Page 123 of Before Broken Vows
"Give me a hand," I tell Dimitri.
Together, with some of our men, we tear away the drywall, exposing a solid steel door with no visible handle on our side. A room built to keep people like us out.
"Now what?" Dimitri asks, stepping back.
I examine the door. "There has to be a release mechanism somewhere in this office. Something that would open it from this side in case of emergency."
We tear the office apart, searching for anything that might open the door. I flip the desk, empty drawers onto the floor, pull books from shelves.
Nothing.
Then my hand brushes against something under one of the frames of a painting. A small button.
I press it.
A clicking sound comes from the wall, and part of the metal door shifts slightly.
I run over and jam my fingers into the small gap that's appeared and pull. The door is heavy, but slowly it starts to move.
"Come on out, you fucker," Dimitri says, gun pointing at the door.
The door opens and I hear a whimpering sound from inside.
The panic room is small, maybe ten feet square, with a cot, a small refrigerator, and a monitoring system that shows every room in the house. On one of the screens, I can see my own men moving through the lower level, stepping over bodies.
And there, in the corner, is Cosmo Kouris.
He's sweating profusely, wearing only underwear. His hand trembles as he points a gun directly at us. His face is pale, eyes wide with terror.
"Stay back!" he shouts, voice cracking. "I'll shoot! I swear to God, I'll shoot!"
Dimitri laughs. "You think that little gun scares us?" He steps forward. "Look how many guns are on you. You even try to fire that and you're dead."
Cosmo closes his eyes and fires. The bullet whizzes past Dimitri's ear and embeds itself in the wall behind us.
"That's one," I say calmly. "How many more do you think you have before one of us puts a bullet between your eyes?"
Normally I would have just killed him, but we need him.
Cosmo adjusts his grip on the gun, trying to steady it. "You're making a mistake," he says. "Do you know who I am? Who I work with?"
"We know exactly who you are," I say. "Minister of Infrastructure. Member of Parliament. Murderer."
"Murderer? You break into my home, kill my security, and you call me a murderer?"
I step closer, ignoring the gun. "You funded the Athenian Warriors. You ordered the hit on my father. You tried to take my son."
"Your son?" Confusion flashes across his face. "What are you talking about?"
"Don't play dumb," Dimitri snaps. "We found the ledger. We have the bank accounts. We know everything."
Cosmo's eyes dart to the monitors, perhaps looking for a way out. There isn't one.
"Listen to me," he says, lowering the gun slightly. "Whatever you think you know, you're wrong. I'm just a middleman. I was just following orders. Money, okay? It was only about money. Nothing personal. Some people didn't like how we were making it. So?—"
"Like my father?" Dimitri yells.
"Whose orders?" I demand.
