Chapter 32 Anika
ANIKA
It’s harder to find Miko than I anticipated. That’s in large part due to the chaos that’s spread throughout the house after the so-called “minor disturbance” that has left the kitchen staff thoroughly rattled.
No one seems quite capable of telling me where my husband went, and my heart flutters anxiously as I start to worry that something’s wrong. That, perhaps, the danger hasn’t passed—or worse, that Miko is hurt.
Finally, the Chiaroscuro butler manages to point me the right way, telling me that Miko took the hallway leading back toward Svetlana’s apartment.
But he couldn’t say what Miko might be looking for there—or even how long ago he had been headed in that direction.
A sliver of anxiety wiggles its way into my stomach. Was he just checking on Svetlana to make sure she’s alright? Is she in danger?
My steps quicken, my thoughts straying from the pregnancy test still grasped in my palm as I follow the familiar hallways toward her room.
Her door is ajar, and my breath catches as an ominous feeling settles in the pit of my stomach.
Then I catch the sound of Miko’s deep baritone. Relief floods me, and I move closer, preparing to join them—until I catch his tone.
“You knew.” Miko’s voice is startlingly jagged, almost broken, and it makes my steps falter. “This whole time. You knew who I was.”
Who he was? As in, he’s no longer that person?
Frowning, I creep closer to the door to peer inside.
Svetlana sits at one of her reading chairs, her body language relaxed despite Miko standing in front of her like a shadow carved from steel, every line of his back rigid.
“Of course I knew,” she chides with a grandmotherly affection.
“You think I wouldn’t recognize my own blood?
It doesn’t matter that I haven’t seen you since you were a toddler.
I felt it in my bones the moment I laid eyes on you.
You move like your grandfather. And your eyes hold the same sadness Viktor’s had. ”
Ice trickles into my blood at Svetlana’s strange explanation.
It tickles something at the back of my mind and, at the same time, puts my stomach in knots.
I study Miko from the back, his hunched shoulders and bent neck—as if he’s either looking down at something, or about to buckle under the weight of Svetlana’s confession.
“Pyotr,” Miko whispers. “He was my brother.”
Something heavy hits the floor with a soft thud, and neither of them move to pick it up.
Perhaps the sound was actually my heart, and it only sounded distant when it sank to my feet because my whole body has gone numb.
I can’t seem to find a clear thought in my buzzing brain as Miko’s words slowly worm their way into my skull.
Pyotr… had a brother?
“No,” Miko growls, anger crackling around him like lightning. “You’re lying.”
My heart stutters, the blood draining from my face at the sudden shift in his temper.
But Svetlana seems perfectly at ease. “I’m not,” she says calmly, but that only seems to aggravate him.
“You’re just saying it to screw with my head.”
“Mikail—”
“Don’t call me that!” he roars.
Ice floods my body, and I take an involuntary step back at the white-hot fury rolling off of Miko in waves.
It’s powerful enough to make it all the way into the hallway, and I swallow hard as I place my hand over my heart, willing it to stop racing.
But before I have time to recover, Miko’s fist is lashing out with lightning-fast speed.
My hands fly to my mouth to cover my squeak as the blow blasts through the wall to his left.
To her credit, Svetlana doesn’t even flinch.
All my instincts scream for me to go help her, but fear has frozen my feet to the floor.
In fact, I can’t seem to move a single muscle as I watch the man I love turn aggressive in a way that rocks me to my very core.
I knew he was capable of violence.
I watched him kill Pyotr brutally and in cold blood, for Christ’s sake.
But seeing him unleash that same fury before the sweet, frail, helpless old woman who I love more than anyone in the world?
He looks like a man on the brink of snapping.
Miko yanks his hand back out of the wall, blood coating his knuckles and dripping onto her Persian rug. “Why tell me now?” he snarls. “After everything that’s happened? After all that I’ve done.”
“You’re the one who came to me looking for answers. I didn’t want to force the information upon you, but I knew this day would come—when you were ready to know the truth, though I think you’ve suspected something all along. You deserve to know who you are.”
“I knew who I was, until five minutes ago,” Miko hisses, his voice dripping with vitriol.
My skin crawls as my legs refuse to move. This is the same hateful rage I saw in Pyotr. The same unpredictable violence that made me flinch every time he raised his voice or moved too quickly.
It’s a ruthless anger capable of destroying anything in its path: Svetlana, me—our unborn child.
Shivers rack my body as the thought hits me like a freight train.
Then, Svetlana laughs. The sound is low and dry and ancient, and it makes my heart pound.
Visions of Miko coming at her flash behind my eyes, mirroring the way Pyotr used to come at me when I responded in a way he didn’t like.
His fists clench, his shoulders tensing, but before he can come at her, Svetlana crows, “There it is! That red-blooded fury all the Novikov men are so well known for. I was starting to wonder, but you’re just like the rest of them.
It’s in you, boy. You better learn to control it unless you want to lose everything you love—and die a young, gruesome death like the men before you.
Don’t let that rage consume you, Mikhail.
You’ll end up dying alone, because it’ll make you kill everyone you care about before the end. ”
Her voice is laced with bitter warning, like she’s always known the conclusion to this story but hoped it might turn out different—just this once.
Standing rooted to the spot, I can’t move or think or speak through the terror coursing through me.
I’m clenching my fist so hard over my heart that I hear a soft crack and look down.
I’ve broken the lid of the pregnancy test that I’d completely forgotten about.
In an instant, my excitement over having Miko’s baby feels like a sick joke.
What if Svetlana’s right about the Novikov men having poison in their blood?
What if the blood in Miko’s veins is louder than the love in his heart?
What if the darkness in him isn’t something that can be drowned out by good intentions and vows and warm hands in the night?
I press a hand to my stomach, bile rising in my throat.
I can see that same anger in him now as I saw in Pyotr, and I’m terrified that, while I’ve been falling in love with Miko, he might be more of a Novikov than I ever could have realized.
What if, in the end, he ends up just as cruel as his brother?
Can his promise not to hurt me last a lifetime?
Would that promise extend to his child?
What if, despite his best intentions, that legacy of violence already lives inside Miko, waiting for the opportune moment to rear its ugly head?
I can’t take that chance. Not when I have an innocent life that’s just become my sole priority to protect.
Tears sting my eyes as I turn away from Svetlana’s room, from the truth still vibrating in the air.
I walk briskly down the hall, then run back to our bedroom. My hands tremble as I race to the bathroom, pulling handfuls of tissue from the box to wrap my pregnancy test in.
I shove it deep into the bottom of the trash bin and cover it with cotton pads and a bottle of mouthwash—anything I can get my hands on.
It’s gone. For now.
My heart splinters with the decision.
But I can’t stay here—not with this massive time bomb of a secret, not when I saw that look in Miko’s eye.
The one that says he could burn the world down to find the truth.
I won’t let my baby get caught in the flames.