“You will not go to him.”
My voice hit the walls.
Vadim moved one step closer, then stopped.
I lowered my voice because Petya didn’t need volume. He needed a sister who sounded like she meant every word.
“You’re not going to Gennady. You’re not paying him extra because he thinks I was something he lost. I’m not a broken bottle he gets to charge you for.”
Petya made a ragged sound. “Nadia.”
“No. Listen to me. Gennady does not want money. He wants you desperate enough to walk into his hands. He wants me ashamed enough to believe that what happened last night belongs to him. It doesn’t.”
“Does it belong to Sorin?”
My gaze lifted to Vadim.
He heard the question. I knew he heard it.
His face stayed hard, but something moved in his eyes that wasn’t anger. Not at me.
“No,” I said.
The word landed in the room between us.
Vadim didn’t flinch. He didn’t look away. He only watched me, still as stone, letting me say the thing he had to let me say.
“I belong to myself,” I told Petya. “That was the point you missed before you ever walked into that gambling room. Gennady missed it. Every man in that auction room missed it. Do not miss it too because you feel guilty.”
Petya breathed once. Then again.
“Did he hurt you?” he asked.
“No.”
“Are you saying that because he is standing there?”
“Yes, he’s standing here. No, I’m not saying it because of that.”
Vadim’s mouth tightened at the corner.
“You can talk?” Petya asked. “Really talk?”
“I’m talking.”
“You know what I mean.”
“I do.” My fingers loosened around the sheet. “Vadim didn’t force me. Not last night. Not like that.”
Petya went quiet for so long I looked at the screen to make sure the call hadn’t dropped.
Then he said, “I’m sorry.”
The words were small.
Petya hated small things. Small rooms. Small men. Small choices. Small apologies that couldn’t carry what they needed to carry.
“I know,” I said.
