Chapter 2 working together

The silence between them grew heavy with tension. Outside the glass paneled balcony inferno vibrated with life. Music thudding, voices intertwining with the air like smoke. But, here in this isolated space there was only the gravity of two men who had spent years circling each other like predators.

Adrian Moretti had never trusted Nikolai Volkov.

And Nikolai had never provided him with a reason in the first place.

But now they have to set aside their distrust and work together. Their lives depended on it.

Adrian exhaled slowly and set his whiskey glass down with a clink. “Who else knows?”

Nikolai tilted his head slightly, considering the question. “No one outside my circle.”

“Which means what? Half the fucking bratva?”

Nikolai smirked. “I’m more selective than that, Moretti.”

Adrian looked at him absorbing the coolness in his stance and the way he rested back on the leather seat as if this was only another game for him. But Adrian wasn't an idiot, he knew the expression of a man who had already been playing chess for hours even before the opponent realized they were on the board.

"What have you got?" Adrian asked. His fingers drumming against the table.

Nikolai sighed, finally yielding. “A name. Or part of one.”

Adrian arched an eyebrow. “Go on.”

"Lazarov. Ring any bells?”

Adrian’s jaw clenched. It did.

Lazarov wasn’t a name,it was a ghost. A whisper from the underworld, a signature left behind when blood was spilled in ways that couldn’t be traced. It wasn’t a man, but a myth, someone people swore didn’t exist.

And yet, bodies always followed.

"Are you sure?" Adrian asked.

Nikolai nodded. "My men stopped a shipment last week. It was high quality guns. Not Italian, not Russian-Eastern European imports. And hidden in the manifests, there it was. Lazarov."

Adrian rubbed down his jaw, tension crawling through his shoulders. This was larger than he had estimated.

"And?" he asked.

"And," Nikolai said with an easy smile, "that shipment was intended for you."

Adrian froze.

"What?"

Nikolai observed him with an unreadable expression. "Your docks. Your men. That cargo was to go into Moretti hands. Instead, it was diverted. And someone wanted you to not find out."

Adrian's pulse thudded against his temple. The fact that someone had been able to divert an entire shipment from under his nose made his blood seethe.

"Who was on the dock?" he asked.

Nikolai leaned in, bracing his forearms on the table. "I'd say that's the question, don't you think? Someone in your household sold you out, Ace."

Adrian ignored how his old nickname rolled off Nikolai's tongue and how it shot a sharp crack of fire down his spine. He wasn't here to play games.

"If someone is pushing against us, why target you?" Adrian asked.

Nikolai's face turned serious. He said, "Because I got too close."

Adrian scowled. "Meaning?"

Nikolai exhaled a slow breath. He glanced at the whiskey bottle before grabbing it and serving himself a glass.

"I had a meeting scheduled," he confessed. "Someone in Budapest had some intel on Lazarov. A place, even. But before I arrived, the whole fucking building burned to the ground."

Adrian narrowed his eyes. "And you think they were expecting you?"

Nikolai chuckled darkly, stirring the amber colored liquid in his glass. "Oh, I'm sure they did. Because the only other man who was aware of the meeting was dead before I ever set foot in Hungary."

Adrian's thoughts were racing ahead, putting the pieces together. Whoever was behind this wasn't playing with power ,they were cutting loose ends off before anyone could get too close.

He didn't like it.

Didn't like how far it already went.

Didn't like how the sole man who seemed to be in the know was the one he could never quite rely on.

"So what now?" Nikolai asked, angling his glass toward him.

Adrian released a slow, controlled breath. "We locate Lazarov."

"And then what?"

Adrian's eyes locked with his, cold and unyielding. "We burn him to ashes."

A slow pleased smile curved onto Nikolai's mouth. "Now that's the Moretti I know."

Adrian didn't notice the way his stomach knotted.

This wasn't a partnership. It wasn't trust.

It was survival.

And when it was all over, only one of them would be standing...