Today, something different moves through me. Something I barely recognize because it’s been buried so deep for so long that I forgot it existed.
I’m angry.
“That’s him.” Pyotr moves toward me as I pick up the phone.
“I assume so,” I agree.
“Tony, start the trace,” Boris orders into the speaker.
“Running,” Tony confirms. “I’m connected to her phone virtually. Keep him on as long as you can.”
Pyotr puts his hand on my shoulder and lowers his mouth to my ear. “You don’t have to answer. I can do it.”
But I do. Not for Tony’s trace or for Boris or for the operation or any of the tactical reasons that make this call valuable.
I have to answer because I have six years of words locked behind my teeth, and this might be the last time I ever get the chance to tell Bogdan Lebedev what I think of him.
I tap the green button and bring the phone to my ear.
“Daria.” His voice sounds nothing like the man I married. The commanding baritone that used to pin me to the floor with a single syllable is gone. What’s left is thin, reedy, and almost breathless.
He has been running since yesterday. And the fact that he doesn’t call me “darling” the way he always does only makes it all the more satisfying.
“Bogdan.” I can’t hide the smile in my voice.
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
I almost laugh. “WhatI’vedone?”
“My warehouse. My people. Six years of work, Daria. Six years of building something from nothing, and you handed it to the Kozlovs on a fucking silver platter.” His breathing is ragged, and I hear a car engine behind him. He’s still moving. Still running. “You destroyed everything.”
The old Daria would have apologized. She would have stammered some excuse, tried to calm him down, and made herself smaller to avoid what came next. That woman lived in survival mode, where the only strategy that kept her alive was appeasement.
That woman died somewhere between the kitchen floor with Pyotr and the armored car where I sat with a phone in my hand, ready to face this man down for the first time in my life.
“Good,” I spit out.
Silence.
“I’m sorry, what did you just say to me?”
“I said good. I’m glad it’s gone. Every cent, document, and pathetic little empire you built on my name without my permission.” I squeeze the phone tighter, and Pyotr’s hand tightens on my shoulder. “You used me, Bogdan. You forged my signatures on accounts I never opened and laundered moneythrough shell companies while I changed diapers and packed lunches. Then you tried to let me take the fall while you hid behind your uncle like a child.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, I do. We’ve pulled every transaction, forged signature, and fake account. It’s all documented, and every single thread traces back to you.”
When he speaks again, his voice drops into the register he used to save for the worst nights. The voice that came before the backhand and a shove into the wall. Before the hours of silent treatment designed to make me question my sanity.
“You think you’re safe because of your fucking Kozlov’s guard dog? You think that man gives a shit about you?” He’s trying to find the crack he can wedge himself into. “He’s using you, Daria. The same way they all do. You’re a means to an end, and when he’s done, he’ll toss you aside the way I should have done years ago.”
I close my eyes. I can see him so clearly. His leg bouncing on whatever back seat he’s crammed into, one hand on the phone, the other balled into a fist against his thigh. He was always fidgety when he was losing an argument.
Before Pyotr, those words would have landed. They would have burrowed into the part of my brain that Bogdan spent six years training to believe I was worthless without him. The part that whispered,Nobody stays. Nobody chooses you. You are only as valuable as your usefulness.
But Pyotr’s hand is on my shoulder, and I can hear Kira’s voice from two nights ago, chattering about Sofia’s cat and the gardenat the compound, sounding like a little girl who hasn’t been broken by the man on the other end of this call.
I haven’t been broken, either. Not by him. Not anymore.
