Chapter 7 - A Cornered Rat Strikes
The ballroom victory was sweet, but desperate men are the most dangerous predators.
Jason Bennett did not spend the night in federal holding. Using the last remaining bearer bonds he had stashed in a private safe deposit box under Allison’s mother’s name, Jason managed to secure emergency bail through a corrupt bondsman before the federal freeze locked down the state warrants.
He was a ruined man. His passport was flagged. His name was radioactive. He had less than twenty-four hours before the Southern District grand jury returned a formal indictment that would put him behind bars for decades.
In a dimly lit warehouse near the Brooklyn Navy Yard, Jason stood shaking before three men sitting on wooden crates.
These were not Moretti men. These were members of the Petrov Bratva—the violent Russian faction that Marcus Vane had secretly dealt with before Dante purged him.
“I need her,” Jason pleaded, sweat dripping from his chin onto the concrete floor. “If you take Catherine, Dante Moretti will pay whatever you want. Fifty million. A hundred million. He’s obsessed with her! And I know the layout of her SoHo studio. I know the security codes!”
The leader of the Russian crew, a hulking man named Yuri with silver-capped teeth, blew smoke toward the ceiling.
“Moretti’s woman has private security,” Yuri growled in a thick accent. “Four guards. Day and night.”
“At seven o'clock tonight, she does her private fabric review alone in the back studio while the guards rotate shifts outside!” Jason pressed frantically. “Take her! Bring her here! Force Moretti to drop the charges and give us safe passage out of the country on a container ship! It’s the only way you get your money back, Yuri!”
Yuri stared at Jason for a long, agonizing moment before stubbing out his cigarette.
“If this goes wrong, Bennett,” Yuri said coldly, “I will skin you alive before Moretti even finds the building.”
***
At seven-fifteen that evening, Catherine stood in the quiet cutting room of her SoHo boutique.
The studio smelled of cedar, raw linen, and lavender. A warm cup of tea sat on her cutting table. She had sent Daniel home thirty minutes earlier after finalizing the final asset recovery documents. Tomorrow, the divorce decree would be finalized by judicial signature.
She would be free. Truly, legally free.
Suddenly, the lights flickered and went black.
Catherine froze, her scissors hovering above a bolt of silk.
Outside the frosted glass of the studio, the distinctive muffled thud of a silenced weapon echoed through the hallway, followed by a heavy body collapsing against the floor.
Catherine’s blood ran cold. *Dante’s guards.*
She reached into her purse for her phone, but before her fingers could unlock the screen, the studio doors were kicked inward with explosive force.
Three masked men in tactical gear surged into the room.
Catherine screamed, grabbing a heavy brass shears from the table and swinging them wildly, slashing the arm of the first man who lunged toward her.
The man grunted in pain, swearing in Russian, but the second attacker struck her hard across the face with the butt of a handgun.
The world exploded into white sparks.
May you like
Catherine collapsed to the floor, her vision swimming as rough hands bound her wrists with heavy zip-ties. A burlap sack was jammed over her head, plunging her into suffocating darkness, and she was hoisted violently over a man’s shoulder into the cold night.
***
