Loving The Bratva Boss

Chapter 16

Nikolai's POV

The estate is too quiet.

Not the peaceful kind of quiet. The wrong kind. The kind that makes the back of my neck go tight.

I step into the room, jaw clenched. Gio walks beside me, waiting for an order. I don't give one yet.

My phone buzzes.

Domenico: No movement from the east side. Sensors still dead.

I curse under my breath. Dead sensors don't just die. Not on my grounds. Not with the redundancies I built myself. Something has been tampered with.

Someone is inside my home.

I head down the hall, fast, purposeful steps echoing against marble. My priority is clear:

Isabella.

She was supposed to be in the sitting room with Irina. When I check the live hallway feeds—it's empty.

Irina is nowhere.

Isabella is nowhere.

My blood goes cold.

"Find Irina," I tell Gio. "Now."

"And the girl?"

"I'll find her myself."

I don't wait. I move.

My estate is a fortress, but every fortress has a weakness—and right now, I can feel someone pressing on mine.

—

I take the back stairwell two steps at a time. On the second floor, the power flickers. Once. Twice.

Then the lights cut out entirely.

Emergency strips glow dimly along the floor, barely enough to see.

Someone is inside the grid.

Inside my system.

And I know exactly what that means:

The rat is not just sending information out—they're letting people in.

Gunfire cracks from the west wing. Not the loud, echoing kind. Suppressed.

Professional.

My heart slams once, hard. Not from fear.

From anger.

I move faster.

—

Isabella's door is cracked open when I reach it.

No.

No, no, no.

I push inside—

And find her pressed into the corner behind the armchair, knees to her chest, hands over her ears, trying not to sob but failing.

Her breathing is sharp, frantic, tearing out of her like she can't pull enough air in.

"Isabella."

She doesn't look up.

Another suppressed shot echoes somewhere deeper in the house—and she flinches so violently her shoulder hits the wall.

Panic attack.

A bad one.

I cross the room in three strides and crouch in front of her. She shrinks back like she expects me to yell.

I don't.

"Isabella." My voice drops, steady, low. "Look at me."

Her wide, glassy eyes lift just enough to catch mine.