My phone buzzes again. Katya, another message about Mother. The guilt twists like a knife. My mother is dying, asking for me, and I'm fleeing Chicago with the woman whose family killed Mikhail. But if I go to Moscow now, Sofia dies. The choice is no choice at all.
"Where are we going?"
"The lakehouse. It was Mikhail's favorite place. No one goes there anymore."
She flinches at my brother's name, guilt flickering across her face. But she keeps packing, understanding what it means that I'm taking her to his sanctuary.
"Why not?"
"Too many ghosts."
I watch her fold my shirt into a bag, the domestic gesture surreal against the violence still hanging in the air. Someone in my organization just sent an execution order. The betrayal cuts deep, but not as deep as the fear that next time I won't be fast enough.
"I'll find who ordered this," I promise, voice dropping to that register that makes grown men pray. Starting with that fucker, Pavel. "I'll make them watch as I peel their conspiracy apart layer by bloody layer."
"We leave now," I tell her. "Through the service entrance. Same one you used for your midnight escapes. Can't trust the main routes now."
She nods, then holds up the knife she's still clutching. "Good thing I kept this."
"Where the fuck did you even get that one?"
"This one's from home." The ghost of a smile, even now. "The one hidden in the bottom of the closet is from your kitchen. You were distracted, talking about Mikhail's cooking."
Christ, this woman.
The service entrance smells like cigarette smoke from the guards. Sofia knows this route better than I do. She's used it enough times. Every shadow could hide another assassin, every echo another betrayal.
We emerge near the garage, slip into my car without anyone seeing. As I drive, Sofia's hand finds my thigh, warm and steady, anchoring me when everything feels like it's dissolving.
Chicago falls away behind us, city lights fading to black highway. My phone lights up again with Katya's number, but I send it to voicemail. My sister's messages are increasingly desperate. Mother is fading fast, might not make it through the week. The guilt eats at me, but Sofia's life matters more than my mother's last words. Mikhail would understand that, at least.
"You're sure about this?" Sofia asks, though we both know it's too late to turn back.
"I'm sure I can't protect you there," I say, nodding toward the compound disappearing in the rearview. "And I'm sure you're not dying on my watch."
She squeezes my thigh, and something passes between us. Understanding. Recognition that we're both orphans now, cut off from our families by choice and circumstance.
The road stretches ahead, dark and uncertain. In the mirror, I swear I see him. Mikhail, watching from the back seat, that gentle smile that always made me feel like I was failing him. Taking his killer's sister to his sanctuary, about to live with her in his space.
My brother's ghost follows us through the darkness, and I wonder if he's horrified or if somehow, impossibly, he understands.
"How long?" Sofia asks.
"Two hours."
Two hours until I walk into my brother's abandoned dreams with the woman I've chosen over his memory. Two hours to figure out if ghosts can forgive. Two hours before I have to explain to Katya why I'm not on a plane to Moscow, why I'm choosing a Rosetti over our dying mother's last wishes.
I drive through the darkness with her hand on my thigh and my brother's ghost in the rearview mirror, leaving everything behind for the woman who cost me everything and became everything anyway.
22 - Sofia
Two hours of silence, and now the lakehouse emerges from morning mist like something from a Russian fairy tale. My legs are stiff from the drive, from sitting beside Alexei while he gripped the wheel and said nothing, lost in whatever ghosts already haunted him before we even arrived.
The wooden structure rises from the fog, wraparound porch, traditional Russian architecture softened by obvious neglect. Even from here, I can see the tactical disadvantages: too many windows, multiple entry points, isolated location with no backup routes. My hand drifts unconsciously to my thigh where my knife should be, finding only the soft fabric of my dress.
Alexei cuts the engine. Neither of us moves.
"It's been empty for years," he says, voice rough from disuse.
