40. Ofelia
Ofelia
“Thank God you’re here.” I cling to Darya in the Palermo airport, my phalanx of security momentarily forgotten. “And you.” I hug Masha, who returns my embrace with a reasonable dose of teenage insouciance.
“We left the boys at home,” Masha says, with the satisfied air of someone who won that particular argument.
“With the nineras and Abby.” She uses the Spanish word for nannies, mixing her languages as she has since she was very small.
“Abby’s mother came all the way from Australia to help.
” Her smile turns slightly evil. “The boys hate her.”
“Masha,” Darya says, frowning.
She shrugs, unrepentant. “Well, they do. She’s muy estricta—doesn’t let them get away with anything.” She sounds positively gleeful.
“Quite the party.” I raise my eyebrows at Darya. Abby’s mother is a farmer’s wife, so she’s extremely no-nonsense.
She can also be rather vocal in her opinions, so her visits often result in Abby spending a lot of time at Darya’s villa with an enormous gin and tonic in her hand, saying that she remembers exactly why she thought moving to the other side of the world was a good idea.
“Zinaida and Luke are helping out as well,” Darya says. “Abby is at our villa, so they’ve taken her and Dimitry’s place next door. Luke’s sister has come over from Australia to help with their baby, Mila.” She looks as pale and strained as I feel. “They all send their love, by the way.”
“I’m so glad Luke is there.”
“He wasn’t happy about not going to Miami.
” She shakes her head. “But Roman wouldn’t hear of it, not when Mila is barely a month old.
To be honest, I’m not sure that either Roman or I would have felt comfortable leaving unless he’d agreed to come and stay, anyway.
Lucky Zinaida and Abby get along so well.
But enough about us.” She glances at me concernedly as we head for the exit. “How is Lars?”
“No change.” I force myself to smile. “But let’s get back to the villa so we can talk in private.”
We leave the airport and climb into a sedan car. There are two security vehicles in front, two behind, and men on radios monitoring every angle of the airport. Papa might have gone to Miami, but his presence is extremely clearly felt, along with the full weight of Bellini influence.
“Bryce and Luis were cabreados they had to stay behind.” Masha eyes the horde of security surrounding us. “But they’re not needed, I see. Demasiado seguridad, no?”
“I know it seems like a lot of security.” I glance across at her. “But we can’t take any risks until this is all resolved. And I’m glad Bryce and Luis stayed with the boys.” My eyes meet Darya’s. “There are some very dangerous people involved. We all need to be careful until this is over.”
“Over!” Masha snorts derisively. “Nunca termina.”
It is never over.
I don’t answer that. Unfortunately, we all know she’s right.
“Can I see Lars?” Masha asks, when nobody speaks.
I try to smile. “I will take you to the hospital later, if you want to come. We aren’t allowed into his room because of the risk of infection, but you can see him through the glass if you’d like.”
“Is he going to die?” Her characteristic bluntness leaves no room for obfuscation.
“I don’t know, Masha,” I say quietly. “Nobody does yet. They have to keep him in an induced coma until the swelling in his brain goes down.” It doesn’t matter how many times I say words like induced coma and swelling in the brain, they still make me feel sick inside.
“We won’t know any more until the doctors wake him up. ”
If he wakes up.
That question is my first thought when I wake, the last before I sleep, and the color that shades every waking moment in between.
It exists in the same space as the question of will Alexei come back. Instinct tells me the odds of Lars waking up and the odds of Alexei coming back from Miami are not separate calculations. They are the same number.
Whatever it is, I’m not sure I want to know.
Darya’s hand slips into mine. “He’ll come back,” she says quietly. Her deep amber eyes on mine are rich with understanding. “They all will.”
“I hope so.” I barely manage to get the words out. “Oh, God, I hope so.”
It’s midafternoon before I’m finally alone with Darya.
We’ve been to the hospital, where Masha took one look through the glass at Lars’s bandaged head and multiple tubes and, for once, became utterly silent.
She stayed that way through lunch with Benny, Lourdes, and Jack Bellini.
