“Hey, wait, I didn’t even get to eat the lamb!” I protest, struggling as they drag me backward away from the table. “Offer still stands, Dato! Fruit basket! It works wonders!”
He doesn’t reply. But as the heavy doors shut between us, the silence he leaves behind feels heavier than any threat.
By the third day, he finds me in the garden and starts mocking my OnlyFans account, asking if Alexei even knows I’m here since there has been no rescue.
By the fourth day, I’m exploring the library when I hear voices in the sitting room. I peer around the corner and see Dato lounging on a sofa, aiming a gun at an apple balanced on a servant’s head. A younger man on the skinnier side is standing nearby, looking exhausted.
“Dato, this is ridiculous. You’re going to kill the man over a piece of fruit,” the younger man argues.
“This is practice, little brother. Steady hands are the only things that win wars,” Dato replies, his finger tightening on the trigger.
I let out a small, sharp gasp of horror, and Dato’s head snaps toward me instantly. His gun was still raised high, and a predatory grin spread across his face.
“Zoya, love. Come in and join us,” Dato says, gesturing with his free hand. “We were just having a little bit of fun.”
Chapter 7
Alexei
Artem Koval has been dodging a marriage contract for eleven years, but he finally runs out of luck in Kharkiv. I stand by the grimy-streaked window of the warehouse and watch him climb out of a black sedan that has seen better days. He has two guards with him, both useless. They stand there shivering as my men relieve them of their weapons at the door. Artem looks up at the building, his face the color of curdled milk, likely wondering whether he’s here for a meeting or an execution.
“Let’s get this over with,” I tell Viktor. “Bring him inside.”
The warehouse floor is an empty expanse of gray, save for a single wooden chair bolted to the concrete. Artem enters with my soldiers behind him, looking like a man who already knows he’s dead. He sits down, and his hands tremble against his thighs while I let the silence stretch until the weight of it forces him to look at the floor. I pull a cigarette from my pocket and light it, the flame a small flare in the dim room as I take a slow drag and exhale toward the rafters.
“Your security is non-existent, Artem,” I say finally. “And the Georgians are taking your shipments whenever they feel like it.”
Artem flinches at the mention of the name and wipes sweat from his upper lip. “Dato Janelidze is a vulture, Pakhan. He’s stolen three of my warehouses in a single month, and my buyers are walking away because I can’t guarantee a delivery. I need you to intervene before there is nothing left of my operation.”
“And why would I do that?” I ask, watching him through the smoke. “My father has been in the ground for six years, which makes the contract mine, and you have been a very poor businessman.”
“I tried to find her. I swear on my soul, I searched everywhere,” Artem insists, his voice rising in a desperate pitch. “She vanished, changing her name and scouring Poland and America to escape the life I built for her. I never imagined she would have the audacity to hide in Russia, especially not within the borders of your city.”
I begin to circle the chair, my footsteps a slow thud as I want him to feel me behind him. I have known Zoya has been in Moscow for five years, ever since my surveillance teams captured her face through a telephoto lens outside a government building. I watch her live her small life, letting her play at being a journalist while I make sure the darkest parts of my world don’t reach her doorstep. She’s getting too close to things she can’t handle, and I have spent years making sure she stays alive without her ever knowing I’m there.
“Your daughter was promised to me when she was fifteen years old,” I say, stopping directly behind him so he has to strain his neck to see me. “She was a bride for the Romanov heir in exchange for the weapons contracts, making you a very wealthy man.”
Artem is shaking so hard the chair rattles against the concrete floor, yet he still tries to defend his failure. “I did everything possible to satisfy the debt, Pakhan. If I could have delivered her on her twentieth birthday, I would have.”
“My father wanted your head for that insult,” I continue, walking back around to face him. “But I convinced him to be patient as I knew a girl like Zoya couldn’t hide forever.”
His head snaps up, hope and terror fighting for space in his eyes. “So now that you’ve found her, isn’t my debt paid?”
“Idiot. How is your debt paid when you’ve put zero effort into delivering my bride? Not only was she in my territory for five years without my knowledge, but she’s also taken up hobbies hardly fitting for a Romanov.”
I think of her lingerie streams, the way she performs for strangers, hunting for their tips. She thinks she ran away to escape an arrangement with the Germans, assuming that soft boy Erik is the monster under her bed. In reality, I’m the one who owns her, and her recent investigations into my business are pulling her too close to a war she isn’t prepared to fight.
“Stop crying, Artem, as business is never going to be usual again after you cost me five years of my life,” I tell him, leaning in until our knees are almost touching. “I found my wife myself, and I no longer feel the need to negotiate on half-deals with a man who couldn’t even control his own household.”
“The original deal is dead,” I continue. “And since I had to find my own bride, I’m adjusting the cost of my patience. I will be taking seventy percent of your total arms production from this moment on, and in exchange, I’ll provide the protection you’re begging for to keep the Georgians from raiding your ports while we proceed with the wedding preparations as originally planned.”
Artem’s eyes widen as he grips his knees with trembling hands. “Seventy percent is almost everything I have, Pakhan, and I’ll barely have enough left to keep the lights in the factories on or pay the workers.”
“Then you had better learn to work harder, as the alternative is me letting Dato finish what he started while I take Zoya anyway,” I reply, standing up to straighten the cuffs of my suit while I look down at his pathetic frame.
He shakes his head frantically with eyes wide with desperation. “No, no problem. Thank you for sparing my life, Pakhan. I’ll make sure the shipments are ready on the new schedule.”
“Good. You’ll be invited to the wedding, and I’m sure Zoya will be thrilled to see her father again after all these years.”