There will be no third chance for Ava and me.
All she had to do was stay here where I left her. Even if half of what Sergei said was true, at least I wouldn’t have found her at his house where she watched my mother die.
It’s the last thought on my mind as the sound of the front door opens. Like a light switch flipping off, all the alcohol evaporates from my system, and I aim my gun, ready to put a bullet in the first head I see.
Two hands fly up, framing splotchy blond hair. “I survived fighting the Saudis in Najran! I do not wish to die in my own house!”
My tense muscles relax. “Fuck, Mik!” I lower the gun and scrub my hand down my face. “Say something before you bust in like that. You know I’m on edge.”
Maybe all the alcohol didn’t evaporate from my system because if it did, it wouldn’t have taken me this long to put two and two together.
Two and two doesn’t always equal four. In this case, it’s supposed to equal out to three. With only Mik and I standing here, that’s two.
I know where the third is.
The question is—why doesn’t he?
Without another word, I stand up and aim my gun at his head again.
He glances behind him before shifting to his right. “What the hell, Niko? Are you drunk?”
“No, but it’d probably be in your best interest if I was. What happened to Ava, Mik? I tied her up right here.” Keeping the gun on him, I lean down and smack the armrest of the couch. “I told you to watch her.”
“Niko…”
“Did you fall asleep again””
“Niko…”
“Did she turn on the charm? Did you fall for her act and let her go?”
“Nikolai!” Hearing Mik use my full name stops me mid-rant. He’s fuming, his face a deep shade of red that almost matches the splotches in his hair. “I have blood soaked in my hair. It is dried on my neck, and it has stained my clothes. Do you think I tripped and did this myself?”
Shit, he’s right.
Torn out of my pity-party, I finally take a good look at my friend. The entire right side of his head is covered in blood, his blond hair almost unrecognizable. Streaks of dried blood coat his skin and his light blue shirt is stained dark brown. Either he’s been in one hell of a fight or my underestimation was underestimated.
“You look like shit.”
“Well, you do not look so hot yourself, asshole.”
Fair enough.
“Tell me what happened.”
“That woman of yours is what happened.” He scowls, pressing his palm gingerly to the side of his head.
“She’s not my woman.”
“No? You could have fooled me. She started bitching about having to go to the bathroom and would not shut up about it.”
“Mik, tell me you didn’t fall for that and cut her ties.”
“What harm can she do in the bathroom? I thought this until she faked a stupid lady cramp and bashed me in the head with a glass candle.”
I don’t want to laugh. It’s not funny, but fuck me, of all the things to con a man with, anything period related usually is a winner. It’s like male kryptonite.
“You think this is funny? She did not steal your car.”
My laughter dies down as his words sink in. The driveaway was empty when I pulled up. Without thinking twice, I peer out the window and, like I expected, find his piece of shit Toyota sitting in the driveway. “Wait, if Ava stole your car, how did you drive it here?”
He holds up his phone. “I tracked it. Found it circling down in South Beach and took an Uber until I found it.”
“What the…” Then a thought hits me. One I’m not sure if I’m relieved or sick to my stomach to find out is true. Pushing Mik aside, I tear past him onto the walkway against the side of the house. “Ava?” I yell. Picking up speed, I don’t notice a figure standing in front of me, and I collide with a petite frame.
“Hello, moy khoroshiy.” My boy.
For a moment I can’t comprehend what’s happening. Instead of long red hair, the woman standing in front of me has jet black hair that falls neatly around her shoulders. She’s smaller than Ava, so much smaller than I remember. But she’s alive, and she’s here.
“Mama!” My arms swallow her as I pull her into the tightest hug I can.
I haven’t touched my mother in eight years. Even when I moved her from North Carolina to New Orleans, I did it from afar, tearing myself to pieces by watching men I barely knew ensure her safety. The guilt has eaten me alive.
So many conflicting feelings and questions churn through my body, but I ignore them all, except for one I can’t hold back. “I thought you were…” I choke on the words, unable to get them out. “How did you…I don’t understand.”
“I do not understand much either. I was scared when Mark tracked me down,” she admits, pointing toward Mik, her sweet accent music to my ears.
“Mik,” he corrects. When I glare at him, he shakes his head. “Mark is fine.”
She smiles, although I’m not sure she knows why. “He explained it all on the way here.”
“What exactly did he explain?”
A shadow crosses my mother’s face. “Nikolai, why do you have a gun in your hand?”
Shit, I forgot.
“Mom, focus.”
She nods. “He explained who that man was. Why he wanted to hurt me. Why he wanted to hurt you.”
The reminder that Sergei took my mother from her home, ruining the illusion of safety I’d worked so hard to cultivate for her, fuels my anger all over again. “Did he…”
“No, I am fine, Nikolai.” She gives me a knowing smile. “Thanks to your Ava.”
“Ava?”
Her enthusiastic nod stirs me out of my vengeful haze. “First, he kept me in a dark basement, but he said he had a feeling she would come. So he moved me to the—”
“Attic.” I finish for her.
“How did you know?”
