The Volkov's inheritance: 90 days to rule

Chapter 3:The dead man switch

Adrian’s POV

“Where the hell are we going?”

My voice came out rough, scraped raw from the rain and the shouting. The back seat of Raven’s SUV smelled like gunpowder and expensive leather. Water dripped from my hair onto the dark seats. My clothes stuck to my skin. Every time the vehicle hit a bump, glass from the shattered rear window shifted under my boots.

I sat in the middle, staring at the back of Dominic Voss’s silver head. My hands wouldn’t stop shaking. I kept seeing my apartment. The small studio I had hated every single day. The leaky ceiling. The worn-out couch that sagged in the middle. And the photo album. The only pictures I still had of my mother. All of it turned to ash while I sat in a dive bar drinking five-euro wine.

A cold, hard rage settled in my chest. It was sharper than anything I had ever felt. Damien had taken my job. Enzo had taken my home. And now I was sitting between two strangers who expected me to trust them with my life.

Raven’s eyes flicked to the rearview mirror every few seconds. She drove like the roads belonged to her, weaving through late-night traffic without ever touching the brake longer than a heartbeat.

“A secure location,” she said. “Enzo will have the city locked down by midnight. We need to get off the main roads.”

I leaned forward and gripped the back of the passenger seat. “You said my father hired you. When? How?”

She didn’t look at me. “Six months ago. He knew Enzo was planning to move against him. He hired me as insurance. A shadow to watch his back.”

“But he didn’t hire you to protect me.” The bitterness in my voice surprised even me. “He hired you to protect himself.”

“At first,” Raven admitted. Her hands stayed steady on the wheel. “Three days ago everything changed. The night he was killed, he called me. He told me Enzo had made his move. He gave me one final order.”

“What was it?”

“To find you. To keep you alive. And to make sure you claimed what was yours.”

Dominic turned in his seat. His face looked older under the passing streetlights. “Your father knew he was going to die, Adrian. He wanted to make sure you survived long enough to inherit.”

I laughed, short and ugly. “So he watched me. For six months you had a bodyguard following me around. Watching me get fired. Watching me get framed. Where were you when Damien planted that carburetor in my locker?”

Raven’s jaw tightened. “I was outside. But I wasn’t hired to protect your reputation. I was hired to keep you alive. If I had stepped in, I would have blown my cover. Enzo would have known your father had a plan.”

“So you just let it happen.”

“Your father paid me to make sure your heart kept beating,” she said, voice flat and cold. “Not to babysit your feelings.”

I opened my mouth to snap back, but Dominic pointed at the dashboard.

“Raven. Problem.”

Two black sedans pulled out from a side street and cut through traffic like knives. They were moving fast, weaving between cars, headlights locked on us.

“They found us,” Raven muttered. She slammed her foot down.

The SUV surged forward. I was thrown back against the seat hard enough to knock the air from my lungs.

“Get down!” she yelled.

I dropped. A second later, a heavy CRACK echoed through the cabin. The rear window spiderwebbed into a thick, milky fracture, holding the bullet in the polycarbonate layer. "Armored glass," Raven muttered. "It won't hold against rifles. Stay down!”

Dominic shouted and clutched the briefcase to his chest like it could stop bullets. Raven spun the wheel. Tires screamed. We took a hard left into a narrow side street, the two sedans right on our tail.

I stayed on the floor, covering my head, but then I heard it.

The engine.

It was misfiring. A tiny stutter. A hesitation in the rhythm of the pistons. Anyone else would have missed it under the rain and the broken glass and the roaring engines behiund us. But I had spent my whole life listening to machines. I knew the sound of something dying.

“They hit the fuel line!” I yelled from the floor. “You’re losing pressure!”

Raven’s eyes met mine in the rearview mirror. “What?”

“The fuel line! It’s leaking! If you keep pushing it like this the engine is going to seize or blow!”

“How do you know that?” Dominic shouted.

