Chapter Seventy-Eight

Chapter Seventy-Eight
The first crash echoed through the estate hard enough to rattle the framed photographs lining the second-floor corridor.

Conversations stopped.
Heads lifted.

Every man in the command room instinctively looked toward the staircase.

Another crash.
Wood splintered.
Glass exploded against a wall.

Something heavy struck the floor upstairs with enough force to shake dust from the ceiling beams.
No one moved.

They had heard gunfire.
Bombs.
Screams.

They had heard Nikolai Volkov sentence men to death in a voice quieter than most people ordered dinner.

They had watched him walk through blood and fire without changing expression.

They had never heard this.
The destruction continued.

Furniture breaking.
Drawers ripped from their tracks.
Another impact.
Another.

Then—
A sound tore through the estate.
Raw.
Broken.
Inhuman.
It wasn't shouting.
It wasn't grief.
It wasn't rage.

It sounded like something inside a man had been ripped apart.

Several men turned instinctively toward the staircase before stopping themselves.
No one climbed it.
No one dared.

Whatever had shattered behind the bedroom door...
...was never meant to have witnesses.

Then—
Silence.

It settled over the estate like heavy snow.
No crashing.
No footsteps.
Nothing.

The command room remained frozen.
One analyst stood with his hands suspended over a keyboard.
A radio operator held his handset halfway to his mouth, forgotten.
Another man still gripped a pen above an unfinished report.
No one breathed loudly enough to be heard.

Measured footsteps finally broke the silence.
Descending.
Steady.
Unhurried.
Every head turned.

Nikolai entered the command room.
Blood streaked across both knuckles.
A shallow cut marked his cheekbone.

His charcoal suit jacket was back in place, unable to hide the rumpled white dress shirt beneath it or the missing tie that usually completed his appearance.

His dark hair, usually immaculate, was slightly disheveled—as though he'd run his hands through it one too many times.

His breathing remained just a fraction heavier than normal.

Otherwise...
He was every inch the Pakhan again.
Cold.
Controlled.
Unreadable.
The mask had returned.

Without acknowledging anyone, he crossed to the operations table and stared down at the maps covering its surface.

No one spoke.
The room remained perfectly still.

The front doors opened.
Boots crossed the stone floor.

Maksim entered carrying an evidence bag in one hand, mud still drying across his boots from the abduction scene.

He stopped almost immediately.
Something was wrong.
Not the investigation.
The room.

Everyone stood unnaturally still.
No radios.
No discussion.

Every pair of eyes rested on Nikolai.
Maksim looked toward Ilya.
Ilya refused to meet his gaze.

That alone told him everything he needed to know.
Something had happened while he was gone.
Something none of them knew how to address.

"Nikolai..."
Before he could say anything else, Nikolai spoke.
"Office."

One word.
Quiet.
Absolute.

He turned without another glance and walked toward the secure office at the back of the command center.

Neither Maksim nor Ilya hesitated to follow him.
The heavy door closed behind them.

Only then did the command room begin breathing again.

The office was small.
Windowless.
Soundproof.
Nikolai locked the door himself.

For several seconds, none of the three men spoke.

Maksim studied him carefully.
The bloody knuckles.
The fresh cut.
The mussed hair.
The disheveled shirt and missing tie.
Maksim had spent years learning to read Nikolai.
Today...
He couldn't.

"Nikolai..."

"I found something."
His voice remained calm.
Too calm.

He reached inside his jacket and removed a folded white envelope.
He set it gently on the desk.
Then another object.
Small.
White.
Plastic.

Maksim frowned.
Ilya stared.
Neither understood immediately.
Then recognition crossed Ilya's face first.
His eyes widened almost imperceptibly.
Maksim looked from the pregnancy test to the envelope.
Then back again.

"...Anika?"

Nikolai gave a single nod.
Silence swallowed the room.
"She found out two days ago," Nikolai said quietly. "Elizabeth knew."

Maksim closed his eyes.
Only briefly.
Long enough for the realization to settle.
Lizzy had been protecting Anika's secret.
The same woman now missing beside her.

Ilya finally found his voice.
"...Does anyone else know?"

"No."
Nikolai's answer came without hesitation.
He rested one hand on the envelope.
"No one outside this room."

Maksim looked toward the folded paper.
"The note..."

Nikolai's fingers tightened slightly over it.
"That was written for me."

There wasn't anger in his voice.
There didn't need to be.

Maksim immediately looked away.
"I understand."

Nikolai slid the envelope back inside his jacket.
The pregnancy test remained on the desk.

Just long enough for both men to understand exactly what they were protecting.

Then he picked it up too.
Carefully.
Almost reverently.

"And Dmitri?" Ilya asked.

Nikolai was silent.
Finally—
"He shouldn't."

Not doesn't.
Shouldn't.
The uncertainty lingered between them.

Maksim leaned forward.
"How private?"

"The test was taken inside the grooming wing. Elizabeth was the only person with her. There were no medical appointments. No phone calls. She intended to tell me tonight."

His voice caught almost imperceptibly on the final word.
Tonight.
Instead...
He found a note...
...in an empty bedroom.

Ilya's analytical mind was already moving.
"If Dmitri knew..."

"He would have used it," Maksim finished.

Nikolai met his eyes.
"Yes."

The answer chilled the room.
Dmitri had built the entire operation around leverage.
Around exploiting emotion.
If he knew Anika carried Nikolai's child, he would never have kept that weapon hidden.

Which meant—
For now—
He remained ignorant.
Their only advantage.

"No one else learns this," Nikolai said.
Neither man argued.

"The recovery teams don't know."

"No."

"The medical unit?"

"They're informed only when Anika is safely back in our custody."

Maksim's jaw tightened.

"If she suffered abdominal trauma..."

"I know."

The words came sharper than intended.
The room fell silent again.

Nikolai drew one slow breath before continuing.
"Dmitri studied us."

He walked toward the map mounted on the wall.
"He predicted your discipline."
He looked toward Maksim.
"He predicted Ilya's systems."
Another glance.
"He predicted my response."

His eyes settled on the three colored routes branching from the transfer point.
"He built this operation around the people we've become."

Maksim nodded slowly.
"The three vehicles."
"A distraction."
"Not entirely," Ilya said. "One carried them."
"Yes."
Nikolai picked up three red markers from the map.
"He wants us proving which one."

One marker disappeared.
Then another.
Then the third.
He dropped them onto the table.

"We stop chasing his trail."
Maksim frowned.
"Then where do we start?"
Nikolai looked up.
"With Dmitri."

Years of history.
Old warehouses.
Abandoned industrial sites.
Properties Dmitri insisted on keeping despite appearing useless.
Rail access.
Independent generators.
Buildings where noise disappeared beneath machinery or rushing water.
Dmitri always planned for exits.
Always.

"He prepared this long before today," Nikolai said.
"So somewhere..."
Ilya finished the thought.
"...there's a place he's already chosen."
Nikolai nodded once.

A shrill ring shattered the silence.
The secure phone outside the office, wired to ring thoughlut the office and command center.
All three men froze.
That line almost never rang.
Once.
Twice.
Nikolai slipped Anika's note deeper into his jacket.
Close to his heart.
Protected.
Hidden.
He unlocked the office door.
"Trace it."
The phone rang a third time.
Every conversation in the command room died.
Every eye turned toward the desk.