I followed her after she left the diner, kept my distance far enough not to crowd her, yet close enough to find out where she went at night.
But she caught on.
The moment her driving changed, the way she stopped committing to turns, testing the road instead of following it,I knew she sensed eyes on her. Panic slipped through her movements, but I didn’t want to scare her.
So I peeled off, let the SUV drift past and disappear. Later, I drove by the house she’s been living in, but she wasn’t there. I waited for hours, but she never showed up.
Blyat. Why is she not home? What happened with her sister? I swear, if she did something to make Sloane leave, she will pay for it.
But maybe this is something deeper. Maybe Sloane left to protect her sister. Does she think Barrett is coming for her? Is that what this is all about?
The thought hardens into something dark. I will never let him come near her. No one from that crew will ever get to her without dying for it.
Whatever she did back home, whatever choices she made to survive, none of them matter to me. I understand what desperation does to a person. What it costs to stay alive when the world decides you’re disposable. And she had no one growing up. Still doesn’t. No one but me.
When the cops showed up and Barrett assumed she had to be the rat, I helped her. She has no idea what I did, and it’s better that way. She doesn’t know who I am or what I’m tied to, and I’m not about to be the one who drags my world into her life and causes her to run. If she disappeared, it would hurt Lev, and I won’t let that happen.
I need her here. Safe. Where I can watch over her.
Barrett is still looking for Sloane. My contacts in New York confirmed it. He won’t ever stop. Rats die in our world, and he has already written her obituary.
Let him search. They won’t find her. They won’t even come close. I have people steering him the wrong way, old contacts who hold allegiance to my family. That low-level thug doesn’tunderstand that one wrong move, and I blow up his entire world. But for Lev’s sake, I don’t want to start a war unless I have to.
My gaze drifts back to the screen, to the girl who grew into a woman who still doesn’t know how protected she really is, and the familiar pull—the need to make her understand it’s been me keeping her safe all this time—tightens in my chest.
A knock hits the door, interrupting my thoughts.
“Da?”Yes?
Katya, my head housekeeper, walks in with Lev beside her. His headphones are pressed tight over his ears, his body rocking in small, restless motions while he mutters low to himself, and I know instantly that something is wrong.
“I’m sorry to bother you, sir. He is very upset. I think he needs you.”
Lev doesn’t look at me. His eyes are fixed somewhere else, somewhere deep in his head where he sometimes goes, while his fingers twist at the fabric of his T-shirt.
Pushing back the chair, I’m already moving toward him. Katya steps aside the moment I crouch. Lev doesn’t focus on me right away, not until my hands cradle his face.
“You can go,” I tell Katya, and she disappears down the hall. Then I turn back to Lev. “Papa’s here. I’ve got you.”
Getting to my feet, my hand at his back, I guide him into my office and shut the door. Settling on the floor, I pull him onto my lap.
He buries his face in my shoulder, breaths coming in uneven bursts, while the rocking starts again—small at first, then harder, like he’s trying to shake something loose.
I hold him tighter. “Vsyo khorosho. Papa zdes’.”Everything is okay. Papa is here.
The rocking doesn’t stop right away, but it starts to give, the movement shrinking until it’s more of a sway against my chest, his weight sinking into me as his breathing turns calmer.
“Molodets.”Good job.“Breathe with me.”
Minutes pass like this. My legs go numb, but I don’t move. Lev’s fingers curl tighter into my shirt, then loosen, then tighten again, like he’s testing whether I’m still real. His forehead lifts just enough for his exhales to warm my collarbone, but his eyes still hold whatever upset him, that faraway panic he can’t always put into words.
I press a kiss into his hair. “Do you want Papa to play the piano?”
He nods once and lets me pull him to his feet. With his hand clasped in mine, we make it to the grand piano just past the front door, sitting in the same spot it has been since he was two.
I bought it the week I realized it was the only sound that could calm him when he got overwhelmed. I even taught myself how to play, needing to be able to give him that whenever the world got too loud. I still do. Anytime things become too big for him, I sit down and let the notes carry what I can’t fix.
I lower myself onto the bench with him resting on my lap like it’s second nature. The first notes come softly, a melody my hands know without thinking now: a Russian lullaby my mother would sing to me and my brothers when we were little. Or at least that is how Konstantin recalls it. I was too young to remember her before she died.
