Adrik swallowed. He hated talking about this. Hated admitting any of it out loud. “He pulled his hit on me and Sergei.”
Her eyebrows lifted slightly. “And how do you feel about that?”
He glanced at Viktor and then back at her. “Relieved I’m not a target. And I’m not banned from New York… from everyone and everything I love.”
That was the truth. Or at least part of it. The other part was that he still didn’t trust Viktor completely. Not yet.
“Are you going to return with us?” she asked.
There it was—the question he’d been dreading. The one that made his chest tighten. He didn’t want to hurt her. He didn’t want to disappoint her. But he also wasn’t going back to New York. Not when he had Hans. Not when he finally had something good.
“No,” he said softly. “I’m happy in Germany with my boyfriend.”
Her expression softened, but there was sadness there too. “Will you visit me in New York if I go home?”
“Of course, Mom. I love you.”
Viktor leaned closer to her. “Please come home. Let’s start all over again. I don’t want to lose you or any member of our family.”
She looked at Adrik again, like he was the compass she trusted most. “What is the right thing to do?”
Adrik stepped closer, his voice low and honest. “Go with your heart. You love him, and he loves you.”
He leaned over and kissed her forehead, lingering for a second. He wanted her safe. He wanted her happy. Even if that meant being an ocean away.
Burian kissed her too, murmuring something soft. Adrik watched, a faint pinch settling behind his ribs. Whatever tenderness Burian was trying to show—whatever scraps of affection he’d learned over the years—felt foreign to him. Burian was his mother’s favorite for whatever reason and Adrik didn’t understand.
Viktor straightened, his voice shifting into that low, authoritative register when he wanted things done his way. “You two go. I need to talk to your mother alone.”
Adrik nodded and stepped back. The moment he crossed the threshold, everything he’d been holding together pressed down on him—family expectations, old loyalties, guilt he didn’t ask for, love he didn’t know how to carry. It all sat heavy on his shoulders.
But underneath the mess, one truth stayed steady.
He had Hans. And for the first time in his life, he had a future he actually wanted.
Footsteps echoed behind him. Burian. Of course.
“Hey, Adrik.” Burian’s voice was rough, like the words scraped on the way out. “I’m sorry. I know you hate me… sameway I hated you all these years. He always favored you. Never me. When you left, he told me he was stuck with the weak son. Blamed me for you leaving.”
Adrik stopped, jaw tightening. “Because you are the reason all this shit went down. And you are weak, dishonest, and empty-headed.” The anger came easy—too easy. There was nothing Burian could say that would soften it.
Burian didn’t argue. Instead, he pulled two envelopes from his pocket and held them out. “These are from the boys. They miss Uncle Adrik.”
That hit him somewhere he didn’t want to touch. He took the envelopes carefully, as if they were fragile. He loved those boys as if they were his own. Leaving them behind had never been part of the plan, but Germany left little room for being an uncle, and that made him sad.
“I’ll always love them,” he said. “If you’d let them travel to Germany, I’d take them in a heartbeat.”
Burian shook his head. “Never, Adrik. When you can forgive me, then you can see them in New York.”
The bitterness snapped back fast. “Then fuck you.”
He didn’t wait for a response. He headed to his room, threw what remained into his suitcase, and zipped it shut with more force than necessary. He sent Yakov a message to pick him up. Then his phone rang.
“Hey, Adrik! You okay?” Hans sounded warm, steady, and everything this house wasn’t.
“I’m coming home,” Adrik said. “Leaving this house now, heading for the airport.”
“I can’t wait. We have lots to talk about.”
