Chapter 4 - The Russian’s Shadow
"Viktor Vance?" Leah whispered, the color completely draining from her cheeks. "The man who controls the entire docks on the South Side?"
"The same," Gabriel said grimly, pulling her up from the floor by her hand. He didn't let go of her wrist, his grip firm, warm, and utterly inescapable. "Which means your little side hustle just triggered a turf war."
"I didn't mean to start a war," Leah said, panic finally breaking through her professional composure. "I just wanted to balance the ledger."
"You did a lot more than that," Gabriel said, his voice hard, though his thumb instinctively stroked the back of her hand in a silent gesture of reassurance. "You destabilized the Russian syndicate's primary money-laundering network. Vance doesn't care about justice, Leah. He cares about control. And right now, he thinks *I* am the one who orchestrated this theft to squeeze him out of the harbor contracts."
"So tell him the truth!"
"And tell him my twenty-seven-year-old executive assistant with a green diner apron is the master financial hacker who outsmarted his Swiss bank accounts?" Gabriel let out a dry, humorless laugh. "Vance would skin you alive just to see how your brain works before he killed you."
The sirens began to wail in the distance, cutting through the cold Chicago night. Red and blue lights flashed against the shattered glass of the hallway window, painting the room in frantic, strobe-like hues.
"We have less than two minutes before the local precinct arrives," Gabriel said, glancing at his watch. "And half of Chicago's finest are on Vance's payroll. We stay here, we get locked up in a corrupt holding cell, and Vance's men finish the job before morning."
"Then where do we go?" Leah asked, looking around the tiny, wrecked apartment that had been her sanctuary for three years.
Gabriel looked down at her, his dark eyes softening just a fraction, revealing a fierce, terrifying devotion that terrified her far more than the guns outside.
"To my penthouse," Gabriel said. "Where nobody gets in without my permission."
May you like
Before she could argue, Gabriel scooped her up into his arms, ignoring her startled gasp, and carried her straight out through the shattered doorway, stepping over the unconscious mercenaries as the wailing sirens grew deafeningly close.
***