“Because I know Ava.” Damn it. She told me. She said the words right to my face and I refused to listen. I let Sergei get in my head and convince me she’d turned on me like I did eight years ago. I accused Ava of repeating her same sins when it’s me who burned her at the stake twice for crimes she didn’t commit.
“She came in there so brave, Nikolai,” my mom continues, clasping her hands under her chin in complete awe. “That man may have created a child but he is no father. I should know.” A flash of regret crosses her face. She’s referring to my son of a bitch father, so I move to hug her again, but she stops me with a firm hand against my chest. “I am not finished. That man wanted to hurt her, but she still untied me and showed me a way to climb down the back of the house so no one would see. Then she gave me the keys to Mark’s car and told me to go. I wanted to thank her, but she was already gone. That girl saved my life.”
“She went to his office.”
My mother brushes a hand across my cheek. “What do you mean?”
The footing I’d been so sure of fails me as my back slams into the wall. “When she left you, she went to Sergei’s office. Son of a bitch! That’s what he meant when he said you were gone. He knew Ava had let you go.”
Jesus, she threw that grenade, knowing he’d have no way out while hoping I’d have no way in. They both knew my mother wasn’t at Seven. They both knew I’d eventually make my way to the Chernov estate, but Ava planned to make sure nothing was left standing when I got there.
I have to find her.
“Did she say where she was going?”
She shakes her head. “No, all she said was that she had a debt to repay.”
I push off the wall, tearing my hands through my hair. “Mom, this is very important. Who forced you out of your house in New Orleans and brought you here?”
She scrunches her nose up at my question. “No one forced me, moy khoroshiy. I was told you had been arrested and requested to see me. I could not leave Louisiana fast enough.”
“I need the name of the man who told y
ou this.”
She palms her forehead and taps her toe in deep thought. I’m about to lose my mind when she snaps her fingers and smiles. “Evan.”
“Ethan?”
“It could be. It all happened so fast.”
I glance back at Mikhail, who quietly nods, confirming my fears.
Ava’s going to meet with her FBI agent.
But instead of handing him information on her father, she’s going to turn herself in for killing him.
Ava
Just like this morning, I’m staring out the window in the passenger’s seat of a strange car. However, instead of scenic A1A, I’m watching cars fly past me on I-95 South. The nachos I ate earlier are sitting like a rock in my stomach, and as the miles roll by, I’m not confident they aren’t going to come back up.
Once again, night is falling, and as the day disappears, I start to think about ridiculous things like what I’m going to do when all of this is over. I’d love to climb to the top of the Empire State Building in New York then travel all the way to the West Coast and see every star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Maybe I’ll even backpack through Europe.
It’s nice to think of things that will never happen.
That’s because I’m here in this car, still driving on the road to nowhere.
It didn’t have to end this way. Unfortunately, they only cared to look at what was on the outside instead of delving into what was brewing inside. Their plan was doomed from day one. I’ve never been a heavy subscriber to the pack mentality. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out if you roam with wolves, you’re bound to get bit. Eventually, everyone turns on you.
But this she-wolf finally sank her teeth into the alpha, and he never saw it coming.
“Ah! You fucking shot me!”
“That’s why you’re the boss, Papa.” I tap my finger against my temple. “You’re so perceptive.”
“All of this for him? I sent him to kill you, suka.”
“I know.” I swing Niko’s gun beside me as I walk the perimeter of my father’s office. “He told me a long time ago.”
“Yet here you are.” He groans, holding his leg as blood pours out of the wound. “You are just like your mother, a suchka sumashedshaya.” Crazy bitch.
I shrug. “Maybe I am. It’s kind of poetic, don’t you think? You smothered her, and now her suchka sumashedshaya daughter is going to smother you.” I end with a laugh, because irony has a funny way of always standing up and being counted even in dire situations.
“You want to kill me?” he yells. “You want to burn me? Go ahead, myshka. But look around, you stupid girl.” He waves his hand around the room. “You have barricaded both of us in here.”
“Your point?”
“You do not care you are going to die with me?”
Charging toward his desk, I slam my hand down and grit my teeth. “You’ve taken everything from me. My innocence, my dignity, my freedom, and my love. My life is the only thing left.” A secret smile plays on my lips as I sit on the edge of his desk, running my finger down the grip of my gun. “But you’re right, Papa, I have no desire to die with you. As soon as you’re dead, I’m going to find Ethan and tell him I killed you. That way, neither he, Dmitry, or any other of your sheep can pin it on Niko.”
A laugh rumbles low in his throat. “Dmitry will not be implicating Nikolai, trust me.”
“You don’t know that.”
“The man cannot talk with his throat slashed, myshka.”
I roll my forehead against the glass.
How everything can change in an instant.
“Ava, are you all right over there?”
I blink away the fire and smoke, dragging myself away from my father’s office and back into the sedan. Turning away from the window, I see Ethan glancing from the road to me and back. The disarray I last saw his dark hair in is gone. It’s now gelled back in its usual crisp style. His suit is pressed, his white shirt is starched, and his red tie is knotted perfectly. It’s as if my call unwound his bundle of nerves.
