutting through the still air like glass.
Her chin snaps up like a challenge. “I’m not stealing anything.”
The words are brittle, but they don’t hide the tremor beneath them.
I snatch the manifest from her fingers and flip through it with one practiced glance.
The destination codes are wrong—deliberately rewritten.
Whoever taught her to do this knows what they’re doing. Whoever she is, she’s not an idiot.
Up close, I see the details I missed in the doorway: hair the color of lacquer, pulled into a messy knot; skin that should be delicate but is set in a line of hardened defiance; eyes shaped like almonds and black as a storm.
Darkness surrounds us, but a slight feeling of familiarity itches my brain. I shut it down.
Something in me tightens—not interest, not yet, but the cold, precise recognition of a complication. This isn’t a stray courier or a complicit clerk. This is somebody with nerve. Somebody useful. And she’s complicating my clean record. I must take her with me.
“Listen to me,” I say slowly, my voice going low on purpose.
“You just rewired a shipment that’s worth more than your life.
If you’re playing at sabotage for thrills, you’re very bad at it.
If you’re doing it because someone told you to—because you were told you had no other choice—then you’re still trouble, but a different kind. ”
She squares her shoulders. “You don’t get to decide that.”
I let the corner of my lip lift. “No. But I do get to take you somewhere quiet and find out who taught you to forge manifests.”
She opens her mouth to argue again, but my hand moves from her wrist to her waist, pulling her flush against me before she can take another breath.
Her body stiffens, but I feel the quick thud of her heart against my chest. She’s trembling, yet her eyes—dark, sharp, furious—never waver.
She pushes at me, small hands flat against my chest, but I don’t budge. I hold her there, steady, unyielding.
“You’re coming with me,” I murmur, my voice low enough to vibrate between us.
The words roll off my tongue like a promise I intend to keep.
“Like hell I am!”
Before she can argue, I press the silencer’s muzzle to her ribs. Her body jerks, eyes going wide, but she doesn’t beg. She just glares up at me, jaw tight, lips trembling with words she refuses to say.
Good. Let her hate me. Hate keeps people alive.
I tighten my grip and drag her out of the storage room. She freezes the moment she spots the men waiting in the corridor.
“They’re mine,” I say gruffly against her ear, my breath brushing her skin.
She stiffens but doesn’t resist this time. My men stand alert along the dim hallway, their gazes flicking to her and then back to me. I don’t slow down. I just keep pulling her forward, her steps tripping to match mine.
Dragging her into the shadows of the museum, I shove open the service exit and pull her through.
Luka slips in right behind us, letting the heavy steel door close with a dull thud that swallows the outside noise.
The tunnel stretches ahead, long and dimly lit, lined with concrete walls and flickering fluorescent bulbs. It smells of dust, metal, and old rain.
Her breath comes in sharp bursts beside me, echoing faintly off the walls. She’s trembling again—but not the kind of trembling I recognize from fear. It’s anger. Pure, molten defiance. I can feel it burning through her skin as my hand clamps around her arm.
Luka’s boots scrape softly behind us. “Boss,” he mutters, scanning the length of the corridor. “Cameras come back on in ten.”
“Good,” I reply without looking back. “We’ll be out of here by then.”
I push her forward, forcing her to walk. She stumbles once but doesn’t fall, doesn’t plead. Just keeps moving with her jaw clenched, shoulders rigid with pride she can’t afford right now.
We walk for several seconds, the hum of the overhead lights buzzing like flies. My mind runs through possibilities—Chang’s connections, the altered manifests, this girl who clearly doesn’t belong here yet acts like she owns the damn place.
When we reach the midway point of the tunnel, I nod at Luka. “Tie her hands.”
Luka steps forward, looping the zip tie around her wrists. The plastic bites, and she winces but refuses to make a sound. I almost admire it. Almost.
“Everyone retreat. We’ll find our way out,” I tell Luka. “Perimeter sweep, then meet me back at the safe house.”
He nods and falls back as we keep moving toward the faint sliver of moonlight spilling through the other end of the tunnel.
It’s a long walk, the kind that stretches your thoughts. I can hear the quiet rhythm of her breathing beside mine, uneven and furious. When I glance down, her eyes catch mine—black, sharp, alive.
“You’ll regret this,” she snaps at me.
I don’t answer. I only tighten my hold on her arm; the leather of my glove bites into her skin, and she winces, jaw clenching like she’s swallowing a scream.
Good. Stubborn. Fire in the wrong place.
I let that thought sit a moment, savoring the shape of it—annoyance, distraction, the tiny, dangerous thrill that comes when something refuses to break.
Finally, we reach the end of the tunnel, and I dig through my pocket for the key. The lock turns with a metallic whisper. I push the door open, and we burst into the cold night air.
It’s brighter out here. The sodium lamps throw hard light across wet pavement, and when I look at her, the recognition lands clean and sharp.
Elara Chang.
