CHAPTER THREE: BLOOD IN THE WATER
1633 Words
The club throbbed with sweat, smoke, and tension thick enough to choke on.
VESPERA wasn’t Elena Greco’s kind of place. She hated loud rooms, sticky floors, and pretending not to see the vultures circling. But tonight wasn’t about comfort. It was about proximity—to power, to danger, and to the kind of secrets whispered only in places where the music was too loud to trace intentions.
She lingered in the shadows near the VIP booths, the bass rattling up through her boots. Neon lights pulsed in crimson and pale ice, slicing her face into halves—like sin and judgment playing tug-of-war on her skin. She wore black leather, tailored and sharp, like she was daring anyone to touch her.
They wouldn’t. Not tonight.
She wasn’t here to be seen. She was here to watch.
“Bad idea, Greco,” came Julian’s voice in her ear. “This place is soaked in Volkovs. You stand out like a Molotov in a wine cellar.”
Elena sipped a drink she didn’t want, her lips barely moving. “That’s the point. If they think they’ve got eyes on me, they won’t notice what I’m looking at.”
“Still feels like bait.”
“Then stay close.”
He didn’t reply, but she knew Julian was circling the floor somewhere. She trusted him to be her ghost in the dark.
Adrian hadn’t arrived yet.
She wasn’t sure if she wanted him to.
Her eyes swept the crowd and landed on Maksim—one of Katya’s top guys. He was pretending to flirt with a bartender, but his posture gave him away. Too stiff. Too alert. He wasn’t there for the drinks.
And neither was Elena.
When Adrian finally showed, he didn’t crash in like a firestorm. He just appeared—quiet, composed, but with the weight of something unresolved in his step. Black suit, collar open, face tight with the kind of tension that didn’t belong in clubs or conference rooms. It belonged in graveyards.
He found her with that same haunted calm, and for one fragile second, she remembered why his name still stuck in her throat some nights.
He looked at her like he hadn’t decided whether he’d shoot her or shield her.
“Elena,” he said.
“Adrian.”
“You’re early.”
“You’re late.”
That was the extent of the pleasantries. Neither moved to apologize.
They sat in a private booth at the edge of the room. High enough to watch. Low enough to be watched. It was a warning and a challenge, neatly wrapped in one velvet seat.
She leaned in. “Lucia met with Marco two nights ago. It wasn’t sanctioned. She took something from him.”
Adrian’s expression didn’t shift, but the muscle in his jaw twitched. “Katya’s been clamming up. She’s hiding something, too.”
“Think it’s your father?”
He shook his head slowly. “Nikolai doesn’t hide. He wants blood, he spills it. Quiet moves like this? That’s not him.”
“Then who’s playing us?”
Adrian looked out over the crowd. “There was a name I heard once. Back in Warsaw. Moryak. Calls himself ‘The Sailor.’ No turf, no family ties. Just money and manipulation.”
“You think he’s here?”
“I think he’s been here. And someone in either family—or both—is working under him.”
She didn’t respond immediately.
Then, quietly: “Why us, Adrian? Why now?”
His eyes met hers without blinking. “Because we’re the last thing holding our families back from slaughtering each other. If we go, there’s nothing left to stop it.”
Across the room, Maksim shifted—subtle, but deliberate. Adrian noticed it the same moment she did.
Elena’s voice hardened. “He’s making a move.”
Adrian stood without hesitation. “Let’s follow.”
---
They tailed Maksim through the back entrance of the club, slipping into the night like wolves beneath the moonlight. Rain clung to the pavement, reflecting streetlights and secrets in equal measure.
Julian flanked them from a different angle, feeding updates through the comms in clipped whispers.
Maksim didn’t go far. A sleek black sedan waited two blocks down, engine running. He got in without looking back, and the car peeled off without headlights.
They followed on foot, ducking through alleyways slick with oil and rain. The path wound south, closer to the docks—Volkov territory. But this stretch of the waterfront was too quiet. No patrols. No guards. Just a looming warehouse with no markings and dead cameras.
That meant off-books.
