Page 27 of The Mafia Bloodline
Runa looked out the tinted window, brow furrowing. “You keep your plans in a warehouse?”
Volken’s lips twitched. “We keep everything in warehouses.”
When Colt opened the back door, the sharp scent of oil and concrete hit the air. Volken stepped out first, scanning the perimeter, before reaching back for Runa’s hand.
“Stay close,” he murmured.
“I always am,” she said, but her fingers slid into his anyway.
Inside, the warehouse stretched vast and cold, the echo of their footsteps bouncing off the high ceiling. At the far end, a table was set up beneath a bank of low lights. Maps covered every inch of it, hand-drawn overlays of districts, red markings across ports and highways, photographs clipped to the corners with rough notes scrawled in ink.
Runa’s breath caught. “This is what you’ve been working on?”
Volken nodded, stepping closer to the table. “Every sighting. Every transaction we’ve traced back to the demons or Malakai’s human partners. Your father’s last known location was near the southern docks, here.” He pointed to a red X circled twice in black. “We raided that site two weeks ago and found evidence of movement, but they’d already cleared it out.”
Runa moved closer, her honey-coloured eyes sharp in the dim light. “So, they’re still one step ahead.”
“Not for long,” Volken said, his tone dark and steady. “They’re getting sloppy. Tonight’s run will tell us which route they’re using to move supplies. Once we find that, we’ll find where they’re keeping the humans.”
Her throat tightened. “Where they might be keeping him.”
Volken’s jaw flexed. He reached out, brushing his knuckles against her cheek, a rare tenderness cutting through the steel in his voice. “We’ll find him, Runa. One way or another you have my word.”
For a heartbeat, everything was quiet. The hum of electricity from the overhead lights. The slow rhythm of their breathing. The unspoken bond between them, pulsing with trust and fear and something dangerously close to hope.
Volken turned toward Colt. “We’re done here. Lock everything down.”
Colt nodded, moving to the side door, his hand instinctively resting near the gun at his thigh. The air outside had shifted it was thicker now, colder.
They walked toward the exit, Runa pressed close to Volken’s side. He didn’t let go of her hand once, his gaze sweeping the dark edges of the lot.
That’s when I saw him turn his heard as if he heard something.
Chapter 10
I stiffen as I hear a whistle…low, mocking, cutting through the quiet.
“Well, well. What’s a pretty thing like that doing with monsters like you?”
Runa stiffened. I froze, the rage immediately turning my vision red.
Two men stepped out from behind a stack of shipping containers, grinning like wolves. Irish fuckers, by the smell of whiskey and gunpowder that clung to them.
“Boss,” Colt murmured, stepping forward slightly, his hand now on his weapon.
“Don’t,” Volken said softly, dangerously calm. “They’re not here to talk.”
One of the Irish men spat to the side, leering at Runa. “Didn’t know the Bloods were recruiting toys now. Tell me, sweetheart, how much does he pay you to…”
He didn’t finish the sentence.
Volken moved faster than sight, a blur of shadow and violence. His hand closed around the man’s throat, the crack of bone sharp and final as he flung the body aside like trash.
The other man barely had time to swear before Colt fired, one clean shot between the eyes.
That was when the rest came. Five more, emerging from the darkness behind the trucks, guns raised, blades glinting in the dim light.
“Stay behind me,” Volken snarled, pushing Runa back toward the wall. His body shifted, every muscle tight, his eyes glowing faintly silver behind the lenses of his dark glasses.
