Chapter 43
Forty-Three
Slouching back in the deck chair, cool air brushes against my face, and I breathe in the scent of pine and damp earth as the leaves shift and rustle around me like nature’s wind chimes.
Waiting for Syn to come out, I gaze up at the night blanketing the sky.
It looks like a snow globe made from dark-indigo glass.
I enjoy nights like this, where every star in the Milky Way and beyond shimmers their light from millions of miles away.
Stargazing out on the back patio after dinner has become our thing.
It’s something I look forward to every time I come over for dinner.
Just me and Syn and the quiet expanse of the universe above us.
It reminds me of the times when Mama and I would sneak out of the house late at night and sit in the gardens.
She would regale me with every constellation’s story from the boastful warrior Orion who was killed by a scorpion to the magnificent, winged horse Pegasus who was born from the blood of Medusa.
The back door creaks open, then closes, and familiar footsteps beat across the wood plank boards.
“Thought I’d find you out here.” Aleksei drops into the chair beside me.
My chest tightens with loss and hope and a million other emotions I can’t quantify, tangling so tightly together, I’m unable to separate them.
It’s been over a year since I last saw him, and the ache of missing him is suffocating.
I know I’m imagining things. I know he’s not real.
But it’s a beautiful fiction I don’t want to wake up from.
He kicks his feet up onto the deck railing and folds his hands on his lap, a picture of absolute relaxation. Looking up, he says, “From this perspective, the universe looks so small, but it’s really us who are tiny in comparison.”
“You were never one to contemplate humanity’s existence or its place within the grander cosmos.”
He chuckles. “I’ve been learning some new things.”
We sit in silence for a moment, the night thick with so many unspoken things I want to tell him.
“Is Mama happy?”
Aleksei’s head lolls in my direction, the corners of his mouth upturned in a serene smile. “Happier than she ever was here.”
I try to swallow down the heartache that has wedged itself in my throat. “God, I miss her. I miss you.”
Aleksei reaches across the two feet of distance between our chairs and covers my hand with his. “We miss you just as much. She’s worried about you.”
“Is that why you’re here?”
“I’m always here. Can’t get rid of me. Kind of like that rash you had.”
“It was poison ivy. And I was five.”
No one had told me about “leaves of three, let it be” yet. Worst two weeks of my life. With all the Calamine lotion Mama slathered on me, I looked like a pink sausage with hair.
“So, how’s that love pentagon thing going?” he asks.
“I have no idea what that means.”
Holding up five fingers, he waggles each one in succession as he says, “Amato, Knight, Ferreira, Syn, and you. Five makes a pentagon…right? Shit, did I get it wrong? Is it a trapezoid?”
“Pentagon. And there’s nothing going on.”
His laughter booms like cannon fire. “There is most definitely something going on. I can see it, and I’m dead.”
I punch his arm. “That’s not funny.”
“But true. On both counts.” His expression hardens. “Why didn’t you ever tell me that Tristan was our brother? Or about what happened to Mom?”
Old scars that had just begun to heal rip wide open. “I wanted to protect you.”
His eyes roll skyward in exasperation. “From what? The truth?”
“From him.”
No good would have come from him knowing that Francesco was our biological father. Aleksei was already struggling with his demons. Ones I couldn’t save him from. But I sure as hell could save him from Francesco.
Aleksei’s gray eyes sadden when he looks at me. “You protected me my entire life and still the bad shit happened.”
I swipe at the errant tear that breaks loose. “I’m sorry.”
I tried so hard to keep him safe. In the end, I failed my brother. I failed Mama. I seem to fail everyone I love.
“I’m glad you have Tristan. Hopefully he can do a better job of keeping you out of trouble.”
Tears turn to laughter. “I’m not the one who got himself into trouble all the time.”
“What can I say? I’m talented.” He gets out of the chair and squats in front of me, his hands bracing the armrests. “I love you, Aleks. I know I never said those words out loud, but I hope you knew how much.”
Love was an emotion that was not allowed in our house. But I knew what it was because I felt it. From Mama and from him.
“I love you, too.”
He grips my forearms. “I need you to do me a favor.”
