The return was not a triumph. It was a somber procession of ghosts.
Demetri entered the penthouse first, his movements stiff, his clothes smelling of gunpowder, cold night air, and the faint, metallic tang of blood. He had shed his tactical gear, but the violence of the night clung to him like a shroud. His eyes, when they met Nora’s, were the colour of a winter storm after the battle—exhausted, haunted, and utterly remote.
Behind him, Ivan guided a pale and trembling Sasha. The girl’s defiant bravado was gone, stripped away by the reality of gunfire and death. There was a cut on her cheekbone, and her hands wouldn’t stop shaking. She looked like what she was: a teenager who had just stared into the abyss and seen it stare back.
Without a word, Demetri walked to the bar and poured three
