His posture had been relaxed, composed, like a man watching an inevitable outcome unfold exactly as planned.
Witness after witness took the stand.
His witnesses.
They spoke of “evidence” with polished certainty—documents I’d never seen, timelines I couldn’t recognize, bank transfers I didn’t make.
A jailhouse informant claimed I’d confessed during a whispered conversation in a holding cell I’d never shared with him.
The prosecution spoke with rehearsed gravity, letting the lies pile up until they looked like truth simply because of their weight.
When it was my turn, I stood alone.
No strategy. No protection. Just my voice.
“I’ve never left the United States,” I’d said, gripping the podium so tightly my fingers went numb. “Check my records. Passport stamps. Airline manifests. Anything. I was fifteen years old when Maria Volkov died. Fifteen. How could I orchestrate a murder across the world?”
My voice had shaken, but I hadn’t stopped.
“I didn’t even know her. I didn’t know him yet.”
Ruslan’s attorneys rose like sharks scenting blood.
They spoke of motive—resentment, jealousy, family grudges inherited like poison. Opportunity through “extended family connections.” They spoke of my sister like a ghost hovering just out of reach, and somehow twisted that absence into proof of my guilt.
“The accused benefited from the chaos,” one of them had said smoothly. “She married into wealth and security after the victim’s death. She gained everything.”
I wanted to laugh. Or scream.
The verdict came swiftly.
Guilty on all counts.
First-degree murder.
The sentence followed like a death knell.
Life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.
When the gavel fell, the sound echoed through my skull like a gunshot.
I’d turned then—just once—to look at Ruslan.
I don’t know what I’d hoped to see.
There was no pity. No doubt. No flicker of conscience.
Only rage—raw, ancient, and unrelenting. Grief that hadn’t dulled with time, sharpened instead into something lethal. And beneath it all, something colder.
Satisfaction.
This was vengeance, complete and precise.
I’d wanted to scream at him.
Why me?
You know it was my sister.
