by A. Zavarelli
“I get it.” I nod. “I don’t want to see that either.”
“I’m going to drip-feed you information,” he says. “We’ll take it one day at a time. For now, I think the thing you should start with is that neighbor who lived in your mother’s building, Roger Benson.”
“What about him?” I ask.
“He wasn’t just the friendly neighborhood handyman. He was also a retired federal agent.”
“Shit,” I murmur. “That’s who my mother was talking to?”
Maxim nods. “She probably thought he could help her. He probably thought he could too. Who knows? But the feds were hot on that case for a while, trying to figure out who did him in. Vasily was a paranoid fuck for months. He even went out of state for a while.”
“I remember.”
“You might want to lead with that. I’m going to go take a piss before we hit the road.”
He walks off toward the service station, and I stare at the phone in my hand. There’s no more putting it off. Vasily showed his hand today when he sent men after my family, again. And now, it’s my turn to show mine.
I punch in the numbers, glancing at the SUV where Kat and Josh are securely tucked inside. The phone rings three times before Vasily picks up, half-breathless.
“Ivan,” he grunts. “What the fuck—”
“I’m afraid Ivan can’t come to the phone right now,” I cut him off. “Or ever again, assuming that was the man you sent after my family today.”
There is a moment of silence and then a low growl. “Levka.”
“Hello, Uncle. I think perhaps it is time we discuss this business between us like men.”
“Like men?” He snorts. “A man wouldn’t run from his problems.”
“A man wouldn’t order the death of another man’s woman behind his back,” I return. “But I am coming to realize with each passing day that you were never a man at all. First my mother, your own blood, and now me? Is there anyone you will not betray to save your own skin?”
“Fuck you,” he spits into the phone. “You shot Andrei. Your cousin. My son! Who the fuck do you think you are?”
My grip on the phone tightens as I lower my voice, so that he can be sure I’m in a rational mind. “I’m the man who’s going to destroy you.”
“I will send every soldier at my disposal after you. I will tear this country apart until your blood is spilled. And that of your son’s—”
“You know, I am growing very tired of your empty threats.” I meet Maxim’s gaze as he returns to his car, nodding in my direction. “So, I think I will explain this in terms you can understand. Call off your fucking dogs now, or I will have no choice but to unleash every one of your dirty secrets for the entire world to see.”
“Secrets.” He laughs darkly. “You have nothing on me.”
“Oh, but I do. That drive you were so intent on finding? I have that list of names. And it’s funny what connections you can make from such a simple document. Like the fact that the neighbor you murdered in my mother’s building was a retired fed.”
Silence is the only response on the other end of the line, and if it wasn’t for his heavy breathing, I wouldn’t even be sure he was still there. But I’ve got his attention now. And I’m going to run with it.
“There is also the cop that you killed,” I continue. “My mother. Nina’s father. After all, it’s his name on your list. How many others? Too many connections to count. Deaths that can all be linked back to you.”
“You wouldn’t fucking rat on your family,” he snarls. “You may be a lot of things, Lev, but a snitch isn’t one of them.”
“I’ll do whatever it takes to secure my future,” I assure him. “Even if that means throwing you to the wolves.”
“I think you’re forgetting something.” His voice changes to one of amusement. “Betray the Vory, and you will bring down a whole world of pain on yourself. So, go ahead, talk to the feds. See what happens.”
“Ahh... but that’s the thing. I’m not betraying the Vory, am I? I’m only betraying you. Who sanctioned all these hits? I don’t think I need to tell you that the chain of command was broken in every instance.”
“And I think you’re forgetting something,” Vasily replies. “A Vor will always back another Vor. You were never inducted. If it comes down to you or me, it will always be me.”
“We’ll see.”
On the other end of the line, I can hear him twisting the seal of his beloved vodka. He won’t admit that I have him at a disadvantage. I already knew he wouldn’t back down. Even if it costs him his freedom, he will never let a slight go unpunished.
“You think you are so smart,” he says finally. “Calling me to threaten me like a little bitch. But there is a complication that you did not foresee. Something even I did not see. Perhaps you care to venture a guess?”
In the pit of my stomach, I know what he’s referring to. But he’s testing me. He wants to know if I know about Kat’s relation to Gleb, which means that he’s made the connection himself. It’s the only thing he could be referring to.
“Maybe I won’t kill your little bitch when I find her,” he says, answering my unspoken thoughts. “She might come to be useful after all. You, however, I can’t say the same for.”
“So, this is how you choose to proceed?” My hand balls into a fist.
“Come at me with everything you’ve got, Lev,” he answers darkly. “Because I won’t rest until I’ve hunted you like a dog and destroyed everything you love. Mark my words.”
11
Kat
I sit amid bubbles in a tub big enough for two at what is probably one of the nicest places I’ve ever stayed in. I thought Lev would choose a quiet hotel out of the way, but we’re at a high rise in Times Square in the heart of everything.
