Chapter 7 - The Testimony That Turned the Council Against Its Queen
The council convened in a quiet hotel above the Hudson. No one wore ceremonial jewelry. No one knelt. Catherine had forbidden it. She wanted a meeting, not a performance.
Vargas spoke first. “Irina has friends in every port. If you expose her, we risk losing half our agreements.”
“Then we lose them,” Catherine replied.
Sokolov frowned. “And the people employed by those agreements?”
“We replace the criminal contracts with legitimate ones where we can. We pay severance where we cannot. We do not use workers as an excuse to keep moving dangerous medicine.”
The argument lasted four hours. Some members accused Catherine of sacrificing their interests to satisfy the government. Others feared the scandal would destroy every company associated with the Volkov name. Catherine did not dismiss their fears. She answered them with a plan: independent audits, the removal of implicated directors, public reporting, and cooperation with prosecutors.
“Your father would never have agreed,” one man said.
“My father never faced this evidence,” she replied. “And I am not my father.”
When the vote came, Catherine retained her position by one vote. Vargas supported her. Kensington abstained because his firm was reviewing related transactions. Sokolov voted against her, then shook her hand.
“I hope you are right,” he said.
“So do I.”
Outside, Nadia was waiting. “Irina wants to meet you.”
“Where?”
“At the old Volkov residence.”
Catherine had not entered the house in eight years. It stood on a wooded property north of the city, full of photographs that showed her childhood from every angle except the ones that mattered.
Irina greeted her in the dining room. Tea waited between them.
“You have made enemies,” Irina said.
“I already had them. I just know their names now.”
Irina’s expression hardened. “You think the world is divided into innocent people and criminals. It isn’t.”
“No. But there are still choices.”
“Mercer promised the clinics would receive medicine. We had a shortage. He told me the paperwork would be corrected.”
“Did you know the products were counterfeit?”
“Not at first.”
“And later?”
Irina stared at her cup. “Later, I knew enough to stop asking.”
Catherine felt the admission settle between them.
“You could have warned me,” she said.
“I thought I was protecting you.”
“You were protecting the organization.”
Irina did not deny it.
Catherine stood. “I will tell Brooks you are willing to speak.”
“I did not say that.”
“Then you can decide whether you want to help the people who were hurt.”
At the door, Irina said, “I raised you.”
Catherine turned back. “Yes. And I love you. Neither fact makes this acceptable.”
She left before her resolve could break.
That night a journalist published the leaked minutes of the council vote. Catherine’s enemies framed her cooperation as a betrayal of the family. Someone painted a threat across the entrance of Mikhail’s hospital. He called her immediately.
“I’m fine,” he said. “But the staff is frightened.”
Catherine contacted hospital security and the police. She did not send armed men to the wards. She stayed with her brother until dawn, drinking terrible coffee while he finished his shift.
At six, a nurse brought them news. Leo had been discharged to continue treatment at home.
Mikhail smiled for the first time in days. “He asked if you would come see his new tower.”
Catherine smiled back. “Tell him I’ll bring the tallest blocks in New York.”
Her phone buzzed. Agent Brooks had obtained a warrant for Mercer’s office. The senator was under investigation.
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Then another message appeared, this one from an unknown number: VICTOR HAS A COPY OF THE ORIGINAL PATIENT LIST. HE PLANS TO SELL IT.
Catherine’s smile disappeared. The names of sick children were about to become another commodity in the hands of men who valued nothing more than leverage.
