Shocked senseless, Alexei crossed himself. The other three recoiled from his gesture. Pavel’s cocky attitude evaporated and he stared in the direction of his father’s bedroom, lips parted, eyes wide.
Dmitri leaned forward and grabbed the vodka bottle. He chugged half of it down, then clutched it against his chest and said, “Family meeting. Let’s go out on the balcony.”
Ivan led the way, opening the sliding glass door, and Alexeiwas swept along outside with the others. Their balcony was sheltered by an awning that Pavel and Ivan had tied securely in place a few months ago. It stretched above their heads like a ceiling, and the family replaced it every couple of years. Below, the filthy alley that separated their dirty brick skyscraper from the dirty brick skyscraper opposite was bathed in pink and gold from the rising sun. Rays touched the graffiti that coated the bottom floor, the trash that was piled like snowdrifts.
“He was going to go after the baby,” Dmitri said. “I stopped him. But the mother... the mother was there and saw him...” He took another swig of vodka. The other three brothers traded unguarded looks of horror.
“What about the baby?” Pavel asked.
“I left it in the stroller. Someone will find it.” Dmitri gazed down into the alley. Alexei followed his line of sight. Spray-paint explosions of graffiti promised violence, retribution, revolution. “No one will find the mother.”
There was silence. They did not kill children. That rule was ironclad. But to kill a young mother, to leave the child alone...
“Afterward, Fyodor Pavlovich said I was mistaken, that he only wanted to look at the baby,” Dmitri said. “It was a lie.”
“Yes,” Ivan said. “I saw the whole thing.” Pavel threw him a questioning look, and Ivan said, “I saw them on my way home. Of course I ran into them. It was my usual route.”
Dmitri nodded as if to confirm Ivan’s statement. He and Ivan moved closer together, a unified front. A tick of suspicion—or maybe simply false hope—tugged at Alexei.
“He wouldn’t do that,” Alexei said.
Ivan shook his head. “You weren’t there, Alexei. You didn’t see.”
Alexei tried again. “Hedidn’tdo that. The sin was not committed.”
“ ‘Not committed.’Not committed.” Pavel laughed. “Is that what it says in God’s ledger book? ‘Fyodor Pavlovich Karamazov: Sin number two hundred thousand and seventy-five. Not committed because someone stopped him. Skip to sin number two hundred thousand and seventy-six.’ When no onecouldstop him.”
“We have free will. All of us,” Alexei said. Except... he had been unable to stop himself. The police officer, his first victim. The one he had drained until her heart had given out...
Pavel snorted. “We’revampires. And you’re a balalaika. You’re a dusty lacquer jewelry box with a little fairy-tale princess on the lid. You’re not a monk anymore, little brother. We humor you when you make your little faces and tsk-tsk-tsk at us. But everyone here is a black sheep.”
“Wolf,” Ivan corrected.
Silence. No one came to Alexei’s defense. Angry, frightened, he focused on the graffiti. The wall was a mess, so profane and ugly. Such a display would have been unthinkable back in their days in St. Petersburg. Offenders would have been whipped for vandalism. Or worse. Life had been cruel, and often unjust, but there had been far more respect.
Fyodor Karamazov was their father.
Their father who had turned them into vampires without warning. Without asking. How, he had never said. Nor why.
“He cursed us. He rules us. He treats us like serfs.” Pavel rapped his knuckles on the balcony railing. “Do you have any money of your own? A life of your own?”
“You’re trying to do it again,” Alexei said.
“What?” Pavel raised his eyebrows in feigned innocence.
“Make a case for murdering him.” Alexei lifted his chin. “And I will not discuss it.”
“Lex, Lexi-boy, so stern and sure,” Pavel taunted, cocking hishead and pretending to strum a balalaika. “Don’t you think your god would be happy to have one less of us Karamazovs on this earth? Listen to Dmitri. Your father the precious tsar of your life was going to slaughter an innocent.”
There was silence. Finally, Dmitri said, “Alexei, Pavel has a point.”
“Which you both can make so easily, since you’re the two who killed him in the first place,” Alexei snapped. “You’re a devil, Pavel. And youarea sheep, Dmitri.”
He left them there and stomped into his room. Locked the door just to make his case and stared at the ceiling. Papa was snoring, not a care in the world.
“Oh, my Father,” Alexei blurted, then clamped his mouth shut. He must not pray.
After a time, he got back up and walked into the living room. Ivan should be stationed at the bank of monitors; he wasn’t there. Though the sun was out, Alexei went onto the balcony and watched the people walking through the alley. Guys in jeans and T-shirts, the occasional suit. Women in sleeveless tops and dresses. Kids. A black-and-white dog.
