“Do you want to know what I did to her?” he hisses.
He doesn’t say her name, but he doesn’t have to. I can see the fury in his face. The anger he’s suppressing at being duped.
“No.”
“No?” he repeats. “That’s too bad. Because I think it’s important that you know what I did to her when I found out she wasn’t working for me. You see, I had special cameras installed in the baby’s room. Cameras no one but me knew about. Imagine my surprise when I came home, sat down in front of my monitors, and heard her talking to Leo Solovev on a burner phone.”
“Enough,” I say.
“No, it’s not enough,” Spartak lashes out. “It was the worst betrayal I’ve ever experienced. She was with me for years. Fucking years.”
“She was good at her job.”
He shakes his head, still dumbfounded. “She fucked me like she meant it.”
“She did mean it,” I tell him. “She meant it because she needed to convince you of her loyalty in order to kill you one day.”
“Is that your plan, too?” he snarls in my face.
I flinch away from him and try and look as scared as I possibly can. “I’m no spy,” I say. “And despite what my birth name suggests, I’m not Bratva either. I’m just here for my son.”
“Does that mean I won’t have any more trouble from you?”
I nod and look away.
“And what about when I present you with your husband’s head?” he ponders. “What then?”
I stiffen again, but don’t say anything. It’s too horrible to think about, even though I don’t believe that will ever happen.
Leo is far too stubborn to die.
Belov tips his head to the side. “Do you love him?”
I stare at this monster in front of me. This question, I have no trouble answering. “Yes,” I rasp. “I love him.”
“Even after all he’s done to you. He plucked you from your life and threw you to the sharks.”
“You can’t choose who you love.”
He nods. “It’s true. I know the feeling.”
“You?” I scoff. “You know nothing about love. You claim to have loved Ariel, but if that were true, you would never have been able to kill her.”
He laughs. “This is the Bratva, princess. Love means nothing after betrayal. I would have killed my own mother if she’d dared to cross me.”
“That’s because you’re an evil piece of shit.”
“Spare me the theatrics. You don’t think your shining prince would do the same?”
“He’s harsh when he needs to be. Brutal, even,” I say. “But he’s not like you.”
He grabs my jaw suddenly, pulling me towards him so his breath fills my nostrils, rancid and strong. I try to break away, but his grip is so tight that I’m forced to stay still.
“He is exactly like me,” he snarls. “Exactly. And once I’ve fucked the fight out of you, you’ll see that.”
I cringe away from him, and this time, he releases me.
“Never forget who you belong to.” Belov turns away. “You have half an hour with your brat. Then I expect to find you naked and ready in my bed. Understand?”
I nod, but my eyes are fixed on the door. When Belov opens it, I fly through.
It’s not a huge space, but it’s comfortable. Natural light streaming in through the bay windows, illuminating a crib pushed into the corner.
A woman is rocking in a chair next to the crib, her face cast in shadow. She’s in her early thirties with long blonde hair. She stands up when she sees me.
“Who are you?”
“I’m his mother,” I snap. “Move.”
I walk forward and look into his crib.
For a terrifying moment, I actually imagine finding nothing there. That it’ll be empty, that this nightmare story will have a nightmare end.
But then I see him.
I see his dark, beautiful eyes and his dark, fuzzy hair.
I see the features that are slowly starting to take shape just like Leo’s.
“My boy,” I sob. “My baby boy.”
He raises his little fists and bats at the air. I reach down and lift him into my arms. It feels so amazing to feel his weight sink into the crook of my arm.
He coos softly, and I plant tear-stained kisses all over his face. “My boy,” I cry. “My beautiful boy. I’m so sorry I left you. I’m so sorry.”
The woman watches us for a moment, and then sits back down in her chair and opens a book.
Pasha has gotten so much bigger the last few months. I ache at the realization of how much I’ve missed. I’ll never get those moments back. They’re lost to time forever.
“I’ll never leave you again,” I promise him.
I bend down and press a kiss to his cheek. I want to tell him that I’ll get him out of here. That I won’t let him grow up thinking that monster, Belov, is his father.
But I can’t risk saying it out loud.
So I just say it with another kiss. I press my lips to his chubby cheeks. “I’ll take care of you,” I whisper.
Then, in the distance, I hear an explosion.
Followed by gunfire.
The woman jumps to her feet and rushes to the window. I follow, Pasha still in my arms.
We both watch as smoke billows from the far right of the compound. Then, black jeeps appear through the smoke like the four horsemen of the apocalypse, raining bullets as they approach. Mikhailov men fall dead on the grass.
“Jesus,” the woman breathes.
Wrong, I think to myself. Leo.
He’s come for us.
A few minutes of chaos and gunsmoke pass by. It’s hard to make out anything, just the vague, thrashing silhouettes of men doing violence to one another.
Then I see him.
Tall and confident, he fights his way through a line of men. To my surprise, he veers left and jumps onto the roof of one of his own jeeps.
The men before him stop fighting and turn to him, enamored with him the way I am. He was born to be a leader. Born to the power he wields like a deadly weapon.
I strain to hear what he’s saying, but I can’t make out his words. Whatever it is, it seems to get through to the men fighting.
When I see Leo jump down from the jeep and walk into the house, I want to flee the room and run to him. I want to meet him at the front door.
But this fight isn’t over.
Not yet.
The door clicks open, and I pray it will be Leo, even though I know it’s too soon for that. My heart drops when I see the nurse enter the room. She is still wearing the blood-speckled uniform she had on when she slit Semyon’s throat.
Pasha’s nanny rushes forward. “What’s going on? Where are our men?”
“Dead or deserted,” the nurse says coolly. Her eyes flicker to me.
“Oh God… they’re going to kill us…”
“Don’t worry, dear. They won’t kill you,” the nurse says calmly. “I will.”
Then she pulls out a gun and shoots the nanny in the head.
I barely have time to turn and shield Pasha. When I look back, the nanny is on the floor, a pool of blood growing around her.
I face the nurse. I don’t even know her name “Please…”
But before I can finish my thought, we hear footsteps approaching. The nurse turns the gun to me. She closes the distance between us and presses the muzzle to my head.
I squeeze my eyes closed, say a silent prayer, and kiss my son’s forehead.
Whatever happens next is out of my control. I can only cling to my son and think of Leo.
38
LEO