“Miss. Move!” the guard commanded. I tried to stand. I pressed my fist to the ground to try to lift myself, but I fell back down. The pain in my head was too much.
“I said leave! That’s an order!” the female repeated.
The men were silent, when the female again said, “Leave! Pereyti teper! Or so help me God I’ll have you punished for insubordination!”
“B‘lyad!” one of the guards shouted in response. “We’ll be watching. If he does anything to you, we’re coming back in to kill the fucker! I don’t care what the knayz’s instructions are. Keeping you alive is our priority. Those are your father’s orders.” I heard the footsteps leave and the door slam shut.
The pain left my head, but my heart still beat too fast. Muscles weak, I fell back to the floor. I could feel the female nearby, but my body was numb. I could barely move.
Forcing myself to turn, the woman was sitting in the corner where I’d put her. Her brown eyes were looking at me in fear. Her hands were still shaking.
I crawled closer, but the chains were too heavy. Collapsing to the ground, I stared at the female’s eyes, but darkness was taking me again.
Darkness was pulling me down.…
Chapter Seven
Talia
Zaal’s body slumped to the floor beside me, and I pressed a hand over my frantic heart, trying to calm down. I closed my eyes and inhaled through my nose. I’d been wrong. So damn wrong. Kostava wasn’t dead, he was very much alive.
I thought back to early this morning. Thought back to the moment I’d looked at Zaal’s lifeless body on my laptop screen. Thought back to the moment my heart chose to control my head.…
As I heard the front door close from downstairs, Ilya and Savin off to patrol the grounds, my palms twitched with the knowledge that it was just me in the house. Just me and Zaal.
My stomach filled with butterflies at seeing his beautiful face again. Checking in on him each morning had become my daily ritual.
Jumping from my bed, I made sure the bedroom door was locked and I ran to my laptop. Zaal had fallen asleep early last night before I’d gone to bed, after minimal movement all day. But I knew he’d be awake right now, right this minute. He was no longer pacing the floor and snarling at anyone who came near as of this week. Rather, he’d sit against the wall, his head often hanging low, his large body twitching and sweating. But he didn’t move. His jade green eyes were dull when he stared off into space, his attention fixed on nothing.
I didn’t know why, but I watched him, watched him lying there like a broken and abused animal. My chest would ache and no amount of rubbing over the skin could soothe it.
I’d always felt kind of trapped, mentally and emotionally lost in this Bratva life, and staring at Zaal Kostava, the man I was conditioned to hate, just broke my heart. Because he mirrored how I felt. Especially of late, I felt broken and scarred on the inside. He looked broken and scarred on the outside. I felt a connection to the Kostava. I supposed he and I were kindred spirits.
Opening my laptop, I expected to see Zaal in that same slumped sitting position, tied up in chains, hair matted and dressed only in the black pair of sweatpants Luka had insisted he wear when he was drugged that first night.
I clicked on the desktop icon, chose the camera for the basement, and waited with bated breath as it connected. As Zaal came into view, my heart immediately fell. He wasn’t sitting up as expected. He was still sprawled on the ground, body eerily still.
I leaned in closer willing him to move. But two hours passed and he hadn’t even flinched. A deep pit had formed in the center of my stomach. He looked … what if…?