Page 70 of Merciless Daddy

“Blue room ahead,” Tonio said.

“How many outside?”

“No one.”

“That’s wrong.”

“Everything tonight seems to be wrong.”

“Move quickly.”

I heard his knuckles touch wood.

“Kiryl,” he called softly. “My name is Tonio Scordato. Your sister sent me.”

Nothing.

He knocked again.

“Kiryl. We need to leave.”

A muffled voice came through the door.

“No.”

My throat closed.

“Kiryusha,” I said, though he could not hear me directly. “Put me through.”

Angela answered. “Tonio, hold the earpiece against the door.”

Fabric moved. Then Tonio said, louder, “She’s here. She can hear you.”

“Lena?” Kiryl’s voice was thin behind the wood.

“I’m here,” I said.

“He still can’t hear you,” Angela reminded me.

Of course. My mind was moving too fast.

“Tell him,” I said to Tonio, “that I said to open the door.”

Tonio repeated it.

“No,” Kiryl said. “She’d know I wouldn’t believe that.”

Smart boy. Terrified boy. My eyes burned.

Sal’s hand remained beside mine, not touching now.

I searched through twenty years of private language. Nursery jokes. Books. The chocolate Kiryl made too sweet. The sugar flowers stolen from birthday cakes when we were children.

Pink roses.

My mother’s cake.

Kiryl had bitten one and immediately spat it into my hand.