Chapter 26 Anika
ANIKA
“What were you thinking, walking all this way?” I ask, concern tight around my chest as I watch Svetlana totter precariously back toward her room.
The journey clearly took it out of her, and I’m worried she won’t make it back. But I don’t dare leave her side to fetch the wheelchair in case she falls and hurts herself.
“You needed my help,” Svetlana insists, her frail voice cracking as she starts to breathe more heavily.
My heart feels like it might burst with the amount of love I have for this kind old woman.
She might be the single most selfless person I’ve ever met. I honestly don’t know what I would do without her, and it brings tears to my eyes just to consider it.
“Thank you,” I murmur, a tumult of emotions roiling inside me, threatening to explode.
“You never need to thank me, vnuchenka,” she promises, huffing to catch her breath as we finally reach her door.
I pull it open and take her hand to offer my full support now that the wall is gone. “Let’s get you to bed,” I suggest, helping her take the last few steps to the nearest place she can rest.
Svetlana sighs in relief as she settles onto the edge of the mattress and allows me to take her cane.
By the time I turn to face her again, she’s managed to shuffle back beneath the covers, several pillows propping her up.
“Come, talk to me for a minute,” she suggests, patting the open space beside her.
Desperate for some human connection, I sink onto the bed and rest my head in her lap so I’m looking at the small peaks of her toes beneath the blankets.
Svetlana’s gnarled hands gently stroke my hair, calm and soothing as she smooths it down and tucks it behind my ear.
“Will you tell me what happened?” she asks gently.
I hesitate, unsure of where to begin exactly. I’m still trying to sort out what happened.
Now that it’s over, I realize I must have suffered a flashback. Pyotr’s dead, so he can’t hurt me anymore.
But I’m still trying to make sense of what triggered it, and I feel terrible for screaming at Miko like I did.
“If Mikhail laid a hand on you…” Svetlana starts, her tone dripping with vitriol as she breaks my train of thought.
“What?” I ask, propping myself up on my elbow so I can turn to look at her.
“No. No, it wasn’t that,” I insist, knowing that she means Miko even if she’s calling him by her son’s name.
It’s a habit of Svetlana’s I haven’t been fully able to break, but it’s harmless, and thankfully, Miko doesn’t seem to mind since Svetlana can’t help it.
“Miko would never hurt me,” I assure her, confident in the fact even if I’m still confused about what happened.
“Okay,” Svetlana says, her milky gaze closely scrutinizing my face. “Then, what did happen between you two? And don’t tell me it was a simple lover’s spat,” she warns. “I’ve never heard you so terrified.”
My stomach knots when I think about telling her the truth. Because this isn’t about Miko. Not really.
It’s about Svetlana’s great-grandson, and it feels wrong to my very bones to tell her any of the horrible things Pyotr was capable of.
Lowering my head back to her lap, I close my eyes and brace myself as I search for the words to tell her my deepest, darkest, ugliest secret. A secret I’ve only ever told one person before now.
I think of Miko—that night he listened so patiently as he carefully cleaned and bandaged my cut feet.
My chest squeezes when my mind follows the memory up with his pained expression in the foyer just now. I shouldn’t have left things between us the way I did.
But I was too confused and emotional to work out what had happened. The least I can do is clear his name, but that means confessing to Svetlana.
“I’m scared you’ll hate me if I tell you,” I whisper, a single tear squeezing out from the corner of my eye and rolling down my temple. I feel emotionally raw and exhausted, like I’ve been lost far from home and crying for hours.
“Child. Nothing you say could make me hate you. As far as I’m concerned, my sun rises and sets around you. You’re the daughter I never had—the granddaughter and great-granddaughter too. I will love you with every breath, right to my very last. So, tell me.”
A strangled sob catches in my throat, and I drape my arm across Svetlana’s lap, hugging her as best I can. “You’re the only family I have,” I confess.
She’s the only one who’s ever truly looked out for me—at least until Miko.
“Now, tell me. What happened?”