“Because I’m a mechanic!” I snapped, pulling myself up. Glass bit into my palm. “I fix cars for a living! Pull into the tunnel ahead. There’s a maintenance exit on the right!”

Raven didn’t argue. She swerved hard into the mouth of an old construction tunnel. The black sedans followed, headlights flashing against wet concrete walls.

The engine was sputtering violently now. The temperature gauge climbed into the red.

“Turn it off!” I yelled. “Coast it!”

She killed the ignition. The SUV coasted deeper into the dark, slowing fast. Raven yanked the emergency brake. We slid sideways and stopped hard behind a stack of concrete barriers.

The two sedans flew past the tunnel entrance, taillights vanishing into the rain. They hadn’t seen us duck in.

Silence dropped over the vehicle like a blanket. The only sounds were the rain drumming on the roof and the three of us breathing hard.

Raven turned around in her seat. Those ice-blue eyes studied me with a new kind of attention.

“Not bad, mechanic,” she said.

I wiped a thin line of blood from my forehead where a piece of glass had nicked me. “Where’s the safe house?”

“Ten blocks. We walk.”

We left the SUV behind and ran through the rain. My wet clothes clung to me like a second skin. Every streetlight felt like a spotlight. Every shadow looked like it might hold another gun. Raven moved like she had been born in the dark. Dominic struggled to keep up, still clutching the briefcase.

The building she led us to looked like nothing. Gray concrete. No sign. No windows on the lower floors. She took us down a ramp into an underground garage, through a heavy steel door that required both a code and a keycard, then up a narrow flight of stairs.

The apartment on the other side was sterile. Bare walls. No windows. A bank of monitors along one wall showed camera feeds of every entrance and the street outside. It felt like a bunker built for people who expected to die here.

A woman sat at a metal table in the center of the room. Tailored black pantsuit. Dark hair pulled back in a severe bun. She was typing on a tablet with quick, precise movements. She looked up when we came in. Her face was sharp, beautiful, and completely empty of warmth.

“You’re late,” she said.

“We got held up,” Raven answered, already walking to a cabinet for a medkit.

The woman’s eyes landed on me. She looked me up and down—wet clothes, blood on my forehead, grease still under my fingernails that no amount of rain had washed away.

“You must be Adrian,” she said. “I am Victoria Vance. Your father’s Chief Legal Officer.”

I stared at her. Then at Dominic. Then back at her.

“Another lawyer?” The sarcasm came out thick. “How many lawyers did my father need? One finding me in a dive bar and another hiding in a bunker? Did he keep a whole army of you on retainer?”

Victoria didn’t flinch. “I am the one who actually runs the company. Dominic handles the estate. I handle the mess.”

“Well, congratulations.” I dropped into a metal chair. The cold steel bit through my wet pants. “His mess burned my apartment down and tried to put a bullet in my head. Now tell me the truth. What exactly was my father dealing with that got him killed and put a target on my back?”

Dominic and Victoria exchanged a look that lasted too long.

“Tell him,” Victoria said.

Dominic took a deep breath. When he spoke, his voice was heavy with something that sounded like shame.

“Your father was not a legitimate businessman, Adrian. Volkov Shipping was a front. He was involved in arms dealing, extortion, smuggling… He was a criminal. I was the lawyer who cleaned up his messes for forty years.”

I felt a cold chill run down my spine.

“And you defended him?” My voice started shaking. “You knew he was a monster and you just… signed the checks? You helped him?”

“I was young and greedy,” Dominic said. His eyes were wet. “I told myself it was just business. By the time I understood how deep the evil went, I was already in too deep.”

“Get away from me.” I stood up so fast the chair scraped across the floor. My hands were shaking again, but this time it wasn’t from cold. “You’re just as bad as him.”

“Enough,” Victoria cut in. Her voice was sharp as glass. She stepped between us, cold eyes fixed on mine. “You are right. Your father was a monster. Dominic is a coward. But Enzo Santi is worse. And we don’t have time for a morality crisis.”

