“Are you threatening me?” I exclaim, shock flooding my system.
“No,” she replies evenly. “I’mwarningyou. I would not want you to get on the wrong side of that man. Not with all the power he has.”
I consider her words for moment, thinking back, briefly, to the way my sister reacted when she found out the man I was going to be working for. She was scared, no doubt about it, and that means he has power that even she can’t wrap her head around.
The kind of power that might mean he could come after me if, all of a sudden, I was to drop out of our agreement.
“He wouldn’t like the idea of someone coming in, seeing his house, meeting his son, and then leaving,” she continues. “He is very careful about who he lets into this place. And he might see it as a betrayal of his trust if you were to go without any good reason.”
“I gave you my reason…”
“And I gave you the very same answer he will,” she replies. “All I’m saying, Cara, is that you should be careful what you do now that you’re here in his home.” Her tone has a finality to it, and I can sense that she is finished with this conversation.
I stand there, mouth agape, as I try to catch up with it. She’s basically telling me if I were to leave, I would be attracting the attention of the kind of man who… whowhat?
That’s the thing that I can’t make sense of. I don’t know just how far this goes, how dangerous this might be if I don’t play my cards right, but it seems like, whether I like it or not, I might be on the brink of finding out.
I turn to leave the kitchen, my head spinning so much that I can barely remember the code to get back into my part of the mansion. All of a sudden, I’m aware of all the guards around this place, the way they watch me as I move through the main hall.
How could I’ve been so naive as to think a place like this could have been safe for my daughter?
The moment the car pulled up outside it, I should have thought better of it, I should have told them to turn around and take me back to my entirely unremarkable life so I could at least be sure I was safe...
When I reach Nina again, she is perched at the counter, finishing her breakfast. She looks up at me and gives me a big smile, and my heart drops, knowing how badly I’ve let her down.
“Hey, Mommy!” she exclaims, and she comes over to give me a hug. I wrap my arms around her and squeeze her tight, pressing my face into her hair and drawing in the scent of her, trying to remind myself that, at least for now, she’s alive and well.
“Hey, baby,” I whisper. And, as I hold her there, I swear to myself that I’ll do whatever it takes to keep her safe. This man, whoever he is, whatever he is capable of, I won’t let him trap us here. I’ve already experienced that before, that feeling of thewalls closing in around you, the feeling that, no matter what you do, you’ll never be able to escape.
And I’ve sworn for as long as I’ve known about her that I’ll never let that happen to Nina. She will never go through those same experiences I did, the same suffering, the same fear and sense that she will never be able to live her own life.
I just have to try and keep things as normal as I can for her as long as we’re here, and I’ll be able to get us both out of this in one piece.
At least, that’s what I have to tell myself, if I want to keep from losing my mind entirely.
8
ALEXEI
As I stepthrough the front door, I find Marsha standing there before me, her brow furrowed and a concerned expression on her face.
“Pakhan? I need to speak with you.” The tone to her voice tells me this is serious. Her eyes dart briefly to the blood on my hands, but she seems to pay that little heed.
I nod towards my office. “Come with me.”
She follows me to my office, where she pours me a drink without asking and pushes it across the table towards me. That’s the good thing about Marsha, she always seems to be able to tell what’s going on inside my head, without me having to speak a word out loud. She’s worked for me since my father died, and she worked for him before that for at least fifteen years. She knows how this house works better than anyone, and I would trust her with my life.
“What’s going on?” I ask her, as I lift the vodka to my lips, the alcoholic bite at the back of my throat taking my mind off the throbbing pain in my knuckles.
“The new nanny came to me today,” she explains.
I furrow my brow slightly.Cara?She’s meant to be sticking to her part of the house, with Max and Nina. That’s where she belongs, where I know I can keep an eye on her. “And what did she say to you?”
She sighs, shaking her head. “She spun some story to me about wanting to leave. About having some grandmother who had taken a fall, who she had to go and take care of right away.”
My eyebrow cocks. “And you think she was lying?”
“I’m sure of it,” she replies. “And it’s a terrible thing to do, to lie on your family’s lives like that. She must not be very close to them.”