Even though I grew up in Philadelphia, I’ve never been to New York City. Josh has his face plastered to the floor-to-ceiling glass wall, Wally in one hand, little toes peeking out from beneath his new Minion pajamas and staring in awe at everything. He didn’t even fight me when it came time to take his bath when he saw the size of the tub. I guess to him it was like a small swimming pool. Which there is an indoor one here and Lev has promised to take him swimming tomorrow.
“Time for bed, Josh,” Lev says from the doorway of the bathroom. It’s so big, I’m pretty sure the entire cabin Josh and I rented in Colorado could fit inside it.
When Josh doesn’t reply, Lev goes to him and crouches down beside him. He wraps one arm around Josh’s shoulders to point out something, and I think about how right this is. How right that he’s with us. Even with everything going on, I don’t have to do it alone, and I didn’t realize how much of a weight that’s been all these years.
Josh giggles as Lev makes a joke, then lifts him up in his arms and walks him toward me.
“Night, Mommy,” Josh says, rubbing his eyes.
Lev leans him down, and I plant a kiss on the top of his head.
“Night, baby,” I say and watch them walk out through our bedroom and to the connecting one. A few minutes later, I hear the familiar words of Good Night, Gorilla. I lean my head back against the cool ceramic of the tub and close my eyes.
My mom was somehow involved in this world. How? And who would know? Vasily, but he would just as soon kill me than tell me anything. My father?
My father.
My mom was in love with him, according to Maxim.
I sit up, disturbing the bubbles.
My mother was in love with a mobster. Not only that, but the boss of them all. And she ran information on him to Vasily? That doesn’t make sense. Why would she do that? Is Maxim right that he was blackmailing her? Or that Vasily “had something on her,” as he put it?
She was barely twenty when she gave birth to me. How much could there be to “have” on a person?
“He’s out cold,” Lev says not ten minutes later, leaning against the doorframe with arms folded across his chest.
“He must be exhausted with everyt
hing that’s happening.”
He nods. “You didn’t kill him, by the way.”
“What?”
“We didn’t get a chance to talk about it, but if you’re feeling guilty or upset about the guy at the service station, your bullet didn’t kill him. Mine did.”
Is there something wrong with me that I didn’t care about that man? Should I feel guilty?
“I don’t,” I tell Lev.
He studies me in that way of his that he’s always had. Like he can see right into my mind.
I stand and watch him sweep his gaze over me as soapy water glides off my body.
“I don’t feel guilty or upset or anything, Lev. Maybe you should know that about me.” I step onto the mat, and I feel his eyes on me when I walk across the room to the stand-up shower and reach in to switch it on.
I hear the click of the door closing and the lock engaging when I step beneath the flow of steaming water to rinse off.
A minute later, he’s naked and in the shower with me, hands around my waist, turning me to face him.
“What do you think I should know about you that I don’t already?” His gaze locks on mine as one hand slides between my legs.
“That’s two men I’ve killed,” I say.
“I just told you, you didn’t kill him.”
“I wanted to. And he would have bled out if you’d left him.”
“But he didn’t.”
I stare up at him, and I don’t know why I feel defensive and angry. No, I do. Because a part of me blames him even though I know Josh and I were never really safe out in Colorado. I knew this was always going to chase us.
“What is it?” he asks.
“Just let me go.” I push his hand off me. “I’m tired.”
“I’ll never let you go. Don’t you know that yet?”
He grips a handful of hair, hauls me up to my tiptoes and kisses me, his other hand cupping my ass, his cock like a steel bar between us.
“You’re mine, Katya. You belong to me. Forever. I will take care of you. There’s nothing you can say or do that will make me let you go.” He takes my earlobe between his teeth and bites, sending electricity to my core.
“I’m tired.” I push against him but trying to move him is like trying to move a brick wall.
“You need to come.”
“Let go.”
“No.” He tugs my head backward. “I should punish you, you know,” he says.
He presses my back to the wall, and his fingers dig painfully into the skin of my inner thigh as he lifts one leg. He bends his knees a little, eyes locked on mine. My arms wrap around his neck as he lifts me and thrusts into me hard.
I gasp, taking his full length, the stretch painfully good and the sensation of him inside me like this, filling me up like this, I want it.
No, it’s more than want. I need it.
“Does your silence tell me that yes, I should punish you?” He thrusts, and I let out a grunt.
“He was bored. He wanted ice cream,” I say.
“And he can have ice cream. If you’d told me about those men, I wouldn’t have left you alone at the service center. I wouldn’t have let you out of my sight, and what happened wouldn’t have happened.”
“What if the worst would have happened? What if they’d taken him? What if they’d…” I can’t finish, and he doesn’t want me to.
Lev pulls out of me, takes my face in both hands, and brings his forehead to mine.
“Let it go. It’s over, and we’re all fine.”
“Fine?”
“Fine.”
“How can you say that?” I start, but he doesn’t reply. Instead, he switches off the shower. Lifting me, he hoists me over his shoulder, smacks my ass once, and carries me into the bedroom. He tosses me onto the bed and closes the connecting door between our room and Josh’s.
“What are you doing? Leave that open.”
“I don’t think you want him to hear me fucking you, and you do need to be fucked, Kat.”