The name slides into my mind with a click: number one New York museum art restorer, Chang’s daughter and only child. The press images I’d flipped through last week rearrange themselves into a live person in front of me.
I’ve seen her a few times before, always in passing. The last time I saw her was at Lev and Sasha’s wedding. Never have I been this close to her.
Snowflakes cling to her lashes. Her hair glows black against the streetlight. The set of her mouth is granite. She doesn’t look like someone who’s about to collapse; she looks like someone who’s already planned how to come back from one.
“You’re in deep shit,” I say, swallowing the name. Silence thickens for a beat as it settles between us. Her eyes flick—anger, calculation—then she squares her shoulders as if the name should hurt her, but doesn’t.
“And who are you?” she asks.
Of course she doesn’t know me. My superpower has always been invisibility.
Despite being a Rusnak, I’ve never wanted the limelight—or the kind of power that comes with the family name. I prefer the shadows. The field. The work. That’s where the truth lives. Half the time, I don’t even use the name Rusnak unless I need it to open doors or make people flinch.
So no, it’s no surprise she doesn’t recognize me, even though she moves in the same circles.
“Who are you?” she asks again, harsher this time, voice slicing through the cold.
“No one you should worry your head about,” I respond.
In the darkness beyond, Luka and the others pile into the jeep and speed off into the night.
We’ve already subdued the museum security with tranquilizers, nothing permanent.
So I’m not worried about pursuit. Still, Luka warned that the cameras would come back online in a few minutes. We’re out of time.
I drag her toward the black SUV idling a few feet away, engine humming low. She stumbles once but keeps pace, her chin lifted like she refuses to give me the satisfaction of seeing her fall.
“My car is here,” she says, her dark eyes finding mine. “I need to grab—”
“One more word,” I cut her off, shoving the door open. “And tape’s going over your mouth.”
She snaps her mouth shut instantly, fury burning across her face. I almost smile. She slides to the far end of the seat, spine stiff, gaze fixed out the window like she can will herself free.
I climb in beside her and shut the door. My driver—a silent, broad-shouldered man—glances at me through the rearview mirror.
“Drive,” I say.
The SUV lurches forward, tires biting into the wet asphalt as the museum disappears in the rearview mirror, swallowed by the dark.
The night has just turned out better than I expected. I’d gone in to track the shipments, maybe intercept a few crates and extract intel, but instead, I walked out with the manifests I’d been hunting and David Chang’s daughter in my backseat.
Absolutely incredible.
For years, I’ve had Chang under watch. His name’s been floating around the Bratva’s radar like a mosquito that won’t die—annoying, small, but persistent enough to warrant attention.
We let him slide for a long time, let him play with his black-market art schemes and money laundering as long as he stayed out of our way.
But lately, he’s gotten bold. His shipments have begun crossing into Bratva territory, and his clients—some of whom used to be ours—have begun switching allegiance.
David Chang thinks he’s powerful. He thinks his name, his money, and his foreign investors make him untouchable.
He doesn’t realize he’s nothing but a cockroach compared to the Rusnaks.
And now, his only daughter is sitting three feet away from me, arms tied, glaring out the window like she’d stab me if she could.
A slow grin creeps across my face.
This just got personal.
There’s no better time to have leverage against David Chang than tonight.
He’s currently hosting a dinner that’s already buzzing through the underworld; rumor has it the night will end with an auction that will cement his power with foreign buyers.
Intel on the event is scarce, which only confirms what my gut says: Whatever they’re selling is high value.
Look at the men in the room, and there’s no doubt.
They aren’t collectors. They’re high-value buyers who traffic in things that don’t belong on public walls.
That’s why I chose tonight to follow the shipment.
I wanted to see the route, the players, the way they move, the little signatures of a laundering operation.
I wanted proof. I wanted to know which ports Chang uses, which couriers he trusts, which men take the crates the moment the manifests go quiet.
Instead, the trail led me to her. Elara Chang—sharp, stubborn, dangerous in her refusal to be small—got caught in my operation like a live wire. She isn’t only a piece of paper with forged destinations; she’s a connector. She’s blood and memory and bargaining power all wrapped in a single person.
Now she’s mine. That changes the map. With her pressed against the Rusnak ledger, I can force David’s hand without firing the first shot.
I can make him sweat for answers—where the crates disappear, which shell companies collect the payments, who in his network is expendable.
I can pull threads and watch the whole tapestry start to unravel.
And because he thinks he’s untouchable while he parades his trophies at dinner, he’ll be careless. He’ll speak. He’ll let his guard down.
After all, Elara is his heir. His only child. His legacy.
None of this is neat. Holding a person is messy, and leveraging family ties is uglier than any gunfight.
But it’s effective. I feel the old calm settle in the space behind my ribs—the part of me that plans, that counts, that converts chaos into inevitable outcomes.
Tonight, I don’t just want answers. I want a confession, a concession, a rupture in Chang’s little empire.
Elara is the key. How I use her will decide whether this becomes a chess move that ends his reach or the spark that lights everything on fire.