The realizations came in waves, each one worse than the last.
She left on her own.
She didn't want me to find her.
She went to the Belyaevs.
That last thought was the one that made my vision tunnel, that made the cheerful morning coffee shop fade to white noise and peripheral blur. Sophie had walked into Anton's hands. Had offered herself up like a sacrifice because she thought it would save Mikhail. Because I'd been so focused on protecting her that she'd decided to protect me instead.
My hands couldn't hold the phone. It clattered against the trash can's metal edge, and somewhere far away someone was asking if I was okay, if I needed help, if they should call someone. But I couldn't process words. Could barely process oxygen.
She went to Anton. To the man who wanted to marry her, who'd called her family, who'd slapped her hard enough to make her scream during that phone call yesterday. To the Belyaev warehouse where they were holding Mikhail, where they had weapons and soldiers and every advantage.
And I'd slept through it. Had held her last night while she lied about trusting me, about staying safe, about letting me handle this. Had believed her because I'd wanted to believe her, because the alternative—that Sophie would sacrifice herself—was too horrible to consider.
But she had. She'd made a choice while I slept. Had kissed me goodbye—that's what that "I love you" had been, a goodbye disguised as comfort—and walked into hell because she thought saving me was worth destroying herself.
I'd promised her safety. Had claimed her at the auction specifically to keep her out of Belyaev hands. Had built walls around her, had planned contingencies, had thought seventeen moves ahead except for the one move that mattered—the possibility that Sophie's courage would be greater than my control.
My phone buzzed. Kostya calling, probably wanting to know what the fuck was happening.
I couldn't answer. Could barely breathe around the weight crushing my chest.
The barista was approaching cautiously, asking something about calling someone, about whether I needed to sit down. But sitting down felt impossible when standing was already taking every bit of strength I had left.
I grabbed Sophie's phone from the trash with hands that wouldn't stop shaking, clutching the rose gold case like it was her instead of just the electronic ghost of her. The screen was still showing the location app, that blue dot still pulsing right here where she wasn't.
The morning light through the coffee shop windows was too bright. Too normal. Too full of people living their regular lives while mine had just ended.
I had to get out.
Thewarroomwastoo quiet. I was sitting at the mahogany table—didn't remember walking here from the car, didn't remember Kostya and the security detail bringing me back to the compound.
But here I was.
The chess board sat in front of me, entirely empty. No game in play anymore.
My hands were flat on the table but they were shaking. Not slightly. Violently. Like they were mocking me for thinking I'd ever understood strategy, for believing I could plan seventeen moves ahead when I couldn't even see one move—the most obvious move, the one Sophie had been planning while I held her.
Sophie was gone.
The thought kept circling, a feedback loop I couldn't escape. Gone. To Anton. To the Belyaevs.
Very brave. Very stupid.
She was both. Was the bravest person I'd ever known and also completely insane for thinking this would work.
My breathing was wrong. Too fast, too shallow, the kind of hyperventilation that meant panic attack, that meant my anxiety disorder had finally found something real to panic about instead of just catastrophizing normal situations. My vision was going dark at the edges. Tunnel vision, the clinical part of my brain supplied. Symptom of inadequate oxygen to the brain. Breathe slower. Breathe deeper.
But I couldn't. My body had forgotten how breathing worked. My hands were numb. Fingers tingling like they'd been disconnected from nerve endings. The squares of the chess board in front of me were blurring, doubling, becoming abstract shapes that didn't mean anything.
This is how I die.
Not from bullets or betrayal or any of the normal ways Pakhans died. From failing Sophie. From being outsmarted by her desperate courage. From loving her so much that losing her was causing my body to shut down completely.
From my heart, breaking in two.
Mikhail was still captive. Still in Anton's hands. Still waiting for rescue that wasn't coming because I'd been focused on Sophie, on keeping her safe, on solving the wrong problem while the right problem was her solving it herself.
