"Therapy was interesting this week. My therapist asked me to do breathing exercises. In through the nose, out through the mouth, while thinking about what triggers my anger. I sat there breathing like an idiot for twenty minutes. Then she asked me to talk about my feelings. About you. About us. About why I can't let you go. I told her everything. How you're the only person who's ever made me feel human. How every day without you feels like suffocating. How I see you in everything I do, every decision I make, every breath I take. She asked if I thought that was healthy. I told her I didn't care. Also my love, I've been working on our house. I repainted the master bedroom to your taste, adding an extra closet, I've bought new Egyptian cotton sheets, with a 1200 thread count. Only the best for the woman who stole my heart. I'm making everything perfect for when you come home. I also bought baby clothes. I couldn't help myself honey. I was walking past a store last week and I saw the tiniest onesies with elephants on them. I just had to buy them. I don't know yet if we'll have a boy or a girl first, but anyone we have first, I'll love them regardless. When are you coming back? It's been a month now. I'm being patient, like I promised, but I miss you so much it physically hurts. How much longer do I have to wait? I love you. I need you. Always yours, Ilay."
I fold the letter with emotions beginning to well up in my eyes, and add it to the drawer with the first one.
• • •
FOUR WEEKS LATER - LETTER 3
I come home from work on a Friday evening, find the third envelope under my door, somehow this particular letter feels heavier.
I pick it up, and open it standing in my hallway, then I manoeuvre my way inside my house.
My sweetheart.
Guess what? I killed my therapist today. She had the audacity to suggest I should "accept your decision" and "move on." Move on from you? As if you're some phase I'm going through. As if you're replaceable. I put a bullet in her head right there in her office. All those degrees on her wall didn't make her any smarter. No one tells me to give up on you. No one. You've only been gone two months. Two months. And already people think I should forget you? Move on? Find someone else? There is no one else. There will never be anyone else.
Do you know that I never loved anything before I loved you? I didn't know I had a heart at all, until you made it beat. Now that heart belongs to you, and you belong to me, me and nobody else. I'll kill every last one of them before I let them take you. I've killed for you. I've bled for you. And you think you can just leave? This good guy act? This therapy bullshit? It's over. I tried it your way. I sat in those stupid fucking chairs and talked about my feelings and did breathing exercises like some weak, pathetic civilian. I put up with it for you. And for what? So you could send me a text saying you've moved on? You haven't moved on. Don't fucking lie to me. You're mine, Iris. You've always been mine. And I'm done being patient. Here's what's going to happen, and listen very carefully. You have 48 hours from the moment you receive this letter to get on a plane and come back to Russia. Not a week. Not three days. 48 hours. If you don't, I'm coming to get you myself. And when I do, I won't knock on your door politely. I won't ask nicely. I will kick downthat flimsy apartment door, drag you out by your hair if I have to, and put you on my plane in handcuffs if that's what it takes. I will fuck you right there on the floor of your apartment so your neighbors can hear you screaming my name. I will remind your body who it belongs to. I will make you come so many times you forget your own name, and then I will chain you to my bed until you're too pregnant to run. And your family? The ones you're so desperate to protect? If you make me come to Germany, if you make me waste my time hunting you down like some disobedient pet, I'm killing all of them, I'll kill every single person in your bloodline until there's no one left. And you'll watch. I'll make you watch while I erase your entire family from existence. And then I'll fuck you over their bodies so you understand what happens when you disobey me. Is that what you want? You want me to be the monster? Fine. I'll be the monster. I have 247 men in Germany right now. They're watching you. Every move you make, every breath you take. I could have taken you back at any time. Any fucking time. But I was trying to be good for you. I was trying to give you space. I was trying to be the man you wanted me to be. But that's over now. 48 hours, my love. Get on a plane, or I'm coming to get you. But if I have to come get you? If I have to hunt you down like prey? Then God help you, angel. Because I won't. The clock is ticking. 48 hours. Don't make me wait. I love you so much it's destroying me. And if I'm being destroyed, I'm taking you with me. Forever yours, whether you like it or not, Ilay."
My voice breaks on the last words.
I keep reading, my hands shaking so badly the paper rustles.
"P.S. I'm stroking myself to your bedroom feed right now. Spread those legs wider for the camera, angel. Show me thatsoaked pussy one last time before I come reclaim it. Moan my name. I'm listening."
The letter falls from my hands. He's watching me. Right now. There's a camera in my bedroom.
I run to my bedroom, throw open the door, climb onto my twin bed, reach up to examine the ceiling. Then I see it. A Tiny, almost invisible small hole in the ceiling above my bed, the lens so small I would have never noticed it if I wasn't looking.
He's been watching me. Since I arrived. He's seen everything. How? I stumble backward off the bed, my legs giving out, falling to the floor while my mind races through every private moment I've had in this apartment, every time I changed clothes, every shower, every night I touched myself thinking about him.
He saw all of it. I crawl to my nightstand, and grab my phone, to pull up my father's number.
It rings once. Twice. Three times. "princess?" My father's voice comes through. "What's wrong?"
"He found me," I sob into the phone. "Dad, he found me, he knows where I live, he's been watching me, he has cameras in my apartment, he sent me a car, he's going to kill you, he's going to kill all of you if I don't go back, I don't know what to do."
"Slow down," he says. "Tell me exactly what happened."
"He sent me letters," I gasp out between sobs. "Three letters over three months. The last one came today. Dad, he killed his therapist. He said he's done being patient. He gave me 48 hours to get on a plane back to Russia or he's coming to get me himself. He said he'll kill you, Roman, Kirill, everyone if I don't go back. He said there's a camera in my bedroom. I found it. It's in the ceiling. He's been watching me this whole time."
Silence on the other end. "Pack a bag," he says finally. "Right now. Don't take anything you don't absolutely need. I'm sending a plane to pick you up tomorrow. You’re going to America. I have a safe house there."
"But he said—"
"I don't care what he said," my father cuts me off. "You're not staying there alone where he can get to you. Pack. Now. Roman will call you with details." The line goes dead.
I sit there on my bedroom floor, staring up at the tiny camera lens in my ceiling. Then my phone buzzes with a text message.
Unknown number. I open it with trembling hands.I told you I'm watching, angel. I saw you find the camera. I heard you call daddy. You now have 22 hours and 47 minutes left. Your stubbornness lost you a few hours. The clock is ticking. Don't make me come get you. I love you.
Another text comes through immediately after.
P.S. That little show you put on for me last night was perfect. The way you moaned my name when you came? Beautiful. Do it again tonight. I'll be watching.
Chapter 40
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IRIS