He was this way when he picked me up at that Irish pub on the Boardwalk. I wish I could find a word to describe his mood when he slid into the seat across from me and patiently listened as I recounted the story of how Niko had killed all of my father’s guards then forced his way into his house. He even reached for my hand when I got to the part where he decapitated my father and held a gun to my head. He calmly told me Niko’s prints would still be on the grounds, but first he needed to get me out of Miami. When I questioned him, all he said was that I was in danger, and he would take care of it.
Unbothered.
Yeah, that’s the word to describe his mood. Completely unbothered.
“Yes,” I answer, forcing a smile I’m sure isn’t at all convincing. “Just a little car sick.”
He nods and turns the air vents in my direction. “Try not to throw up in this car. It’s a rental.”
If I didn’t need to conserve all my strength, I’d punch him in the face.
“I have an idea.”
His side eye glance is insulting, but I force myself to stay wide eyed and gullible.
“And what would that be?”
“Niko let me go. He still trusts me. I can almost guarantee that if I called him and asked him to meet me at the airport, he’d come.”
Ethan’s brown eyes narrow. He’s studying me hard, looking for a twitch in my eye, a twist of my fingers, sweat on my brow—anything to pinpoint a false motive. When he finds none, he clears his throat. “Why would I want you to do that?”
“Because when we get there, you can arrest him and bring him in. You’ll be an instant hero. It’s your only shot. Otherwise, it’ll be a cat and mouse game for years, and you know it.” My heart’s racing, and I’m gripping my leg so hard I’m leaving bruises.
Ethan mulls it over a few more minutes before smiling and bearing his teeth. “Tell him to meet you at Miami-Opa Locka Airport, far east hangar.”
Swallowing the bile rising in my throat, I pull out the phone from Niko’s jacket pocket and dial the second number I memorized, knowing he won’t answer. As soon as it kicks into voice mail, I leave the first and possibly last message he’ll ever hear from me.
“Hey, Niko, it’s Ava. I’m calling from a phone I stole. I know I have no right to ask you for anything, but I’m in trouble, and I need you to meet me at the far east hangar at Miami-Opa Locka Airport as fast as you can. If you leave now, we should get there at the same time. Please hurry.” As soon as I disconnect the call, Ethan raises an eyebrow. Placing the phone in my lap, I turn and face out the window again. “He’ll be there.”
Niko
My keys are in my hand and I’m halfway out the door to the airport when Mik grabs my arm. “What if it is a trap, comrade? Do you trust her enough to walk into it blindly?”
“Did we not hear the same message?” I glance down at my arm to where his fingers are still pressing into my skin. “And unless you want those shot off, I suggest letting go.”
Mik swallows whatever sharp reply is on the tip of his tongue, and drops his hand. “Yes, but this is also the same woman who escaped from me twice, the last time almost cracking my skull.” He points to his still bloody hair, his eyes flashing.
“You’ll live.” A soft murmur from across the room distracts me, and I shift my eyes to the couch where my mother is curled up and sleeping peacefully. “She saved my mother, Mik. I owe her.”
Sighing, he steps out of my way and nods. “For your sake, I hope you are right.”
Before I can change my mind, I tear out of the driveway, ignoring stop signs and stop lights until I’m on the Turnpike. Pressing the pedal to the floor, I weave in and out of traffic like I’m in a video game.
Scenarios run through my head of what kind of trouble she could’ve gotten herself into so fast. She left Sergei’s on foot with no money or ID.
Shit, did she hitchhike and someone kidnapped her?
No, that’s stupid. No kidnapper would let her use a p
hone. I should know that.
The only reason she’d ask me to meet her at the airport is if she’s planning on making one hell of a quick getaway. Sergei does have a private jet. She’d have to find someone to fly them, because while I have a lot of skills, piloting isn’t one of them.
All I know is I won’t let her down. When Ava needed me most, I refused to believe her, and now she’s suffering the consequences. I wasn’t lying to her when I told her I loved her. If I get the chance to tell her again, I’ll never let her forget it.
As I exit off the Turnpike, my phone rings again.
Unknown.
I answer before the second ring even hits. “Ava?”
“Niko, we need to have a chat.”
Fuck, I don’t have time for this. “I’m a little busy right now. Can it wait?”
“No. I received an interesting phone call today. I have to say, I was surprised, but intrigued. Normally, I wouldn’t entertain such nonsense, but I was made an offer I couldn’t refuse.”
An offer he couldn’t refuse? What is this, The Godfather?
“What the hell are you talking about?” My response is probably out of line, but I’m not feeling courteous at the moment.
Luckily, he doesn’t seem to give a shit about anything I have to say.
“Pay close attention, Gaheris. What I’m about to tell you, I will only say once. Do exactly as I say, the way I say it. After I’m finished, don’t call me back. You’re on your own.”
“Okay…” I draw the word out, unsure of what’s coming next.
“Oh, and, Niko?”
“Yeah?”
“Don’t fuck up.”
Ava
The hangars at Miami-Opa Locka Executive Airport are baby blue. I have no idea why I think to notice, or why I even care. Maybe the thought is so mundane it keeps my mind off the fact that Ethan is pacing behind me like a caged tiger.
Darkest Deeds: Cavalieri Della Morte Page 19