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“Enzo Ricci,” Sergei greets, spreading his arms. “The legend himself. We were expecting you.”

I remain still. Don’t blink. My hand rests casually near my holster, loose but primed. Behind me, a tense Marco shifts, but I still let the thick, suffocating silence hang until Sergei’s smile falters at the edges.

When I finally speak, I do so with a flat, cold voice. “You talk too much.”

Ivan’s fingers twitch near his gun, eager. I track the motion without turning my head. I’ll put a bullet between his eyes before he clears leather.

“Funny,” Sergei continues. “Martinelli talked about you often. Said you’d come for him. Guess he was right. Shame he bled before you got the chance to say goodbye.”

Marco draws up beside me, his gun low but ready. “Did you kill him for sport or just to set the mood?”

Sergei chuckles. “We did it for business. But now…we want something from you.”

“What’s that?”

“The girl.” His smile sharpens. “Sophia Martinelli. Bring her to us, and maybe we’ll let you keep breathing.”

My hand twitches toward my holster.

Sergei notices the gesture and laughs. “Ah, loyalty. Always so tragic. You Benedettis used to be wolves. Now you play at being knights.”

Under his breath, Marco mutters what sounds like an Italian prayer for the dead.

My words come out low, steady, and final. “You’ll never touch her.”

“Then you’ll die for her.” Sergei tilts his head. “Romantic but stupid.”

At that, gunfire explodes through the warehouse, metal screams, bullets shred the air, and the sharp, electric smell of cordite assaults my lungs.

Six Russians pour out from behind containers. Armed, trained, and deadly.

They move on instinct, firing, reloading, ducking, returning. The rhythm of war.

Marco drops one of them with a clean shot through the neck. Blood sprays the wall in a dark arc.

I clip another in the leg, and the guy goes down screaming. Four left.

Before I can roll away, a bullet tears through my shoulder. The hot, blunt, blooming pain doesn’t stop me, though. Pain’s nothing more than a sensation.

After someone shouts in Russian, the brothers try to duck behind crates. I fire two shots, one quick, one deliberate. Ivan drops. Sergei curses, scrambling for cover.

More Russian men flood in. Too many.

“Fuel tank!” Marco yells, pointing to the rusted container near the back wall.

Perfect.

I aim and shoot.

Gunfire drives our assailants back as boots sprint across metal. My shot hits true. A spark, followed by a few beats of quiet. Then hell opens its jowls.

The blinding white explosion rips through the air with a deafening roar, and bright heat slams against my skin.

The blast throws both Marco and me down, glass raining from the ceiling like glittering shrapnel.

Smoke. Fire. Screams.

My ears ring. I can’t hear. Can’t see through the haze.