Page 193 of Celestial Combat

He drained his drink, setting the glass down with deliberate calm. “My father was murdered years ago. Cut limb by limb,” he said slowly. “My name is Oleg Aslanov.”

“What about the underboss, Aleksandr Ivanova?”

Oleg looked away from us, toward the one-way glass. “Ivanova vanished when the old network collapsed.”

Zane leaned forward, voice threading danger. “We know you know.”

Oleg took a slow breath. “He was seen five months ago. Remote village in Siberia.”

“Coordinates.”

Oleg reached over to the bar counter and handed over a piece of paper. Silence held us inside until Zane picked it up and slipped it into his pocket.

Without another word,we left as quietly and effectively as we’d entered – back through the unconscious bodies, through the club’s pulsating floor, and out into the cold Moscow night.

As we got back into the alley where our SUV waited, I glanced at Zane.“We make a good team.”

The look in his eyes made my chest squeeze as he opened the car door for me. “Always have.”

His heart thundered.

My own matched with its own fierce beat.

Chapter 49

Present

Siberia, Russia

THESUN HADN’T RISEN YET, but the sky on January ninth was tinged with a dull indigo – the kind that barely promised light. Siberia in January was like a breath held too long. Still, suspended. Endless white.

I pressed my hand against the icy passenger window of the SUV, watching frost bloom where my fingers touched the glass. Outside, the pine trees looked ancient, dark silhouettes dusted in snow. Branches heavy with silence. The roads were narrow, unpaved, flanked by miles of untouched wilderness that looked like it had been frozen in time.

Zane had one hand on the steering wheel, the other resting on the gearshift. His jaw was locked in that familiar way it got when his mind was spinning through possibilities. Calculating. Waiting. Planning. The only sound was the low hum of the engine and the occasional crunch of tires against snow-packed dirt.

We hadn’t gone back to the hotel after the club. Figured Trevor had probably figured out where in Moscow we were the second we’d stepped out of the VIP lounge.

We drove straight to a private airstrip where one of his many friends owed him a favor. The jet was waiting by the time we got there – dark, sleek, and fast.

Now we were two hours deep into the Siberian countryside, near Lake Baikal. The cold seeped into everything. Even inside the car, it felt like the winter air was finding cracks to crawl through.

Zane’s phone buzzed on the center console, the screen lighting up with a name I didn’t recognize – just a first name in Cyrillic. He glanced at it, didn’t answer.

Still waiting.

“Are you cold?” he asked, voice low and rough like the gravel road beneath us.

“A little,” I said, pulling the shearling coat tighter around me.

Zane’s eyes flicked to me for a moment. That unreadable stare. “We’re close.”

“To what?” I asked quietly. “A man who vanished fifteen years ago?”

Zane ran his tongue over his teeth before bringing his hand up to wipe the smirk off his face. “A cabin. About forty minutes out.”

The wind howled against the SUV like a warning.

And we kept driving.

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