The knife wavers slightly, pulling back from Katya's throat by a fraction of an inch. Not much, but enough to give me hope.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see Alina. She's watching me with an expression I can't quite read. Surprise, maybe. Or something deeper. She's seeing a side of me I don't show often. The man who chooses negotiation over violence when it serves his purpose.
"Don't listen to him," the older man hisses. "He's lying. He'll kill us both the second we let her go."
I don’t say anything.
The younger man’s eyes meet mine, and I see the war playing out behind them. Fear and desperation and the faint glimmer of hope. His hand is still shaking, but the knife has pulled back another fraction.
“You can walk away,” I say smoothly. “Start over. Find new employment. Live."
The seconds stretch out, each one feeling like an eternity. Katya is crying silently, tears streaming down her young face. Alina stands frozen, her hands still raised, her green eyes locked on her sister.
And I wait. Patient. Controlled. Giving the men the space to make this choice.
Finally, the younger man’s shoulders slump. The fight goes out of him all at once, and I see the moment he surrenders. "I'm sorry," he whispers. "I'm so sorry."
He shoves Katya forward, hard, and the girl stumbles toward Alina. At the same moment, both men turn and run for the jet.
"Take them,” I say calmly into my comm.
The first shot drops the younger one before he makes it three steps. The second takes down his companion a heartbeat later. Both men fall to the tarmac and don't move again.
29
ALINA
Katya stumbles forward, and I catch her before she hits the tarmac. We collapse together, my arms wrapping around her small frame as sobs tear from both our throats. She's shaking so hard I can feel it in my bones, her fingers clutching at my sweater like I might disappear if she lets go.
"I've got you," I whisper into her dark hair, breathing in the familiar scent of her shampoo beneath the smell of fear and sweat. "I've got you, Katya. You're safe now."
She makes a sound that's half laugh, half sob, and buries her face in my shoulder. I hold her tighter, one hand cradling the back of her head, the other pressed against her spine. The cold concrete beneath us seeps through my jeans, but I don't care. Nothing matters except the fact that my sister is alive, breathing, here in my arms.
Around us, Dimitri's men are securing the area. I hear their voices speaking in low Russian, the sound of bodies beingmoved, vehicles starting. But it all feels distant, muffled, like we're in a bubble where only the two of us exist.
After what feels like hours but is probably only minutes, I pull back enough to look at her face. My hands frame her cheeks, and I study her in the harsh security lights. There's a bruise blooming along her left cheekbone, purple and angry. Her bottom lip is split, crusted with dried blood. More bruises circle her wrists where zip ties cut into her skin.
Rage burns hot in my chest, but I push it down. Later. I can be angry later. Right now, Katya needs me calm.
"Are you hurt anywhere else?" I ask, my hands moving to check her arms, her ribs, looking for injuries I can't see. "Did they… did they do anything to you?"
She shakes her head quickly, understanding what I'm really asking. "No. They just… they kept me locked in a room. They hit me when I tried to fight, but they didn't..." Her voice breaks. "They said they were saving me for something. I didn't know what that meant."
Relief floods through me so intense it makes me dizzy. "It doesn't matter now. You're safe. I promise you, Katya, no one is ever going to hurt you again."
She looks at me with those brown eyes that are so much like our father's, and the question I've been dreading spills from her lips. "Where's Papa? Where's Mama? What happened at the church? Everyone said you were dead, that Dimitri Morozov killed you, but then those men came and took me and I didn't know what to believe."
I don't know how to answer. How do I tell my sixteen-year-old sister that our father orchestrated a massacre at my wedding?That he sold me to his enemies? That he tried to have me killed? That I put three bullets in his chest and watched him die?
How do I tell her that our mother knew, or at least suspected, and did nothing?
"It's complicated," I say at last, the words feeling inadequate. "Papa… Papa made some bad choices. He got involved with dangerous people, and things went wrong."
"Is he dead?" Her voice is small, frightened.
I can't lie to her. Won't lie to her. She deserves the truth, even if it's ugly. "Yes."
She stares at me for a long moment, and I see her processing this information. Tears well in her eyes, but she doesn't look surprised. Maybe she already knew, on some level. Maybe she'd seen the darkness in our father that I'd been too blind to recognize until it was too late.