“We don’t have time for a morality crisis,” Victoria cut in. Her voice was sharp as glass. She stepped between us, cold eyes fixed on mine. “You are right. Your father was a monster. Dominic is a coward. But Enzo Santi is worse. And tomorrow morning, the board of directors is meeting. If you are not there to claim your provisional seat, Enzo will vote you out and take control of the company.”

I stared at her. A thought suddenly struck me. A cold, sharp realization that made no sense.

“Wait,” I said, my voice tight. “Back in the alley. The men who attacked us. They didn't aim for my chest. They aimed low. At my leg.” I looked at Victoria. “If Enzo killed my father to take the company, why not just kill me? Why send men to capture me?”

Victoria stopped. She looked at Dominic, then back at me.

“Because he can't,” she said quietly.

“What do you mean he can't?”

“Your father was paranoid, Adrian. He built a failsafe into the will. A Dead Man's Switch. If you die before you claim the inheritance, the entire company is instantly liquidated. And a file containing every crime Enzo has ever committed is sent straight to Interpol. Enzo would lose the money and spend the rest of his life in prison.”

I felt the air leave my lungs. “So he’s not trying to kill me.”

“Not directly,” Victoria said. “He has to beat you legally first. He has to force you to sign away your rights, or get the board to disqualify you. Once you are legally out, the switch shuts off. And then he can put a bullet in your head.”

I stared at her. “I don’t want his blood money. I don’t want any of this.”

“You don’t have a choice.” She didn’t raise her voice. She didn’t need to. “If you walk away, you lose every layer of protection we can still offer. He will hunt you. And he will find you.”

“Let him hunt me,” I snapped. “At least I’ll die with a clear conscience.”

Victoria’s eyes narrowed. She leaned forward slightly, voice dropping to a cold, precise whisper.

“And what about Damien Cross?”

The name hit me like a fist to the chest.

I hadn’t told her about Damien. I hadn’t told her anything about my life beyond what happened in the last twelve hours.

“How do you know that name?” My voice came out tight.

Victoria didn’t flinch. She picked up her tablet, tapped the screen once, and turned it toward me. A photograph filled the display. Damien at some yacht party, laughing with a bottle of champagne in his hand. The same arrogant smirk he had worn when he fired me that morning.

“I know everything about you, Adrian,” she said. “I know you grew up in the slums. I know your mother died when you were twelve. I know you worked at Cross Motors for four years. And I know that Damien Cross framed you for stealing that carburetor.”

My blood ran cold. She knew everything.

“He destroyed your life,” Victoria continued. “He humiliated you in front of everyone. He took your job, your reputation, your money, and your home. If you walk away tonight, he wins. He keeps his dealership. He keeps his money. He keeps his perfect reputation. And you spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder, wondering when he or the people he answers to will finally finish the job.”

I stared at the tablet. The rage that had been sitting in my chest all day boiled over until it felt like it might burn through my ribs.

“He framed me,” I said, voice shaking. “He burned my apartment. He tried to erase me.”

“We don’t know how deep his connection to Enzo runs yet,” Victoria said carefully. “But we know he is not clean. And we know the only way to destroy a man like Damien Cross is from a position of greater power. You have exactly ninety days to prove to the board that you can run this company. If you fail, the company is liquidated, Enzo takes what's left, and we all die.”

She placed the tablet on the table in front of me and straightened.

“Sit down, Adrian. I’m going to teach you how to be a shark.”

I looked at the photo of Damien still glowing on the screen. I looked at Raven standing near the monitors with her arms crossed. I looked at Dominic, who couldn’t meet my eyes.

Then I sat down.

The metal chair was still cold. My clothes were still wet. The cut on my forehead still stung.

But the rage in my chest had found a new shape.

It wasn’t just survival anymore.

It was going to be war.