Chapter 11 - Captured Behind Enemy Lines
Khnets’ scarred face contorted with a mixture of disbelief and venomous fury as he recognized the woman in black tactical gear.
"Volkova..." Khnets hissed, his voice trembling with manic hatred. "Viktor's little rat. I should have burned the entire forest to make sure you were ash!"
Without warning, Khnets grabbed the heavy lever of the cargo crane beside him and pulled it down violently.
A suspended ten-ton shipping container swung wildly through the air, crashing into the steel gangway with a deafening screech of ripping metal. The explosion of sparks and falling iron severed the walkway, separating Vincent and Elena.
"Elena!" Vincent yelled, lunging forward as the steel deck buckled beneath the impact.
Khnets’ remaining bodyguards opened fire, laying down a wall of lead that forced Vincent behind an engine bulkhead. In the chaos and blinding smoke, two massive Russian mercenaries tackled Elena from behind, disarming her in a desperate, violent grapple.
"Bring her aboard!" Khnets screamed, retreating into the armored wheelhouse of the ship. "Cast off the lines! If we can't have Chicago, we take Viktor's daughter to international waters and bleed her dry!"
The heavy mooring lines were severed by an axe, and the massive cargo freighter began to pull away from the dock, churning the freezing waters of Lake Michigan.
Vincent burst through the smoke, firing his sidearm until the slide locked back empty, watching Elena being dragged into the armored bridge. Through the rain-slicked glass of the wheelhouse, their eyes met for a single, agonizing second.
She didn't look afraid. Her eyes burned with a clear, defiant message: Come get me.
Vincent tossed his empty weapon aside. A terrifying, icy calm settled over him—a level of lethal focus he had never experienced in his entire life.
For thirty years, Vincent Romano had fought for territory, for money, and for syndicate pride. But standing on that rain-soaked dock, watching the woman who had captivated his entire soul being taken, he realized none of that mattered.
He wasn't fighting for an empire anymore.
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He was fighting for his queen.
Vincent sprinted toward the end of the pier, leaped onto the high-speed tactical interceptor boat moored at dock one, and ignited the twin 500-horsepower engines. The vessel roared to life with a deafening scream, tearing across the black waves in hot pursuit of the freighter.
