Yes. He would have. And so would I.
The difference is, Dmitri had a plan when he claimed Kira. A strategy, however ruthless. He knew what he was doing and why.
I have nothing. Just five million dollars of impulse, a woman who hates me, and a war I'm not prepared to fight.
I push back from the desk and stand. The vodka remains untouched. I leave it there.
Outside my office, the house is quiet. Early morning light filters through the windows, pale and thin. The staff move silently, trained to be invisible. Guards patrol the perimeter in careful rotations.
I should sleep. I should eat. I should do any of the practical things that keep a body functional.
Instead, I find myself climbing the stairs.
Her door is at the end of the hallway. I stop outside it, my hand raised to knock, then frozen.
What am I going to say to her? How do I explain seventeen years of violence and strategy and cold calculation? How do I make her understand that the man who brought her coffee between classes and the man who threatens dismemberment are the same person?
How do I tell her I want her without it sounding like another cage?
I press my palm flat against the wood instead of knocking. The door is solid oak, cold under my skin. She's on the other side—I can feel her presence like a gravitational pull.
Is she sleeping? Crying? Planning her escape?
I could walk in. I have the right—I bought her, after all, as Dmitri so bluntly reminded me. I could push open this door and take what I've wanted for two years.
The thought disgusts me.
I drop my hand and step back. Force myself to turn. Walk away down the hallway, each step heavier than the last.
Leaving was the only way I knew how to protect you, I told her.
It was true then. I'm not sure what's true now. All I know is that I can't be near her when I'm like this—raw, uncontrolled, balanced on the edge of something I might not be able to take back.
She deserves answers. She'll get them. But first I need to find something I haven't possessed in two years.
Control.
***
Mrs. Novak finds me in the kitchen an hour later, standing at the window, watching dawn break over the gardens.
"She hasn't touched her breakfast," she says quietly. "Or slept, from what I can tell. She's been sitting at the window since I left her."
My chest tightens. "Has she tried to leave?"
"No. But she asked about phone access. I told her I'd have to check with you."
Phone access. She wants to call someone. Her friends? The police? A lawyer?
It doesn't matter. She can't contact anyone—not until I've explained the situation, made her understand the danger. One wrong word to the wrong person and Sergei Morozov will know exactly where to find her.
"No calls," I say. "Not yet."
Mrs. Novak nods, her expression carefully neutral. She's been with us for twenty years—survived my parents' deaths, watched Dmitri and Anna and me grow into the people we've become. She doesn't judge. She just adapts.
"She's frightened," she says. "Trying not to show it, but she is."
"I know."
