Chapter 52
Gabriel
Sergei is restrained. Romano is contained. Cassio’s men dragged him out of the church like trash. The kind of violence that doesn’t need to prove itself.
Cassio did not kill him in front of witnesses. But I saw his eyes. Cold. Focused. Romano will not see another sunrise.
The bigger problem is the note.
Rafa hands it to me like it is radioactive. One sheet, folded, not Savannah’s handwriting. The interior of the car smells like leather and gun oil and cold air trapped inside when the door slammed.
Rafa sits in the passenger seat, still and alert, hands on his thighs like he is ready to move quickly.
Behind us, one of my men drives with both hands on the wheel, eyes flicking to mirrors and scanning intersections.
The city sounds leak in through the windows, tires on wet pavement, distant sirens, the faint thump of bass from somewhere.
I take the paper.
I open it.
YOU CAN WIN A CHURCH.
YOU CANNOT WIN A CITY.
No signature. No name. But I know the style. I know the arrogance. I know the way men like Mikhail think.
I stare at the paper until my jaw hurts, then fold it and slide it into my pocket like it is nothing. Because paper is not the threat. What it represents is.
It means they were close enough to touch Savannah, close enough to leave a message in her hand. Close enough to test our perimeter and laugh while doing it.
Rafa’s voice is low, careful. “You want it bagged?” he asks. “Evidence?”
“Later,” I say.
My tone comes out flat. My mind is the alley and the van and the sound Savannah’s breath made when the door opened. A sharp, vicious inhale like her body chose war.
Good.
That is my wife.
Rafa glances toward the back seat like he is checking for permission to say more. He chooses his words like a man walking across glass.
“She didn’t freeze,” he says. “She fought. She bit him. Hard.”
My throat tightens. I keep my eyes on the street ahead, but my vision is not the street. It is her mouth. Her teeth.
“Did she get hurt?” I ask.
“No,” Rafa says quickly. “Not hit. Not dragged inside the van. Bruise on her arm from contact. Her jaw is sore. Her hands were shaking.”
I nod once. My hand slides to the pocket where the paper is. The car turns and streetlights strobe across my knuckles.
My phone vibrates. Cassio.
I answer on the first ring.
“Sergei is alive,” Cassio says.
The background on his end sounds like movement, men talking low, footsteps, doors.
“He is alive for now,” I reply.
Cassio exhales once. He is the kind of man who can turn an exhale into a threat, and then he says the words that change everything.
“We are taking Mikhail’s daughter tonight.”
My body goes still. The plan. The Russian princess. It’s not just an idea anymore. It’s a young woman about to be taken alive and held.
Savannah knows.
“Cassio,” I say, voice low, “if you touch her wrong, you will start a war you cannot control.”
Cassio’s voice is flat. “I am controlling it.”
Then colder. “You wanted Mikhail blind.”
I taste the bitterness because he’s right. We said it. We planned it. We drew lines on maps and talked about the risks like we weren’t discussing a woman. But planning it is different when you have to hear it happening for real.
Hearing it means there is a girl somewhere who is still breathing like she thinks she is safe. Hearing it means Savannah might look at me later and see the same monster she used to fear, just wearing my name.
I swallow. My throat is dry.
“What are you going to do?” I ask.
Cassio pauses, long enough to mean this is already decided.
“Kidnap,” he says.
Simple. Italian. Brutal.
“And then,” Cassio continues, “we end this the only way men like Mikhail understand.”
My fingers curl tight around the phone. “What?”
Cassio’s voice drops. “A marriage.”
The word hits hard, not because I did not expect it, but because I did. This is what men like us do when we need a war to stop. We trade women. We trade bodies. We trade a womans life like its currency.
My chest clenches like the air got heavier.
I look out the window at the dark city, wet asphalt and neon signs flickering.
I think of Savannah in the safe room, her diary in her hands like a shield, her body shaking while her spine stayed straight. And I think of a Bratva princess, Mikhail’s daughter, about to learn what Savannah already knows.
