My heart drops into my stomach.
Ah shit.
Nico!
Nico is Voronin’s son.
"Where is he now?" I ask because terror is a strange, cold thing, and it makes my hands go numb.
"Gone, Oksana!" Grigori roars. "You tip him off?"
"What? NO!" I snap. "Are you fucking insane?"
"You tell that rotten husband of yours?"
"Do NOT call him that," I hiss. "And no—Stephano has no clue. So quit screaming at me before I?—"
"Clue about what?" Stephano cuts in, deadly calm. That tone. The one that means corpses will be involved shortly.
Raf glances at me in the mirror. "Uh, Oksana? What the fuck is happening? Nico’s whatnow?"
"Oh, great," I mutter. "Now you did it, Grigori. Thank you so much."
I hang up on my brother before he can growl something nuclear. The car falls into thick, suffocating silence. Stephano’s eyes are on me.
Dark. Razor-sharp. Demanding.
I inhale.
Exhale.
Decide honesty is the only thing that will keep the man I love from combusting on the spot. "Steph…" I begin, but my voice cracks, and I clear it. "Stephano, Nico is not Gustave’s son."
His entire body goes still. "What are you talking about?"
I hold his gaze because if I look away, I’ll break. "He’s Alexei Voronin."
The world stops.
Stephano blinks once. Twice.
Then: "…fuck."
He doesn't ask if I'm sure. His trust in me is like a knife twisting my heart.
Raf mutters, "Holy shit."
Stephano’s breathing changes, shallow, jagged, weaponized. He’s processing a lifetime of memories and three years of grief in one heartbeat.
I go on because I have to. "Steph… this means he wasn’t Aurelio’s prisoner. Not really. They had three years to work on him. Groom him. Turn him into a Voronin."
He shuts his eyes like the thought physically hurts. "He’s not my brother."
"No," I whisper, and then add words I don't think I've ever said before, "I'm sorry." And I am. I am sorry to have to give him the news, to gut the man I love. To tell him that the man he thought of as a brother isn't.
"Half-brother." Raf tries.
I shake my head. "No."