As soon as lunch was over and everyone dispersed—Jack to work, Lourdes for siesta, and Benny back to the hospital—Masha retreated to her room, where she’s been rapping out flamenco steps ever since, practicing the rapid-fire footwork with the same intense focus with which I escape into piano practice.
“I know it’s best to leave her alone when she’s like this,” Darya says, turning her wineglass on the table. “But I hate seeing her so upset. I was worried about her coming at all, but she insisted.”
“It’s good that she’s here.” I try to smile at her. “You did the right thing. There’s no point trying to hide all this from Masha. She learned early on that reality is best dealt with head-on. We all did, unfortunately.”
She nods. “And she loves Alexei so much.” Glancing at me, she grimaces. “I’m sorry, Ofelia. That was very insensitive of me.”
“No.” I swallow the ache in my throat. “You’re quite right. She does love him, very much.” I stare at the glittering sea far below us.
Luca Bellini has gone to the States with his closest men to ensure the New Orleans branch of his family offers Alexei their full support.
Jack has stayed in Sicily with us to coordinate security, although we barely see him.
It’s odd staying in someone else’s home during such a personal time, but Luca has ensured we have the villa to ourselves, except for a discreet small army of distant relatives who arrive at all times of the day to ensure our meals are cooked, beds made, and laundry done.
They won’t hear of us lifting a finger and are unfailingly warm, kind, and generous.
“You love Alexei too,” Darya says quietly. She touches the sapphire ring on my hand. “And my brother clearly loves you, Ofelia. Try to have faith in that. In him.”
“It’s hard.” My voice is so strangled it’s barely a whisper. “I don’t—” I take a ragged breath, trying to steady myself. “I’m not sure that Alexei can come back from this, even if Lars does wake up.”
“From everything you and Roman have told me,” she says, “I think there will be a lot of people trying to make sure he does, Ofelia.”
“They don’t know him. Not like I do.” I speak before thinking, then color when I see her face. “I’m sorry. I know he’s your brother.”
“Yes, he is.” Darya’s mouth twists painfully.
“But you shared something during the time you were kidnapped that nobody else can ever really understand. Masha may know more of it than most, but she was a child. It was you and Alexei who carried the burden of what happened in those cells all those years. I can’t imagine how that must have been, for both of you.
” A flash of darkness passes her face. “Although I can imagine, all too well, the kind of torture Vilnus put you both through.”
I squeeze the fingers holding mine. “I know the Orlovs did terrible things to you as well. I’m sorry I didn’t talk to you about what happened.
I just—I couldn’t.” I meet her eyes. “I still can’t.
All I can say is that Alexei was as much Vilnus’s victim as I was.
More. And no matter what I say, I know that some part of him still blames himself for everything the Orlovs forced us to endure, even if I never have. ”
“He was blaming himself long before you were kidnapped,” she says.
“I used to be angry at him for making the decision to stay in Miami without talking to me. But time, not to mention parenthood, has a way of changing that. Sometimes I look at little Aleksander and wonder what he would choose to do if he was forced to watch from the corner while I was raped and Masha was tortured.” She nods at the horror in my face.
“I don’t think Alexei ever felt like he had any choice other than revenge.
I doubt that he ever allowed himself to dream of a life beyond that.
He might never have done so if it wasn’t for you. ”
“The week before the—before it happened,” I say, struggling even now to use the word bomb, “when we were sailing down the coast of Italy, I knew something was wrong. He was working late at night, when he thought I was asleep. I could tell that whatever he was doing was upsetting him, but he wouldn’t talk about it.
I woke up one night and saw him out on the deck.
He was gripping the railing with his head down, breathing like he was going to pass out.
I was about to go out to him, but then he turned and saw me.
“You should have seen him, Darya. It was just like when we were back in that cell, with the Orlovs. The mask came down right away, just like he used to do when Vilnus came into the room.” I shudder.
“I knew immediately that he didn’t want me to see him like that.
But now . . . I just wish I’d gone out onto that deck,” I say miserably.
“I knew we needed to talk. I thought there’d be another time, a better one.
But then Mickey found out we were engaged and said some terrible things. Alexei overheard them and left.”
I tell her about what Mickey said and about following Alexei ashore.