I hurled the phone at the far wall with everything I had.
It exploded on impact—plastic and glass shattering across the marble floor like shrapnel.
A sound tore out of my chest, raw and animal, echoing off the vaulted ceilings. I paced the room like a caged beast, hands fisting and unfisting, breath ragged, vision red.
How dare he.
How dare anyone dictate terms to me—Dmitri Volkov. The man who had clawed his way out of nothing. The man who had destroyed empires.
“Boss.”
Giovanni’s voice cut through the haze.
I whipped around, fury still blazing in my eyes. Giovanni stood in the doorway, tall and broad-shouldered, posture steady, unflinching as ever.
The scar along his cheek—earned in a knife fight we’d survived together years ago—pulled slightly as his jaw tightened. He wasn’t afraid of me. Never had been.
“What?” I snapped.
He held up a tablet, expression neutral but eyes sharp. “We found them.”
My pulse stuttered. “Found who?”
“Marco and Isabella.”
Penelope’s parents.
The names hung in the air like a promise and a curse.
For years—years—I’d had my people scouring the globe.
Bribes. Blackmail. Ghost accounts. Dead drops. We’d hacked government systems, leaned on traffickers, turned informants inside out from New York to Eastern Europe. And now—
A dark, vicious satisfaction coiled in my gut.
“Where?” I asked.
“Brooklyn,” Giovanni replied. “Different names. Low profile. But it’s them. We’re certain.”
I didn’t hesitate. “I’ll handle them personally. Capture them. Prepare to send them over.”
Giovanni’s fingers tightened on the tablet. “That’s where it gets complicated. New U.S. government policies are cracking down hard on extraditions and cross-border operations. Transporting them here would light up every system we’ve avoided for years.”
He hesitated, then added carefully, “We may have to go there and deal with it cleanly.”
“We?” I echoed, arching a brow.
He met my gaze without flinching. “No. You’re right. You go. I’ll hold the fort here. I know the operations inside out.”
Then, quieter: “But boss—be careful. New York isn’t our territory anymore.”
I waved him off, the decision already made. “You stay. Manage things here. Keep Lake Como stable.”
I turned away, already calculating flight times, routes, contingencies.
“I’ll fly to New York tomorrow,” I said coldly. “And I’ll end this chapter myself.”
Giovanni nodded once. He didn’t argue. He never did when my voice took that tone.