Page 28 of Crimson Curse
Monaco. Where Lucien built his empire on the bones of better men. Where old alliances died and new hatreds were born. Melor Kozlov owes me nothing, but he owes Lucien everything, including a scar that runs from his collarbone to his wrist.
“This concerns our mutual friend,” I continue.
Silence rolls across the ocean. Then, “How mutual?”
“He killed two of mine tonight. Sent me a photograph to commemorate it.”
Another pause. “What do you need?”
“Everything you have. Movement, contacts, patterns. I want to know what he eats for breakfast and which side of the bed he sleeps on.”
“This kind of information isn't free,moy droog.”
“Name your price.”
“Montreal shipping rights. Full access, no interference.”
The request strikes like a hammer. Montreal represents millions in annual revenue and connections that took a decade to establish. But some prices are worth paying.
“Done.”
“I'll have something for you within forty-eight hours,” Melor assures.
The line goes dead. The first piece falls into place. Lucien thinks he’s untouchable. He's about to learn otherwise.
I spend the rest of the morning making similar calls, pulling threads that stretch across continents, awakening debts and alliances that have slumbered for years. Each conversation costs me something—money, territory, and favors that will need to be repaid—but the network takes shape. By noon, I have eyes in Monaco, Paris, Miami, New York, and Chicago.
The sun climbs higher, burning away the last shadows of night. My office now smells like coffee and determination, rather than smoke and failure. The fragment of the plaque still sits on my desk, but it no longer looks like a weapon turned against me. Now it looks like the promise of retribution.
When late afternoon finally arrives, the house empties. My men return to their families, their apartments, and their own methods of processing what we've lost. Lex offers to stay, but I dismiss him with a shake of my head. Certain types of grief require solitude.
I make my way to the gym in the basement, a space carved from concrete and necessity. Heavy bags hang from reinforced beams, weights sit in perfect rows, and the air holds the permanent smell of sweat and iron. This is where I come when words aren't enough, and the civilized veneer needs to be stripped away.
I wrap my hands methodically, the ritual as familiar as breathing. Cotton and leather, wound tight enough to protect the bones but loose enough to feel the impact. The heavy bag waits, solid and patient, ready to absorb whatever I need to give it.
The first punch lands clean, a sharp crack that echoes off the walls. The second follows immediately, then the third. I find my rhythm, left hook followed by right cross, combinations that my body knows by heart. Each impact drives deeper, harder, until the bag swings on its chain and my shoulders burn.
Sergei's face appears in my mind. The way he laughed at crude jokes, and the pride in his voice when he talked about his children. Gone. Reduced to nothing by Lucien's need to send a message.
The punches come faster now. The bag protests under the assault, the leather creaking and the chain rattling. My knuckles begin to ache despite the wrapping, but the pain feels honest.
Anton next. Quiet, dependable Anton, who never missed a shift and never complained about the cold during winter watches. Who sent money home to his mother and saved the rest for a future that will never come. Dead because I built something worth destroying.
I throw combinations now without conscious thought, muscle memory taking over where reason fails. Left hook, right uppercut, straight cross. The bag gives ground with each impact, swinging wider, the chain groaning overhead.
The wrapping on my right hand begins to loosen. The leather underneath grows damp with sweat and blood. I don't care. The bag becomes every enemy I've ever faced, and every threat I've failed to eliminate before it could strike back. It becomes Lucien's face, smug and calculating, watching his bombs tear apart my world.
The rage builds like pressure in a sealed container, demanding release. I give it everything. Grief for the dead, fury at the living, hatred for my own failures. The bag shudders under the assault, the seams straining, and the filling rolling inside the leather shell.
Then something gives way with a sound like thunder. The bag splits down the middle, sand pouring out in a gray cascade that covers the floor like snow. I stand there breathing hard, my hands screaming, watching the evidence of my rage spilling across the concrete. But the pressure inside remains. The grief hasn't diminished. If anything, it's grown larger and hungrier, demanding more than physical violence can provide.
I look down at my hands. The wrapping has come completely loose on the right, revealing knuckles that are split and bleeding. The left isn't much better. Blood drips onto the scattered sand, dark spots in the gray.
This is what Lucien's message has done. He's awakened something in me that has been sleeping since Sasha died but remembers what it means to lose everything and still find the strength to take revenge.
The bag lies in pieces, destroyed but not defeated. Like my men tonight, the warehouse, and everything Lucien touches. But destruction isn't the end of the story. It's just the beginning of the next chapter.
I walk to the sink in the corner and run cold water over my hands, watching the blood swirl down the drain. The cuts will heal, but scars will remain. And every time I look at them, I'll remember this moment. Lucien Antonov wanted to send me a message. Tomorrow, I'll begin sending him one in return. And unlike his bombs and photographs, mine will be written in a language he'll never forget.