“Anything.”
The sadness burns away from his demeanor like flames disintegrating paper into charred flakes of ash. “When you get out of here—and you will get out of here—”
“Aleksei, don’t go,” I implore when he begins to fade away. I try to grab hold of him, but he slips right through my fingers like mist.
“—tell Syn that you love her.”
I startle awake and almost pass out again as I wheeze through the pain of several broken ribs.
The effort of trying to draw in slow, shallow breaths taxes what little strength I have left.
Everything hurts. Every-fucking-where. My head is throbbing so hard, I wouldn’t be surprised if my skull cracks wide open and spills my brains all over the floor.
I wonder if this is what Tristan experiences every time he gets a migraine.
Blinking my eyes open is an impossibility because of the crusted blood cementing my eyelashes together. Wouldn’t matter anyway. My eyes are so swollen, I wouldn’t be able to see farther than two inches in front of me. Not like there was much to see.
Between punches, I tried to catalog what I could. Anything that would help me figure out where I was. Other than the chair I’m strapped to, there was nothing but four concrete walls, a concrete floor, and a single lightbulb hanging from the ceiling.
“Welcome back.”
My head jerks up at the woman’s voice. I regret it instantly when pain explodes behind my closed eyelids.
“Speak for…yourself,” I mumble through puffy lips.
The woman’s overpowering perfume penetrates through the clotted blood filling my nasal cavities. The guy broke my nose on the fifth punch. I can only imagine what my face must look like.
High heels click against the concrete floor, the sound traveling around the chair counterclockwise in a circle before stopping directly in front of me.
“A sense of humor. You never used to have one.”
I go completely still when recognition slams into me. I know that voice. I didn’t pick up on it the first time. Too busy getting the shit beaten out of me.
“It’s been…a while, Serena.”
“Ding, ding, ding,” she chirrups, tapping the top of my head with a pointed fingernail as she says each ding. “Took you long enough.”
I don’t need to hear the convoluted backstory. It’s pretty obvious. Serena is a back-alley cat with nine lives. Cunning, sneaky, and always lands on her feet. I now regret not having Drako put eyes on her when she left DF.
“You and Viktor.”
Viktor Androv is pushing sixty. He must be going through one hell of a midlife crisis to be sleeping with her.
“You know the saying. The enemy of my enemy is my friend…well, in this case, my fiancé. I would invite you to the wedding, but I don’t think you’ll be able to make it.
” I can hear the smile in her tone, but it’s not a nice smile.
She’s loving every second of this, like a child who got away with something bad she did.
“I’ll make sure…to check the registry…and send the least…expensive gift.”
Serena chortles, like what I just said is the funniest thing she’s ever heard. “Gosh, I’ve missed you.”
“Wish I…could say the same.”
Her heels start click-clacking in a circle around me again, and the annoying sound only makes the throbbing in my head worse.
“Do you recall the last time we saw each other?”
“Unfortunately.”
She whacks the back of my head. Goddammit, that hurt.
“Don’t be rude. As I was saying, the last time we saw each other, I was begging for your help, and you just stood there and let that cunt humiliate me again.”
Syn didn’t enjoy making Serena crawl to the elevator, but in her defense, Serena deserved it.
“How’s the hand?”
Serena’s response is to smack me. Harder.
“Good enough to do that.” Clickity-clack. Clickity-clack. “I will never understand why you and Hendrix are so obsessed with that ugly bitch.”
“Seems like you’re…more obsessed.”
Another smack. I wish she’d stop doing that.
“Too bad Viktor isn’t going to hold up his end of the bargain.”
Clickity-clack. Clickity-clack.
Finally able to crack my eyes into slits, the thin stream of light flooding in from the open doorway momentarily blinds me. Serena is a blurry blob, as are the two armed guards standing at her flank.
“What are you…talking about? What…bargain?”
A Cheshire smile slowly spreads across her face. “The one where your ‘wife’ willingly gave herself up in exchange for your freedom. Or so Viktor led her to believe. Kind of tragically romantic if you think about it. Like Romeo and Juliet but with more blood.”