“Lev—”
He grabs my ankle, pulls me flat on the bed, then flips me onto my stomach. He slaps my ass again.
“Lev!”
“Don’t worry, you’re safe,” he says, gripping my cheeks and spreading me open. “At least from my hand.”
He thrusts into me, and I arch my back to take him as he fists my hair again, tugging my head backward and stilling deep inside me.
“From now on, you tell me everything, Kat. Every little inconsequential detail. You got that?”
I wriggle my hips beneath him, wanting him to move, and when he won’t, I slide my hand between my legs.
Chuckling, he takes my wrist and draws my hand away.
“That pussy’s mine, too, sweetheart. You don’t touch it without my permission anymore.” He stretches that arm and my other over my head and closes both hands over a rung of the metal headboard. “Keep them there.”
He thrusts once more, then draws out of me. His breath is warm against my cheek as I feel his hand slide between my cheeks, rub against my pussy, then find my other hole.
“What are you doing?” I start, trying to pull away.
He doesn’t let me, though. Just starts moving his fingers back and forth, and back and forth, smearing my own arousal into me.
I still, too embarrassed but also aroused.
“This is mine too, this tight little hole.”
When he pushes his finger inside me, I tighten all my muscles.
“You can’t…you’re too big!”
He turns my head, so I have to look at him from the corner of one eye.
“You’re right, it’s going to be a tight squeeze,” he says, moving his finger in and out, and in and out. “But we’ll make it work.”
He pulls his finger out and slides himself between my ass cheeks, rubbing his length against my ass before bringing the head of his cock to my entrance and gently pushing against me.
“Lev.” It’s a whimper as he takes my clit between his fingers.
“You need to be fucked. You’ll feel better after you’re fucked. Isn’t that right?”
I nod because this feels too good.
“Then answer my question. Tell me you understand that you will tell me every single thing so I can fuck your tight little ass already.”
“Yes. Yes. I understand.” I nod my head, arching my back, and when he lets me, I shift to my knees, and he settles between them.
“You’re perfect, you know that?” he asks, fingers still working my clit as he takes inch by slow inch of me. “Perfect for me.”
I come then, with him moving inside me and his fingers rubbing my clit. I bury my face in a pillow, and that’s when he pushes all the way into me and begins to fuck me. To really fuck me.
I tumble from one orgasm to the next, lost, my mind a fog, and when I feel him throb inside me, when I feel him empty, I come again, one final time as he lays his full weight on me like he’s empty too, like he’s given everything to me.
12
Kat
Lev cleans me gently afterward, dresses me in one of his T-shirts, and tucks me into the crook of his arm on the bed.
He was right. I did need to be fucked. I feel better. Lighter.
I glance at the door between our rooms, which Lev opened again. If I listen closely, I can hear Josh’s even breathing.
“Why didn’t Maxim stay here too?” I ask. The older man said he’d see us tomorrow and disappeared before we got to the hotel.
“He’s been in hiding a long time. He wants to trust me, and he wants to help you and Josh, but Vasily would kill him if he knew he was alive. I’d do the same if I were in his shoes.”
I nod. Makes sense. “The man at the service station, he said something I didn’t really think about then.”
“What was it?”
“He said that his order was to take me and ‘the kid’. He said he didn’t want to hurt us.”
“Vasily knows, Kat. He knows who you are.”
“Which means
he won’t want to kill Josh or me? Even though he killed my mom?”
“He’s a sick bastard. I don’t think he’d let you live out of any kindness, and as long as Gleb doesn’t know you exist, all bets are off. But if Gleb found out…”
“But that could lead to a whole other scenario and possibly not a good one.”
“I think he’d want to protect you and Josh. It’s just my gut feeling.”
“What if he doesn’t believe it?”
“After seeing you, he’ll at least be willing to listen. You look exactly like her. He could run a paternity test if he wanted to. And either way, he has no reason to want you or Josh hurt.”
“I’ve seen what’s on that drive.”
“And I wonder what he’ll make of it when he sees it.”
“What if he does accept that I’m his daughter and that he should protect us but then wants us to be a part of that life? Wants Josh to be a part of it?”
“You’ll drive yourself insane going in circles like this. We have to wait and see.”
“And what about you? Will he protect you from Vasily?”
“Don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself.”
He brushes a strand of damp black hair off my face. “I want my hair back. I want to keep looking like her. It’s the only piece of her I have.”
“Soon. I promise.”
“Do you think it’s true? That Vasily killed her himself?”
“I don’t know, Kat. But Maxim has no reason to lie.”
“He tried to help her. At least she had one friend in the end.” I look up at him and realize how selfish I’m being. He lost his mom too and to the same murderer. “Tell me about your mom.”
He takes a deep breath in, and his eyes alight on the small jewelry box that I set on the table when fishing for Josh’s pajamas.
“She was kind and gentle. She never wanted anything from my uncle. And when I think back now, I see things differently. I see how she tried to shield me from him. See how she was when she was around him, jittery and skittish. I think she was always afraid of her own brother. Maybe she knew what he was capable of all along even when it came to his own blood.”