The ride back to the estate was a frantic blur of strobe lights and shadows. Yuri's private security team had swarmed the road like a dark, disciplined tide, securing the perimeter with cold efficiency before transferring us to a second, more heavily armored vehicle.
Yuri sat beside me, his face carved from unyielding stone despite the blood that had now saturated his shirt and stained the leather seat. He refused the paramedics' intervention with a sharp gesture, holding onto his consciousness through sheer force of will until we were safely behind the iron gates of his fortress. Only then did he allow his private surgeon to lead him toward the medical wing—the part of the house I was strictly forbidden to enter.
"Stay with Elena," he commanded. His voice was barely a coherent whisper, yet it still carried that serrated edge of absolute authority.
"Yuri—"
He didn't look back. The heavy double doors swung shut, leaving me alone in the foyer with the metallic tang of gunpowder and the ghost of his expensive cologne clinging to my skin like a second layer of trauma.
That night, sleep was a phantom I couldn't catch. Every time I drifted, I saw the "unbreakable" glass turning into a storm of diamonds. I felt the crushing, protective weight of Yuri's body shielding mine from the lead. I paced my room until the moonlight shifted across the floor, my mind a chaotic loop of questions. Why would someone risk a war to kill him now? And more importantly, why did a man who claimed to own me as an "asset" risk his own life to keep me breathing?
Driven by a restless, nervous energy, I slipped out of my room. The house was unnervingly still, the air thick with the silence of a tomb. I found myself drawn back to the library. If Yuri was right—if my father had truly stolen a list of names—there had to be a reason the world thought the map was hidden in my mind.
I began to search the shelves, not for literature, but for architecture. I ran my fingers along the mahogany panels, feeling for a seam, a hollow space, a flaw in the perfection. Near the back of the room, hidden behind a collection of vintage, hand-drawn maps, my hand brushed against a small, recessed lever.
With a soft, pneumatic hiss, a section of the bookshelf slid back.
It wasn't a hidden room. It was a recessed safe. Inside, resting on a velvet cushion as if it were a crown jewel, was a single, old-fashioned brass key and a tattered envelope yellowed by time. It was addressed to a single letter: J.
My heart hammered a frantic rhythm against my ribs. J for Jessy.
The next day, the dynamic between us shifted. Yuri was back in his study, his arm in a black silk sling, looking pale but as formidable as ever. I found him in the glass conservatory, the air thick with the scent of damp earth and blooming jasmine. I was hunched over a tablet I'd managed to "borrow" from the kitchen staff, trying to bypass the local network to see what else lay hidden in the digital walls.
He didn't take the device away. He didn't even scold me. He simply reached over my shoulder, his large hand covering mine on the screen. The heat of him was overwhelming—a sharp, electric contrast to the air-conditioned chill of the conservatory. I could feel his breath against the curve of my ear, a soft, dangerous warmth that made my skin prickle.
"You're using the wrong protocol," he whispered. His fingers moved mine, guiding them with a surgeon's precision to a hidden partition in the software. "If you want to see what they're hiding, you have to go through the back door. My brother is sloppy with his encryption; he thinks the Volkov name is enough of a firewall."
I froze, the proximity making it hard to breathe. "Why are you helping me hack your own family?"
"Because," he said, his voice dropping an octave into something dark and resonant, "I want to see what happens when the Phoenix finally decides to fly. Just remember, Jessy—the higher you go, the more it hurts when you eventually fall."
He pulled away, but the ghost of his touch stayed on my skin, a lingering burn. I looked down at the screen, at the files he had helped me uncover. It wasn't just a list of names. It was a list of targets. A ledger of people marked for "erasure."
And at the very top of the list, written in my father's own digital signature, was his own name. Beneath it, in a font that felt like a scream, was mine.