He will.
The question is whether it will be soon enough.
My fingers curl slightly against the fabric of my dress. Just enough to ground myself. Just enough to keep the rising panic from taking hold.
I refuse to let it.
I’ve survived too much to break here. Not like this. Not sitting in a room waiting to be consumed by someone else’s plan.
Timofey.
My chest tightens, but not in fear. In something far more dangerous. Something certain.
I love him.
The thought doesn’t fade. Doesn’t weaken. Doesn’t shift under pressure. It stays exactly where it is. Rooted. Unmoving.
I love him.
My husband.
And somewhere out there, I know he’s coming.
It’s almost strange—how everything that broke my life eventually led me to him.
If I trace it back, line by line, decision by decision, there’s a cruel kind of clarity to it. Everything that was taken, everything that burned, everything that nearly destroyed me…it all pushed me here. To this point. To him.
And for all of it, that’s the one thing I wouldn’t undo. Not even if I could.
I let out a quiet breath, leaning back slightly in the chair, eyes unfocused for a moment as the memories settle in.
My father.
His certainty. The way he never doubted what the Rusnaks represented, even when I did. Even when I questioned it. Even when I resented it.
I didn’t understand it then. I thought I did, but I didn’t.
Now I do.
He was always right.
A faint, almost bitter smile touches my lips at the thought. Not because it’s funny—but because it’s true. Because he never needed to guess. He always knew. Always saw ten steps ahead while everyone else was still reacting.
Thank goodness I listened.
The words sit heavier now, layered with everything that came after. Everything that cost me. Everything that brought me here.
I once resented the Rusnaks. Their reach. Their influence. The way their name moved through rooms like gravity, like inevitability.
It felt suffocating then. Unfair. Too absolute.
Now I understand what absolute power really means.
It means survival when nothing else holds.
It means structure when everything collapses.
It means still standing when everyone else has fallen.