That sometimes your life becomes a bargaining chip without your consent.
Cassio speaks again, sharp, cutting through my silence.
“This was the first attempt on your wife,” he tells me. “It will not be the last. So keep her close.”
Then he hangs up. The line goes dead.
The hum of the car feels louder than it should. The heater clicks again. The city keeps moving.
I sit there for a moment, still and silent. My jaw clenches. My tongue presses to the back of my teeth like I can hold the rage inside.
Rafa watches me from the passenger seat, careful. He knows better than to ask if I am okay. Okay is not a thing. Okay is a fairy tale.
I unlock my phone and text Luca one line.
WHERE.
His reply comes back instantly.
AIRFIELD. NOW.
The screen glow cuts across my knuckles. My hands look like they belong to someone else in that light. Someone who doesn’t hesitate. Someone who doesn’t regret.
My next breath tastes like iron.
I turn my head toward Rafa. “Change route,” I say.
Rafa doesn’t ask why. He just nods and leans forward, speaking to the driver in a low voice. The car shifts lanes, turns harder, and we move.
My mind flicks to Savannah. The image of her forehead pressed to my chest. The way she said it.
I did not disappear.
I feel something hot behind my ribs.
I pull out my phone again, not to call Cassio, not to call Luca. I call the safe house.
Juan answers. “Jefe.”
“Put her on,” I say.
A pause. A small rustle. Then Savannah’s voice, soft and raw, still shaking but holding.
“Gabriel.”
The sound of her saying my name hits my body like a drug. I close my eyes for half a second. Just half.
“That page,” I say. “It is in my pocket.”
“I know,” she whispers.
“You did good,” I tell her.
Silence, then the smallest inhale, like she is trying not to break.
“I bit him,” she says, almost like a confession.
My throat tightens. “I know. And I am proud of you.”
Her breath shudders.
“Listen to me,” I say, voice low and controlled. “You stay inside. You keep your diary. You do not let anyone touch it. You hear me?”
“Yes,” she whispers.
I open my eyes. Streetlights flicker over the windshield.
“I’m going to handle something,” I say.
Her voice tightens immediately. “Where are you going?”
I don’t lie to her. Lies are how people disappear.
“I’m moving,” I tell her. “I’ll come back.”
There is a beat where I can hear the room around her, soft footsteps, a door shifting, someone breathing nearby. She is not alone.
Then she says, quietly, “Keep me close.”
The words land hard because Cassio said the same thing, because she knows what it means.
I swallow. “I’m doing that,” I say. “Right now.”
Her voice drops even lower. “Do not let them trade another woman like paper.”
My chest goes tight. Because she is not asking. She is warning. She is showing me the line. And lines matter.
“I hear you,” I tell her. I mean it. I don’t know what I am going to do with it yet, but I hear her.
“Gabriel,” she whispers again. “I didn’t disappear.”
My fingers curl around the phone like it is the only solid thing in the world.
“No,” I say. “You didn’t.”
I end the call before my voice changes, before she hears the monster. Because she deserves the part of me that is safe, not the part of me that is about to go to an airfield and help kidnap a woman.
I put the phone down and touch the folded page in my pocket again.
YOU CAN WIN A CHURCH. YOU CANNOT WIN A CITY.
Mikhail is telling me the city belongs to him. He is telling me he can reach anywhere. He is telling me Savannah was a warning shot.
I stare out at the dark streets and see cameras on corners, cars pacing, windows that look empty but aren’t. This city isn’t neutral. Every street is part of the fight.
We survived the first trap. Now we set one.
And the cost is going to be a princess.
I lean forward slightly, voice low to Rafa and the driver and the men in the car with me.
“Airfield,” I say.
No other explanation. They don’t need it. They feel the shift. The car speeds up.
And in the back of my mind, one truth keeps repeating.
Somewhere in my house, Savannah breathes.
And I cannot let that change.
Not ever.