Chapter 2 - The Ghost of the Estate
The hidden corridor was suffocatingly narrow.
Silas followed the shadow of his housekeeper, watching her move with the fluid, lethal grace of a trained operative. Every step she took was measured. Every corner she cleared was executed with military precision.
She wasn't a rival mobster. She was a professional.
“My security detail,” Silas whispered as they descended a spiral iron staircase into the depths of the estate. “Fifty men. Handpicked.”
“Dead,” Nadia replied without looking back. “Or bought. Julian poisoned the well three months ago. He doubled their salaries with Volkov money. The ones who wouldn't take the bribe are bleeding out in the courtyard right now.”
Silas closed his eyes.
Thirty years of power, dismantled from the inside by the boy he had raised.
They reached the heavy oak door that led into the wine cellar. Nadia pressed her ear against the wood. She held up a closed fist.
Stop.
She raised two fingers.
Two men.
Nadia looked at Silas. She handed him a sleek, black combat knife she pulled from an ankle sheath.
“I take the one on the left. You take the right. Silent. If a gun goes off, fifty men will swarm this basement.”
Silas gripped the handle of the blade. It had been a decade since he had done his own wet work. He was a king, accustomed to ordering deaths from behind a desk. But the grip of the knife felt familiar. Like an old, dark friend.
Nadia silently turned the brass handle.
She kicked the door open and moved like lightning.
The two men in the wine cellar barely had time to turn. They were heavily armed, wearing tactical gear with the Volkov insignia patched onto their shoulders.
Nadia didn't hesitate. She lunged at the man on the left, driving her knee into his chest and wrapping her arm around his throat in a flawless chokehold, snapping his neck with a sickening crunch before he could pull his trigger.
Silas moved on instinct.
The man on the right raised his rifle. Silas batted the barrel away with his left forearm, stepping into the man’s guard. He drove the combat knife upward, sliding the blade between the ribs and piercing the heart.
The man’s eyes went wide. Silas clamped a hand over his mouth, lowering the dying mercenary silently to the cold stone floor.
He pulled the blade free and wiped it on the man’s tactical vest.
He looked over at Nadia. She was already dragging her target behind a rack of vintage Bordeaux.
“Not bad for an old wolf,” she muttered.
“Who sent you, Nadia?” Silas asked, his breathing heavy.
“My name is Elena Rostova,” she said, stripping the mercenary of his spare magazines. “My father was Alexei Rostov. You shot him in the chest twenty-two years ago in front of me.”
Silas froze.
Alexei Rostov. The former head of the Russian syndicate.
“You’re a Volkov,” Silas realized.
“I was a Volkov,” she corrected. “Until Julian made a deal with my uncle to take your throne. My uncle ordered me to stand down so Julian could have the glory. But I don’t take orders from men who betray their own blood.”
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She racked the slide of her pistol.
“We have a common enemy tonight, Silas. Tomorrow, we can kill each other. But right now, we need a car.”