Elena stayed behind while Adrian crept up the side wall, sliding between crates and scaffolding like he’d done it a hundred times. He found a window cracked open and watched.
Inside, Maksim approached a man in a long coat. The lighting was dim, but something at the man’s wrist caught Adrian’s eye—a silver-faced watch. Familiar. Distinct.
Then the figure turned slightly, and Adrian’s blood turned colder than the rain.
It was Luca Mancini.
Greco.
He moved like he belonged there. He handed over a sealed envelope and a flash drive. Maksim nodded, took the case, and left.
Adrian backed out and returned to Elena fast and quiet.
“It’s one of yours,” he said under his breath. “Luca.”
“Luca?” Her voice barely rose. “That can’t be right. He’s trusted. My father—”
Adrian cut her off. “Your father’s not the one meeting Volkov bagmen in abandoned dock warehouses.”
She stared past him, her stomach twisting.
They didn’t make a move. Not yet. It wasn’t the time. They needed to know what was in that case—and more importantly, who it was meant for.
They vanished into the night before anyone noticed they were ever there.
---
By the time Elena got home, dawn had bled into the sky like a wound spreading across the clouds.
She stepped into the kitchen half-expecting silence, but found her father already there. Espresso in one hand. Disappointment in the other.
“You’ve been out,” Vincenzo said, not bothering to look up.
“I went for a walk.”
“You went into a Volkov club.” He turned then, fixing her with that patented Greco stare—more knife than glance. “And I don’t appreciate being lied to.”
“You had me followed?” she asked, trying not to sound as angry as she felt.
“I had you raised,” he replied. “You think I don’t know the scent of betrayal on my own blood?”
Elena’s hands tightened around the edge of the marble counter.
“I found something tonight,” she said, voice low. “Something you need to know.”
He sipped his coffee.
“Luca met with a Volkov. At the docks. Handed over a case and a drive.”
Vincenzo said nothing.
“I don’t know what’s in it,” she continued. “But he’s compromised.”
Her father didn’t blink. “And yet you come to me with suspicion, not proof.”
She took a step forward. “Would proof even matter to you?”
He stared at her like he was seeing something he hadn’t expected. Then he said, “Be careful, Elena. Volkovs love like they shoot. Quick. Ruthless. And always ready to walk away from the body.”
She left before she could say something she’d regret.
---
Across the city, Adrian stood in the grey chill of his father’s balcony, watching the skyline bleed into fog.
Nikolai Volkov emerged behind him, cigar burning between his fingers, amusement crackling in his voice.
“You look like hell.”
Adrian didn’t turn. “Did you know about Maksim?”
His father took his time answering. “Maksim works with Katya now. I don’t keep her toys in my drawer.”
“She’s building her own empire under your roof.”
“And why shouldn’t she?” Nikolai exhaled. “I built mine under my father’s. It’s tradition.”
“You knew something was wrong. And you kept quiet.”
“Of course I did.”
Adrian spun to face him. “We’re being played.”
His father smiled through the smoke. “We’re always being played. That’s the game.”
Adrian didn’t smile back. “Then maybe it’s time to flip the board.”
Nikolai nodded once. “Just make sure you know who’s sitting across from you before you do.”
---
That night, Elena and Adrian met at the abandoned church on West 79th—their neutral ground.
The old stone walls still smelled like incense and dust. It was the only place left in the city untouched by either family.
She didn’t waste time.
“Luca’s missing.”
Adrian’s eyes sharpened. “How long?”
“Since last night. He didn’t report in. No one’s seen his car. It’s like he vanished.”
He swore under his breath.
Elena sat on the altar steps. “You were right. This rot goes deeper than we thought.”
He stood in front of her, silent for a beat. Then: “So what now?”
She looked up. “We go quiet. Start digging. Together.”
“And if what we find leads right back to the people we bleed for?”
She rose to her feet. “Then we burn it down.”
He didn’t flinch. Just reached out, brushing her hand without claiming it. A touch, not a promise.
“You and me?” he asked.
“You and me,” she confirmed.
And for the first time in weeks, the fear didn’t win.
The war was coming either way.
At least now, they wouldn’t be walking into it alone.
- Writer
