As I entered one particular street, a sense of excitement coursed through my body. Quickly, I searched the numbers of the houses… until I found myself outside a block of luxurious apartments. Somehow I was certain it was the address I wanted.

Security guards paced menacingly in front of the glass-walled entrance. I slunk back into the mouth of a nearby alley, melding with the shadows, eyes fixed on the door.

I waited for hours, hours spent skulking around the building, scoping out a way in. But it was impenetrable, far too protected. Then when dawn broke, a large dark-haired man with a buzz cut, looking as though he was in his mid-twenties, walked out of the building, strutting his built frame like he owned the fucking world. Every hair on the back of my neck pricked, followed by rage igniting in my stomach.

It only took one glance to know I was looking at Alik Durov, the cunt I was going to kill. Everything about him from his Slavic face and closely shaven head to his built body screamed wealth and arrogance—I detested the fucker on sight. I would take pleasure in making this kill. I’d draw it out to intensify the bastard’s pain.

A few seconds later, a large black car pulled up in front of the building. The dick, Durov, stepped in the driver’s side and took off down the street. Like lightning, I took off at a sprint, hugging the still-darkened edge of the pathway. I tried to keep up with the car, but I knew even at my fastest pace I couldn’t track the car.

Two blocks down, the car was held up in heavy traffic. Crossing the busy road, horns blared at me, but I had a single-minded purpose—to confront this asshole alone, somewhere.

The car turned right and I followed it three blocks down to a deserted parking lot, a deserted parking lot next to a large warehouse, a warehouse that Durov parked in front of, and slowly he got out.

Reaching into my pockets, I slid on my prized bladed knuckledusters and clenched my fists, enjoying their cold touch on my skin. I stared at Durov’s back, imagining where I would sink the spikes—his skull so I could watch his blood spurt like a geyser, the top of his neck, circling around his body to witness the life leave his eyes, his kidneys so I could watch his body die slowly, internal organs shutting down one by one, or straight into his heart, quick, effective, mortal.

Moving stealthily round the lot’s perimeter, I made my approach, stopping only to swipe dirt below my eyes, leaving the choice of killing blow to my instincts. Suddenly, a side door flew open, an older, hard-faced man stepping through.

“Durov! Get your ass in here. You’re late!”

Durov.

It was Alik Durov.

My target… my kill.

Durov laughed at the man and, within seconds, he was in the building. Pissed at the missed opportunity, I checked around to make sure I wasn’t being watched. Then I jogged across the warm asphalt, making sure my hood covered my head and hid my face. Something about this whole scenario felt too much like I’d been here before. Like I hadn’t spent my life trapped in the Gulag hell, killing for survival, piercing flesh and taking lives. No, something, some twist of my gut told me Brooklyn, New York, meant something to me, like some sense of my past was clawing its way out from under my skin.

Circling the warehouse, I found a small window. Ducking down to the ground, my chest to a patch of dirt, I peered inside and my blood began pumping at the sight.

A training gym… and Durov walked up to a bag and began throwing punches.

He was training to fight.

Fight.

I was made to fight.

It’s all I knew how to do.

My eyes flared, anticipation running through my veins. I knew this setup. I’d lived this for years and years. And the cage… every link of metal, every spring of the floorboard, every inch of razor wire was my home. Every stain of blood on that white surface had made me the man—the monster—I was today. But what really made my heart race was the row of weapons lined on the wall. The chains, daggers, and blades told me all I needed to know: the fights in this place were to the death.

This was a death match ring.

It called to everything I had become—a stone-cold killer, a fighter—and by the look of things, Alik Durov was also a fighter to the death.

As my nostrils flared, my hands began to shake with the rush, the adrenaline, with the plan of revenge forming in my mind. I would join this fight ring, I would slaughter this cunt, and I wouldn’t lose. Never had.

Rising to my feet, I walked through the entrance, the smell of sweat and blood filling my nose. It calmed me right down.

“Who the fuck are you and what do you want?” My attention snapped to a short, squat man sitting at a small desk. He had pulled out a gun and aimed it right at my forehead. I kept my hood low, shielding my eyes. I would never meet another’s eyes. Something deep inside never let me.

His eyes widened in fear when I stepped forward, the gun not fazing me. “I want to fight. Want in the cage. I want to kill,” I growled in a deep, rumbling voice. I saw the man sizing me up, pissing himself—I wasn’t surprised. I was tall, built like a fucking tank, tattooed, scarred… fucking dead inside.

I had nothing to lose. I feared nothing, not even death. Death would be a welcome end to the life I’d lived. But before my end, I would be taking down one Alik Durov with me… and I wanted to finally know why.

“You got a sponsor?”

I said nothing, and the asswipe took my silence for a no.

Standing up, he kept the gun aimed at my head. He took out a cell and called someone. I recognized the device; the guards were always yapping on the fucking things, depriving me of sleep. Someone obviously answered and a sharp grunt sounded through the speaker.