Page 159 of Made for Sinners

I was already moving, crossing the room in three long strides. “Where?”

He tapped a few keys, and a map appeared on the screen. A red dot blinked in the middle of an industrial district on the outskirts of the city. “Abandoned warehouse. Used to be a textile factory. No activity for the last five years—until tonight.”

I stared at the screen, my pulse pounding.

“Get eyes on it,” I said. “Drones, cameras, whatever you’ve got. I want to see inside before we go in.”

The tech nodded and got to work.

Rafe stepped back into the room, phone still pressed to his ear. “Valentina’s on the line.”

I took the phone from him and walked to the corner of the room, my voice low and sharp. “Tell me what you know.”

“I heard,” she said, her voice tight. “I’m sorry, Dante.”

“Don’t waste time apologizing. Just tell me who did this.”

There was a pause.

“Nikolai knows,” Valentina said, her voice calm, calculated.

I ground my teeth, my grip tightening on the phone. “Then why the fuck are you wasting my time?”

“Because…” She hesitated, and my patience snapped.

“Get to the fucking point, Valentina,” I barked, my voice low, lethal.

There was a pause, heavy enough to make my chest tighten, and then she said it—quietly, reluctantly, like she already knew the damage it would do.

“It was Aleksander.”

The words hit me like a bullet to the chest.

I went still. Too still.

The war room fell silent around me, the tension so thick it felt like breathing smoke. My brothers watched me from across the room, their expressions unreadable, but I could feel it—uncertainty, caution, fear. Not of the Russians.

Of me.

Valentina’s voice came again, tighter now. “Do you know what I had to do to get that information? What I had to promise?”

“I don’t fucking care,” I growled, pacing like a caged animal. “My wife is gone. They took her. They gagged her. They filmed her. And now you’re telling me Aleksander Romanov signed off on it?”

“Yes,” she said. “But?—”

“No buts,” I snapped. “They stole from me. They betrayed me. And now they’ve taken her?”

My voice cracked at the end, and I hated that. Hated the way it exposed the raw, bleeding edge of my fury.

“She’s not just some pawn,” I said, quieter now, but no less lethal. “She’s my wife.”

“I know,” Valentina said softly. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry doesn’t bring her back,” I said. “Nikolai has five minutes to call me. Five. If I don’t hear from him, there will be war.”

“Dante—”

“Five minutes,” I said, and hung up.

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