No. It’s not. Not anymore.Tears sting my eyes. He will never understand what it means to be a mother. It means that you don’t live for yourself anymore. As long as they live, I live for them.
And the pride in his eyes as he looks at me—it can’t be my currency anymore. I can’t have both. So I choose Manya and Karine. There is no question.
“Your mother is just this way,” my father says, and he leads me down one of the many halls. My heart is in my mouth, dread calcifying my bones, rooting me to the spot as one of the guards unlocks a steel door. “Come. Say hello.”
The smell hits me first. A wave of rot, of undeniable death, that strikes me so fully I stagger backward. A guard’s hand catches the back of my neck, as if he were just waiting for the opportunity.
“You wanted so badly to be like her, didn’t you, Annika?” says my father, looking into the dank cell. The damp, freezing, cramped place is empty but for one thing: the body, crumpled on the cement floor. Rags and pale skin and the spill of hair, and the wretched, sweet, rich smell of decomposition. “Now, you can be.”
Animal instinct takes over. As the guard thrusts me forward, I dig my heels in, scrabbling desperately. He gets me over the threshold and I slam my hands against the doorframe, gasping as I fight to keep myself out of the room.
“I always thought it was an easy choice,” says my father mildly. “But for you it seemed complicated. This simplifies things, doesn’t it? You promise me your loyalty, but I don’t want your promises. I want proof.”
My father’s voice is in my ear, low and calm.
“If you betray me, you won’t just meet the same fate as your poor, sweet mother. Your children will too. And I will make sure they rot before you; I will make sure you see their faces as they melt, their little bodies as they wither. I won’t let you look into their cell; I will lock you inside of it. Do you understand me?”
Monster. Inhuman. Impossible.
“This is not a game, Annika. This is life. Yours. Theirs. Do you understand me?”
And I do. All at once—I do. “Yes,” I choke out.
“Good.”
The guard releases me. I stagger back from the room, losing my footing, spilling unceremoniously onto the floor. My father gazes down at me as the guard closes and locks the door, as I glimpse my mother for the last time.
“Now,” my father says. “We have some visitors to greet.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
Maxim
Not a soul in sight.
We stalk freely though the dark hallways, but whoever occupied this building mere hours ago has either left or hunkered down. Doors are open everywhere, but the chambers and offices and factory floors we investigate are empty. No warm lightbulbs, no papers, no jackets or full trash bins. The place could have been abandoned for years.
But we know better. It becomes immediately clear that what we assumed would be a violent shootout is going to be something more like a siege, ambush, or stealth mission. No doubt Viktor Desyatov knows we’re here. Maybe they’re waiting for us to step into some kind of trap. Maybe they’re hunkered down deep in the guts of this place, prepared to wait us out.
Maybe they’re hiding, and we simply need to find them.
Annika.I wish I could say that I sense her, but I don’t. I don’t know if she’s alive or dead, wounded or alright. I don’t know if she’s fighting or waiting to be rescued. I don’t know if she has chosen a side.
We’ve reached a massive factory-type floor, when Sacha stops me, hand on my chest. My men, fifteen of them in total, trail to a near-silent stop, guns held to chests and eyes peeled. They look for all the world like a troop of soldiers, not a bunch of street-risen Russian gangsters. It gives me little comfort.
“What is it?” I ask Sacha, voice low. I take in the sprawling space: extremely high ceilings, cement walls and floors, behemoth structures with conveyor belts falling into disarray. Dust and rust cover every inch of the giant metal machines. Clearly they haven’t been used in years.Ghost town.The thought sends a shiver down my spine. “Sacha.”
Sacha has his rifle in one hand, phone in the other. His eyes are wide. “The tracker.”
Annika.“What?”
“It just turned on.” He straightens, looking to his left. “There.” At the far end of the factory floor, there’s a metal staircase. Snow flutters down from the dark landing above. “Up there.”
“Let’s go.” I move toward it, but Sacha stops me again. “I know it might be a trap. What other choice do we have? Maybe it’s not. Maybe she’s leading us to them.”
Sacha releases me, expression cold and wary. “I hope you are right about her.”
I do too.I nod once, and stalk toward the staircase. I look up once we reach it. Cold wind howls down from the upper level. Through breaks in the high ceiling, snow falls freely. Silently, I move up the stairs, men in tow.
