Instead, I dream of butterflies with switchblades for wings. Of a man in a chair, hands clenched to stop himself from reaching for me. Of promises that sound like threats and threats that sound like promises.
And I don't dream of Mikhail at all.
14 - Sofia
Ican’t stop thinking about his hands on my face, and it’s making me useless.
My first full day in his quarters, first morning waking in his bed. Alexei left before dawn for meetings, business, the weight of responsibility that never lets him rest. He paused at the door, looking back at me tangled in his sheets, and there was something in his eyes that said we need to talk about last night. But no time. Never enough time.
Now I'm alone in his quarters, pacing like a caged animal. The restless energy builds with each step from bed to window, window to dresser, dresser to door. I'm wearing one of his shirts, borrowed without asking because I refuse to put on another rough cotton dress. The white fabric hangs to mid-thigh, soft against my skin. Nothing underneath because my only pair of panties is still drying in the bathroom from when I washed them last night. The shirt barely covers what needs covering, and every movement reminds me I'm essentially naked in his space.
The fabric brushes my bare thighs with each step, a constant reminder of my vulnerability. My body heats. Even confusion can't stop the way I respond to being wrapped in his scent. Cedar and smoke cling to the cotton, surrounding me, making my nipples tighten beneath the thin fabric.
"What if I won't regret it?" That's what I told him last night, vodka making me brave. What kind of thing is that to say to the man holding you captive?
I should be planning. Strategizing. Reasserting my power in this situation, finding ways to escape, to gather more intelligence. Instead, I'm replaying the way his thumb brushed my lip, how he almost kissed me before pulling back. How he spent the night in that chair rather than risk touching me.
The bedroom feels smaller with each circuit of my pacing. Always locked. Always watching. The cameras track my restless movement, and I wonder if he's watching from wherever his meetings take him. The thought makes my skin flush. Him seeing me like this, barely dressed in his clothes, restless with want I can't name.
I need to move. To do something. To remember I'm a weapon, not some lovesick girl drowning in borrowed shirts and confusion.
The main door is locked, of course. Electronic, requiring his thumbprint or override code. But there's another door, the one I noticed when the guards first brought me here. Connected to his bedroom, the private study I've been curious about since I first saw it. Not the one where he conducts business. Something more personal.
I shouldn't. This is his space, his sanctuary. But restlessness wins over caution.
The lockpick slides from my hair, warm from my body heat. The door's lock is good, German-made, expensive, but not impossible. Forty seconds of careful work, letting Emilio's tech unpick the electronic lock.
Click.
The study opens before me, and I step through.
Smaller than his main study. Warmer. The air smells of old paper and leather, dust motes dancing in filtered sunlight. Books line every wall including Russian literature, military history, architecture volumes that seem out of place. Another bonsaisits on the windowsill, younger than the one in his bedroom, branches reaching toward the light.
I'm hyperaware this is Alexei's private space. His scent is stronger here, concentrated. My body responds with my pulse jumping, skin heating beneath his shirt.
But it's the boxes that draw my attention. Cardboard boxes stacked against the far wall, labeled in Cyrillic. My spoken Russian is pretty good, I know this from overhearing the guards, but reading Cyrillic is different. The letters swim before my eyes at first, then slowly resolve into meaning. Like my brain is remembering something it once knew. Personal effects. Storage. And a name that makes my chest tight: Mikhail.
I shouldn't look. These are his brother's things, his grief made tangible. But my hands are already opening the first box, the cardboard rough against my fingertips.
Photos spill out. Mikhail at different ages. As a child grinning gap-toothed, as a teenager looking serious over a chess board, as a young man laughing at something off-camera. Architecture magazines, dog-eared and annotated in neat handwriting. A telescope, folded small but well-maintained.
The remnants of a boy who wanted to build things, not destroy them.
Something about his face in these photos tugs at me. Not just familiarity from the pictures I've seen before. Something deeper. Like a song I've forgotten the words to but still hum unconsciously.
The second box holds clothes. A jacket that still smells faintly of cologne. A watch, stopped at 3:15. And at the bottom, wrapped in tissue paper, a leather diary.
My hands tremble as I unwrap it. The leather is worn soft from handling, warm against my palms, edges frayed from years of use. Mikhail Volkov embossed in Cyrillic on the cover. Ishouldn't read this. It's private, sacred, the interior world of a dead boy.
I open it anyway.
Most entries are in Russian. The Cyrillic letters should be indecipherable, but as I stare at them, something shifts in my mind. Like a door creaking open. I can read them, slowly at first, then faster as some dormant part of my brain awakens. When did I learn to read Russian? The same time I learned to speak it? In that garden I can't quite remember?
Complaints about his father. Notes about books he's reading. Observations about architecture, about light, about the way buildings breathe.
Then I find it. An entry dated three months before he died:
"S came to the garden today. She's learning Russian faster than I expected. Her accent is still terrible but she laughs when I correct her. I think I'm teaching her more than words. I think I'm teaching her how to be brave."
