Chapter 138 Nikolai
I found Anton Petrov in three days.
He was hiding in a small apartment on the outskirts of the city. Living under a false name. Working at a grocery store.
I watched him for two days. Learned his routine. Saw how he lived. He had a girlfriend, a kind woman who smiled at him when he came home from work. They cooked dinner together. Watched television. Laughed. He was trying to build a normal life with stolen money.
On the third night I broke into his apartment while he slept. I put a gun to his head and woke him up.
"Please," he begged. "Please do not kill me. I will give the money back. All of it."
"It is too late for that."
"I have a daughter. She is only two years old. Please. She needs her father."
I looked at him. At the fear in his eyes. At the photos on the wall of a little girl with dark curls and a bright smile. This was what Smoke wanted me to do. Kill an innocent man. A father.
But I thought about Anya. About what I would do to save her. About the deals I had made with devils.
And I pulled the trigger.
Anton's body fell back onto the bed. Blood spread across the white sheets. I did not feel anything. No guilt. No remorse. Nothing. I cut off his head like Smoke had demanded, wrapped it in plastic and put it in a bag.
When I left the apartment, the girlfriend was still sleeping in the other room. She would wake up to a nightmare. The little girl would grow up without a father. Because of me.
I brought the head to Smoke. He smiled when he saw it.
"Good. You have proven yourself. Now we can begin."
He gave me three hundred men all armed and trained to kill. Viktor Sokolov added two hundred more. Weapons. Explosives. Armored vehicles. Everything we needed to start a war.
We spent two weeks planning. Studying Volkov's patterns. Learning his security. Finding his weaknesses. And then we learned something that changed everything.
Volkov was hosting a meeting. A gathering of the most powerful men in the Russian underworld. Government officials. Military officers. Businessmen. All corrupt. All dangerous. All gathering in one place.
"This is our chance," Viktor said. "We hit them while they are all together. Kill Volkov and everyone who supports him. Burn it all down in one night."
"There will be casualties," I warned.
"Acceptable losses," Smoke said. His burned face showed no emotion. "This is war. People die in war."
I thought about Anton Petrov. About his daughter. About all the innocent people I had already destroyed. What was a few more?
"We do it," I said. "We burn it all."
The night of the attack came fast.
We drove to Volkov's estate in a convoy of black trucks. Five hundred men armed with automatic weapons, grenades, rocket launchers, and enough ammunition to destroy an entire army. The estate was lit up like a palace. Cars lined the driveway. Guards patrolled the perimeter. Music and laughter drifted from inside.
They had no idea what was coming.
"Remember," I said over the radio. "No survivors. We kill everyone. Volkov. His guests. His guards. Everyone who stands in our way."
"Understood, boss," came the reply.
We hit them at midnight.
The first explosion took out the main gate. The second took out the guard tower. The third took out the power. The estate went dark. Then the screaming started.
We poured through the gate like a flood. Gunfire erupted from every direction. Volkov's guards fired back but they were unprepared, caught off guard, outgunned. My men moved through them like death itself, silent and efficient and brutal.
I led the charge toward the main house. My rifle spat fire and death. Men fell in front of me, behind me, beside me. I did not care. I kept moving forward.
We reached the front door. I kicked it open. Inside was chaos. People running, screaming, dying. I saw a government official trying to hide behind a couch. I shot him twice in the chest. I saw a businessman crawling toward the exit. I shot him in the back. I saw a military officer reaching for his weapon. I shot him in the face.
Blood painted the walls. Bodies littered the floor. The smell of gunpowder and death filled the air. This was not a rescue mission. This was a massacre.
We moved through the house room by room, killing everyone we found. Servants. Guards. Guests. It did not matter. They all died the same. The gunfire was relentless. Men screamed for mercy. They received none. The floors became slick with blood. The walls were riddled with bullet holes. Chandeliers crashed down from the ceiling. Paintings of dead ancestors were torn apart by gunfire.
I found Volkov in his office. He was trying to escape through a window. Two of his guards were with him. I shot the guards first. They fell without a sound.
Volkov turned to face me. His eyes went wide when he saw who I was.
"Markov. You are supposed to be dead."
"I was. Now I am back. Where is Anya?"
"You think I will tell you? You think I will give her up after everything?"
"Tell me or I will make your death last hours."
Volkov laughed. Blood dripped from his mouth. "She is not here. I moved her. Somewhere you will never find her."
Rage exploded through me. I grabbed him by the throat and slammed him against the wall. "Where is she?"
"Go to hell, Markov."
I put my gun to his knee and fired. He screamed. The bone shattered. "Where is she?"
"I will never tell you. Never. She is mine. She will always be mine."
I shot his other knee. He collapsed to the floor, screaming and writhing. Blood pooled around his legs. His face was white with pain.
"Last chance. Where is Anya?"
Volkov looked up at me with hatred burning in his eyes. "You will never see her again. I made sure of it. Even if you kill me, even if you burn this whole city, you will never find her."
I put the gun to his head. "Then you are useless to me."
I pulled the trigger. His head snapped back. His body went limp. Alexei Volkov was dead.
But the satisfaction I expected did not come. Just emptiness. Because Anya was still gone.
Outside, the battle continued. Grenades exploded. Machine guns rattled. Men screamed and died. I walked through the carnage like a ghost. Bodies everywhere. Some of my men. Most of theirs. The who's who of the Russian underworld lay dead in pools of their own blood. Generals and gangsters. Politicians and murderers. All equal now. All dead.
"Boss!" one of my lieutenants ran up to me. "The house is clear. Everyone is dead. What are your orders?"
"Burn it. Burn everything. Leave nothing standing."
We poured gasoline through every room. Set fires in every corner. Within minutes the entire estate was engulfed in flames. The fire spread quickly, consuming curtains, furniture, bodies. The heat was so intense I could feel it on my face from fifty meters away. The sky turned orange. Smoke rose like a funeral pyre.
I stood outside and watched it burn. The flames crackled and roared. Walls collapsed. Glass shattered. The mansion that had held my wife prisoner became ashes and dust.
This was what revenge looked like. This was what justice cost. But it meant nothing without Anya.
"Search the grounds," I ordered. "Every building. Every room. Find her."
My men scattered. They searched for hours through the ruins, through the outbuildings, through the gardens. They found bodies. They found weapons. They found money and drugs and secrets. But they found nothing. No Anya. No sign of her. No clue where she had gone.
She was gone. Vanished. Like she had never existed at all.
I fell to my knees in the ash and dirt. Covered in blood and soot and failure. I had killed Volkov. I had burned his empire to the ground. I had won the war. But I had lost everything that mattered.
"Boss," my lieutenant said quietly. "We searched everywhere. She is not here."
"Then search again."
"We did. Four times. She is gone."
I looked up at him, at the ruins of the estate behind him, at the smoke rising into the night sky.
The fire was still burning. The bodies were still smoking.
But Anya was nowhere to be found.