The guys wouldn’t let that happen. They would stop her. “You’re lying.”
Her smile morphs into a gleeful smirk. “I’m going to relish watching Viktor carve up that bitch right in front of you.”
Songbird, what did you do? I can’t let Viktor get her. The things he’ll do to her. The things he’ll let his men do to her.
Practically skipping to the door, Serena says, “Oh, I forgot to tell you. Don’t expect a rescue from your new friends. They’re all dead.” She makes a finger gun, holds it to her head, and pretends to fire. “I do feel a teensy bit bad about the baby. Oh, well. Such is life.”
No. No.
Horror congeals my blood, literally stopping my heart from beating. “What the fuck did you do?”
She fiddles with the diamond choker around her neck, then smooths down her hair. “And I wouldn’t count on Drako Petrov helping either. Car bombs are a lovely thing. Nice chat! We’ll catch up more later. Toodles!” She blows me a kiss and sends me a jovial finger wave goodbye.
“Serena! Serena! Stop!” Panic imbues me with a strength I didn’t know I had left.
Struggling to get free, I inadvertently topple the chair over. The side of my head smashes against the unforgiving floor, and an explosion of stars fills my vision. Worse, I can’t breathe as I lay helpless, my arm wedged between the chair and the floor, pressing uncomfortably on my broken ribs.
The rage swiftly dissipates and welcomes the despair to take over.
Fénix’s life was cut short because of me.
The woman I love with every fiber of my being lost the child she loves with every fiber of hers because of me.
Tristan died because of me. Drako. Hendrix.
Constantine. Syn will be next. Dierdre and Pyotr.
Viktor won’t stop until he takes everyone I care about.
I’m so sorry.
I’m so fucking sorry.
I lie on the dirty concrete, drowning in remorse and pain.
Get the fuck up, Aleks. You can still save Syn.
Aleksei’s voice is the catalyst I need.
Save Syn.
I let my mind go to the place where I don’t feel any pain. The place Nikolai taught me to find. “Never show weakness,” he would say as he beat me. “Never let them break you.”
Shifting my weight, the zip ties bite deep into my wrists, but I feel some give in the duct tape, the sticky adhesive slick with sweat and blood.
If there was something with a sharp edge I could get to.
I test that idea by wriggling around, hoping to use the friction of the chair against the floor to try and saw through my bindings, but all I manage to do is move across the room like a humanoid snail.
Think, dammit. There has to be a way.
A recollection pops into my head. What did Constantine say he did when Gabriel strung him up on chains?
Drawing in a ragged breath, I press down on my left hand, bending my thumb backward. There’s an audible pop when it dislocates. Okay, that sucked, but it worked.
Using slow, incremental movements, I’m able to slip my hand out of the zip tie, and for the first time since I woke up in this fucking chair, I get my first taste of freedom. I just hope that I can pop the joint back into place just as easily.
The door scrapes open.
Going perfectly still, I hope that whoever came in doesn’t notice anything since the duct tape is still wrapped around the zip tie.
There’s a muffled thud, like a duffel bag being tossed onto the floor behind me.
“Watch the door,” one of the men says.
The other man replies in Russian. Something that sounds like, “Why do you get to go first?”
“Watch the fucking door,” the first man barks.
“Fuck you,” the second man replies in English and slams the door shut.
Facing the wall, I can’t see shit, but I’m pretty sure what’s about to happen. I just need to hold on a little longer. Get through whatever beating he’s about to bring. Wait for my opportunity. And kill the bastard.
There’s a distinctive sound of a zipper being pulled. With a chuckle, he says, “I can assure you that I’m going to enjoy this even more.”
If this asshole pisses all over me, I’m going to lose it.
A sudden grunt of pain shatters the darkness, followed by a sharp gasp, then a short, sickening crack, much like the sound a branch makes when it snaps underfoot.
Twisting my head around as far as I can, I don’t trust my hazy vision when I look up into the beautiful cornflower-blue eyes of my angel. Surely, I’m hallucinating.
Syn’s smile is effulgent. “Hi,” she whispers, then kneels on the guard’s chest and gouges his eyes out.