Something about its persistence—blooming despite concrete and exhaust and the certainty of being crushed eventually—makes me pause.
Diana would appreciate this. The thought surfaces unbidden, instinctive. She’d find meaning in something fragile surviving where it shouldn’t, would probably turn it into a metaphor about resistance and beauty in unexpected places.
I crouch and carefully extract the flower from its crack, roots and dirt still attached. The gesture feels absurd the moment I’m holding it—a Bratva captain stopping his convoy to pick wildflowers like some romantic fool from a movie even Diana would probably mock.
I return to the SUV, cradling the flower carefully, aware that Oleg is watching with an expression I don’t acknowledge. Strategic detachment would dictate leaving it where it grew. Personal attachment makes me carry it home.
The distinction between those two states has collapsed entirely where Diana is concerned.
Something’s wrong the moment I enter the estate. The air feels different—charged in ways that suggest confrontation rather than routine evening.
Taras meets me at the entrance, his expression carefully neutral.
“Mrs. Rudenko is in the living room,” he says quietly. “She’s been waiting since four.”
The phrasing carries weight. Waiting implies purpose, preparation. I nod once and head toward the living room, stillholding the ridiculous flower I picked with intentions I can’t fully articulate.
Diana sits in one of the armchairs near the fireplace, documents spread across the coffee table in organized arrays that suggest hours of review. She looks up when I enter, and the expression on her face stops me in the doorway.
Her dark eyes are red-rimmed, tears already shed or barely held back. The composure she usually maintains has fractured into something raw and vulnerable that makes my chest tighten with immediate alarm.
“What happened?” I cross to her quickly, scanning the room for threats that don’t exist. “Are you hurt?”
She gestures toward the documents without speaking. I recognize them immediately—printouts from the filing cabinet in my office, emails and memos I knew existed but hadn’t thought about in months. The timeline aligns with Ethan’s death. The market repositioning memo sits on top, my own clinical assessment of how his investigation’s termination would benefit Rudenko interests.
The flower is still in my hand, absurdly incongruous with the evidence of my complicity spread across the table.
Diana’s gaze drops to it briefly. Something that might be pain flickers across her expression before she looks away.
“You knew,” she says, her voice hollow. “Not just that Lorenzo was going to kill him. You knew it would benefit you. You positioned to profit from his death.”
The accusation I’ve been dreading since she started asking questions about Ethan lands with the weight I anticipated. No deflection will work here. No strategic framing can soften what those documents prove.
I set the flower on the side table carefully and move closer, settling into the chair across from her. “Yes.”
Her breath catches. She’d been expecting denial, or justification, or something other than blunt confirmation. The honesty strips away whatever composure she’d maintained.
“You wrote a memo.” Her voice shakes. “About market opportunities. About contracts you could absorb. You calculated profit margins from my brother’s corpse.”
“I assessed operational impacts and positioned accordingly.” The clinical phrasing sounds monstrous spoken aloud. “That’s what the role requires, identifying opportunities regardless of their source.”
“Their source was murder.” She stands abruptly, papers scattering. “Ethan’s murder, and you treated it like a business acquisition.”
I remain seated, forcing myself to accept her fury without deflecting it. “I didn’t kill him. I didn’t order it or facilitate it. When Lorenzo informed me he was moving forward with containment, I recognized the fallout would create opportunities. Not capitalizing on them wouldn’t have brought your brother back. It would just mean someone else absorbed those contracts.”
“So you’re the ethical opportunist?” Her laugh is bitter. “That’s your defense?”
“I’m not defending it.” I stand slowly, needing her to understand even if she can’t forgive. “I’m explaining the reality I operated within. Sartore was handling Ethan regardless of what I did. The choice wasn’t between saving him or profiting—it was between profiting or letting competitors capitalize on the same market gap.”
Diana crosses to me suddenly, her hand striking my chest hard enough that I feel the impact through my shirt.
“You should have saved him.” Tears stream down her face now, the devastation complete. “You had resources, connections, the ability to intervene in ways that might have mattered. But you chose money over his life.”
“I chose organizational stability over starting a war.” My voice roughens despite my effort to maintain control. “Yes, I profited from that choice. I won’t apologize for that because the alternative wouldn’t have changed Ethan’s outcome.”
She hits my chest again, then a third time, each strike losing force until her hands just rest against me. “You’re disgusting.”
The vulnerability in her voice—the raw admission that she wants me despite everything—hits harder than any accusation. I catch her wrists gently, holding them against my chest where she can feel my heartbeat accelerating.