“I… saw Pyotr,” I confess.
With vivid clarity, I suddenly recall my intense orgasm right before my flashback.
I can still feel the effects of having Miko’s hard length buried inside me, and in a flash, I’m intensely aware of the sticky arousal between my thighs.
I press them together, my cheeks warming when I think about what we were doing before I completely lost my mind.
And now I’m hiding away in Svetlana’s bedroom, too embarrassed to talk about what happened and mortified over facing the consequences.
“Like a ghost?” Svetlana gently prods when the silence stretches too long.
“No.” I furrow my brow, keeping my eyes closed tight as I try to recall the details. I want to figure out what triggered me so badly—so I know what not to do next time.
The smell of whiskey is the most obvious culprit. It always made Pyotr mean, and tonight, it was making me tense before I’d even identified the smell. I should have said something, but I didn’t want Miko to stop.
Then, my heart jolts as I recall the way he pinned my hands over my head. In the moment, it felt… hot.
Like he wanted me to just lie back and enjoy the pleasure without trying to reciprocate.
But it also felt too confined.
Like I couldn’t escape—or fight back.
A violent shudder ripples through me, and I know that’s what did it. Because that’s exactly what Pyotr used to do if I ever tried to say no to him.
Svetlana is patient, waiting for me to explain myself as her hand returns to gently stroking my hair, and as my pulse slowly settles, I take a deep, steadying breath before I dive into my confession.
“Babushka, Pyotr used to hurt me,” I say. “He hit me sometimes—often—if I did something to make him angry. And a few times, after one of his late nights drinking, he would…”
I can’t bring myself to say it. The pain and mortification are too much, but I need her to understand so she won’t blame Miko.
“Miko and I were… being intimate,” I explain delicately. “And right in the middle of it, I envisioned Pyotr.” Shaking my head, I bury my face in the soft fabric of her gown. “I panicked and just… ran. Miko didn’t do anything to hurt me, but Pyotr did.”
Silence settles heavily between us once again, but Svetlana’s gentle touch never falters.
“I’m so sorry, vnuchenka. I should have known,” she murmurs finally, her voice dangerously frail.
“How could you have?” I ask. “I never told anyone about Pyotr’s abuse.” Not until the night I told Miko. But confessing it to Svetlana feels like a massive weight off my heart.
Turning my head to look back at Svetlana, I’m shocked to find her expression sad.
“I didn’t realize it had gotten so bad,” she says.
“I’ve known for long a long time that all Novikov men are born with a poison in their blood.
” She tsks, the sound both sorrowful and heartbreaking as she slowly shakes her head.
“It makes them hurt the ones they love, and they’re helpless to stop it.
But I was never sure about Pyotr. He could be such a charmer, that one. ”
I nod, a fresh tear escaping my eye to roll down my temple. “He was good at hiding it. And I always tried to cover the bruises with clothes or makeup. I was so ashamed because I was sure it was my fault.”
“No, Anika,” Svetlana says firmly. “The devils inside the Novikov men are something far too powerful for anyone like you or I to overcome—or even sway. I’m proud of you for being strong enough to survive it.”
Warm gratitude floods my chest, and I sit up to give Svetlana a proper hug. “I’m so grateful for you,” I whisper, pressing a kiss to her cheek.
She gives a warbling chuckle, her hand patting me affectionately on the back. “I’m here whenever you need me. Any time at all.”
“Thank you,” I say again, meeting her eyes with a smile. “I can go back to my room and let you get some sleep,” I offer.
I think I’ve calmed down enough to have my emotions under control, and now that I’ve had a chance to clear my head, I should really make things right with Miko.
But Svetlana shakes her head. “You stay here for the night and give your mind time to rest and recover. You’ve clearly been through a trauma and shouldn’t be going right back to the place where it happened.”
“But Miko—” I object, but Svetlana holds up a silencing hand.
“You two can patch things up in the morning,” she assures me. “Now, do an old lady a favor, and fetch me an extra blanket.”