But I see it. See all of it.
Aleksandr gets out, following her inside like the love-struck dog he is. He’s still texting on his phone, probably reporting back to the Pakhan already, detailing every moment of the evening like it matters. Like he has any idea what actually happened in that library.
I stay in the car and let the driver pull away from the curb. I lean my head back against the leather headrest and close my eyes. She’s just disappeared out of view, and I already miss the sight of her. This desperation, this longing is consuming me. I unlock my phone, pulling up the app for the tracker I planted in her bag lining weeks ago, just a precaution, I told myself. Just good operational security. Nothing to do with the obsessive need to know where she is at all times, to make sure she's safe, to monitor potential threats in her vicinity. The dot blinks steadily on the screen inside Lush. Right where she should be. I pocket the phone. Tell the driver to take me home.
My penthouse feels emptier than usual tonight. All the expensive furniture highlights the lack of soul the space has. It's filled with useless museum pieces arranged for maximum effect. Nothing that matters. Nothing that means anything.
I grab a vodka bottle and don't bother with a glass , drinking straight from the bottle like the desperate degenerate I'm becoming. I think about her hands in Dimitri's. The choice she’s now made. That there is an alliance forming right under the Pakhan's nose. I think about how I helped engineer it, positioning pieces on this board for years, moving players into place, waiting for the right moment to let them collide. I think about how she's going to feel when she realizes I've been helping her from the start. The burn of the vodka in my throat doesn’t help distract me. Nothing will help except seeing her, touching her, kissing her until neither of us can think straight.
I've been patient, careful, and controlled my entire life. But my patience is running out. The end game is approaching. Soon she'll make her move and just as soon Dimitri will make his. Before I know it, everything will come crashing down, and we'll all have to live with the consequences. Or die with them.
My phone buzzes with a text from one of my men at Lush. Just checking in. Routine report. Everything's fine. Sofiya's on stage, making money, drawing in the crowd.
I should go in and watch her dance, position myself where I can intervene if something goes wrong. But I stay home instead. I choose to sit in my empty penthouse and drink expensive imported vodka while thinking about a girl who should be the last person consuming my thoughts.
I think about how I'm going to protect her from herself, from the Pakhan, from Dimitri's ambitions. From everyone who wants to use her for their own purposes.
The city glitters below my window. All those lights. All those lives. All those people who have no idea what's coming. What's building in the shadows. The violence and betrayal and blood that's about to spill across everything. She's at the center of it all. My beautiful, damaged, and dangerous girl who thinks she's orchestrating her own revenge.
I’ll let her think so anyway. Let her have that illusion a little longer.
When everything falls apart—and it will fall apart, that's inevitable—I'll be there. I'll catch her if she falls. I'll kill anyone who tries to hurt her. I'll burn the whole fucking city down if that's what it takes to keep her alive. Even if keeping her alive means dying myself.
Even if it means she'll hate me for it.
I drain the vodka and throw the bottle at the wall. It shatters, glass raining down like the storm that is heading our way.
Tomorrow I'll go back to being the Pakhan's loyal second while secretly undermining him. I'll stand beside him while plotting his downfall. I'll do it all for her because she's the only thing that's ever mattered. The only choice I've ever made that felt like mine instead of something forced on me by circumstance or duty or the violent world I was born into.
She's my choice. My redemption. My destruction.
And I'm hers, whether she wants me or not.
God help us both.
CHAPTER 9
Sofiya
SONG: RUN RABBIT BY ALT BLK ERA
The next deliveryis routine until it isn't. Aleksandr sends me to a warehouse on the East Side, neutral territory, where deals happen in the shadows and everyone pretends not to notice the blood staining concrete floors. I'm carrying another USB drive. More blackmail material, probably. More leverage in the endless game of control the Pakhan plays with his people.
I’m wearing black jeans tonight, with a light sweater that is uncomfortable in the smoggy heat of the city but will keep my arms protected if I run into trouble. My boots have good traction steel toes, should the need arise. My usual attire would draw too much attention here, where the women present are either working or working, if you catch the distinction.
The warehouse smells like rust and old fear while the industrial lights cast everything in sickly yellow, the kind that makes everyone look jaundiced, guilty, already dead.
Three men wait near a card table, smoking and playing a game with dice that involves more cursing than actual rules. The tallest one looks up when I enter.
Igor.
Ten years older, gray threads through his hair now with lines around his mouth from too many cigarettes and not enough remorse. But unmistakably him. The hands that held me down while Anatoly carved into my back. The voice that told me I was getting what I deserved.
My entire body goes rigid, and every instinct screams at me to run or fight or do something besides stand here like a deer in headlights. But I've trained for this. Prepared for the moment when I'd face them again. The breathing exercises, the compartmentalization, the ability to bury emotion so deep it can't interfere with action , it all serves its purpose in this moment.
I smile, a soft, uncertain one. Everything he'd expect from a woman alone in a warehouse with three armed men. "Delivery," I say, holding up the drive like an offering.
Igor's eyes travel over me, slowly assessing. The kind of look that makes my skin crawl. The kind that makes you want to shower in bleach and fire. Every single woman in the world knows this look.
