Page 102 of Knuckles & Knives
“No,” I interrupt, standing with the kind of decisive energy that means I’ve made a choice they won’t like. “Marina Volkov knows me better than Cross ever did. She helped raise me, taught me, shaped my thinking from childhood. If I don’t face her, she’ll keep manipulating events from the shadows until she destroys everything we’ve built.”
“Then we all go,” Axel says immediately.
“She specifically said come alone.”
“Since when do we follow enemy instructions?” Dom asks with dark humor.
“Since those enemies demonstrate the ability to eliminate everyone I love,” I reply. “Marina isn’t bluffing. She has resources we haven’t identified, connections we don’t understand, and five years of preparation we’re only beginning to comprehend.”
“So what’s the plan?” Marcus asks, his analytical mind already shifting into tactical mode.
“I go to the greenhouse at midnight as instructed,” I say slowly, thinking up the plan as I voice it aloud. “But “Axel ghosts the perimeter, provides reconnaissance and backup extraction. Marcus maintains overwatch from electronic surveillance, monitors all communications. Dom positions for rapid intervention if things go badly. Kieran coordinates with federal contacts, ensures legal support if we need it.”
“And you walk into a trap,” Dom says flatly.
“I walk into the final confrontation with someone who’s been manipulating my life since childhood,” I correct. “Someone who needs to be faced, defeated, and eliminated as a threat.”
“What if she kills you?” Axel asks bluntly.
“Then you avenge me and build something better from what’s left,” I reply, “but she won’t kill me, not immediately. Marina’s too proud, too invested in proving her intellectual superiority. She’ll want to explain her plan, demonstrate her tactical genius, make me understand how thoroughly I’ve been outmaneuvered.”
“Her mistake,” Marcus observes.
“Exactly. Marina taught me strategy, but she also taught me patience. She’ll expect the impulsive young woman she knew five years ago. She won’t be prepared for who I’ve become.”
The drive to Vincent’s estate takes forty-three minutes through city streets that hold too many memories. I remember visiting the greenhouse as a child, learning about rare plants and careful cultivation while Marina explained how growing power required the same patience and attention to detail.
Now, as I approach the glass structure illuminated by moonlight, I understand that she was teaching me about herself—the kind of person who could wait years for the perfect moment to claim what she believed she deserved.
“All teams in position,” Dom reports through my earpiece. “Thermal shows one heat signature in the greenhouse, possibly two more in the main house.”
“Electronic surveillance active,” Marcus adds. “I have eyes on all approaches, communication intercepts running.”
“Perimeter secure,” Axel confirms. “No visible backup, but that doesn’t mean much with someone this careful.”
“Federal assets on standby,” Kieran concludes. “Thirty-minute response time if we need official intervention.”
I take a deep breath, checking my weapons one final time before approaching the greenhouse door. Marina Volkov has been the invisible hand guiding events for five years, the puppet master pulling strings while others took risks and faced consequences.
Tonight, that ends.
The greenhouse door opens at my touch, revealing an interior that looks exactly as I remember from childhood—exotic plants arranged with artistic precision, temperature and humidity controlled to perfect specifications, the scent of roses heavy in the recycled air.
“Hello, little birdie.”
Marina Volkov emerges from behind a display of climbing roses, and the years fall away like shed skin. She’s older now, her dark hair touched with silver, but her eyes still carry the same calculating intelligence that made her invaluable to my father and, apparently, deadly to everyone else.
“Marina,” I reply, not moving from the entrance. “You look well for someone who’s supposed to be dead.”
“Death is just another form of operational security,” she says with the kind of philosophical observation that used to fascinate me as a child. “Vincent never understood that. He had too attached to grand gestures and public displays of power.”
“Is that why you had him killed?”
“I had him eliminated because he was weak,” Marina corrects, moving deeper into the greenhouse with fluid grace. “Sentimental, predictable, ultimately more concerned with legacy than survival.”
“He loved you.”
“Love is a tactical weakness,” she replies, and the casual dismissal of my father’s feelings sends ice through my veins. “Vincent’s attachment to me made him vulnerable, just as your attachment to those four men makes you vulnerable now.”
