Chapter Eight #2
“What if Polina tries to hide Sofiya from me again? Take her away where I can’t find her?”
“My wife wouldn’t do that. She knows what is at stake. Trust me. Just let them see each other here and there. That’s all I ask.”
“You’re making demands,” I say, staring at my scotch.
“We’re in this alliance together. I think I have the right. Sofiya and Polina want to see each other. Let it happen and Polina won’t be a problem for you. You have my word on that.”
I consider it. Ivan isn’t wrong. Polina will try to confront me again; try to take Sofiya from me. Maybe I should play nice with my mother-in-law.
“Deal,” I say. “They can see each other when I choose. Not before or after. When I choose.”
Ivan lets out a slow breath. “Deal. I’ll let Polina know. But you have to let it happen at least once a week. Polina will go stir crazy if she’s not allowed to see Sofiya soon.”
“Fine,” I grumble. “Once a week. But nothing more. Sofiya is mine now. She doesn’t belong to you or your wife.”
“Understood.” Ivan hesitates.
“What?”
“It’s just… make sure you’re being nice to Sofiya. She’s a sensitive girl. I don’t want my daughter broken, you know?”
All I do is smile tightly as I take another sip of my scotch. It burns nicely on the way down. It’s top shelf, I can tell. Ivan really is trying to butter me up.
“You’re in no position to make those demands of me,” I say. “How I treat Sofiya is none of your concern. She’s my wife now.”
“Yes but I am her father. I will always be her father. You can understand that. Just go easy on her here and there. Let her know she’s loved. I maybe coddled her a little too much growing up but it is what it is. Sofiya won’t do well if you’re cold to her. Just keep that in mind.”
“I didn’t come here to ask you advice on my wife, Ivan. I came here to talk about Alek Morozov. So let’s do that.”
Ivan opens his mouth to object before he closes it and nods, knowing that the conversation about Sofiya is done.
“Alek is encroaching on my territory,” I say. “I need you to help me get him to back off.”
“How do you propose we do that?”
“We’ll set up a meeting with him. Today. Tell him to back down or he’ll face the full force of us. You and me.”
Ivan scratches the back of his ear. “And you think Alek will just set up a meeting with us?
“No. We’re going to go meet him. Right now.” I stand up and lean down to speak into Ivan’s ear. “And if you tell me what to do with my wife ever again, I’ll end this alliance, Ivan.”
“So then I would just take Sofiya back from you.”
“No. You won’t. I’ll kill you if you try and you know it. So stay in line. Now, let’s go.”
Ivan slowly follows after me. I’m sure he’s wondering if he made a mistake in giving Sofiya to me. Well, too late now. I’m not giving Sofiya up for anything in this world.
I know where Alek will be since I had some of my men keep an eye on him ever since I came back to New York. It was nice to get away from business for a few days in Greece but it’s time to get back into it.
It’s time to reclaim the territory Alek is trying to take.
Ivan and I go to Alek’s nightclub. It’s empty inside this time of day. The bouncer out front is hesitant to let us inside but I show him my gun and he let’s me in, not wanting to risk getting killed. And I will kill to get what I want.
Alek is seated in a booth, watching a half-naked woman dance on a pole. Other than the two of them and the few guards stationed around the place, there’s no one else here.
I stand before him but Alek doesn’t take his eyes off the woman.
Older than me by almost a decade, Alek has a dominate presence about him.
Grey lines his temples but other than that, he’s still a handsome man in a distinguished way, which is annoying.
Most of the mafia men around here are old and fat.
I’m one of the only young ones so to have competition from a man like Alek stings a little.
“What do you want?” Alek asks.
“You’re trying to take over my territory and I don’t appreciate it. So back off.”
Finally, Alek slides his eyes over to mine. “And if I don’t?”
“I’ll kill you.”
“And then you’d have a war on your hands. I doubt you’d want to risk that. Didn’t you just get married? I doubt you’d want to risk your wife’s life, now would you?”
“Don’t talk about my wife,” I growl, placing my hand on my gun. One of Alek’s guards steps over to me.
“Don’t,” he warns.
Slowly, I remove my hand from the gun. “Fine. I won’t kill you now, Alek. But if you don’t back down, I will come for you. I have Ivan Smirnov on my side. I have power and strength to decimate you. Or…”
Alek raises an eyebrow before he turns back to the dancing woman. “Or?”
“Or we could make a deal.”
That gets his full attention. “A deal?”
“We could agree to work together. You would get some of my land but I would reap the benefits of getting a percentage of any earnings you bring in.”
Alek leans back in his seat. “Now why would I do that?”
“Because then you won’t have a war on your hands. Consider my offer, Alek.”
“I’m good. You can go now, Dimitri. I’m trying to watch Natalya dance here. You’re in my way.”
I leave the club with Ivan right behind me. “Fucking asshole.”
“Dimitri?” Ivan asks. “What are we going to do about him?”
“He has a point. I can’t just kill him without causing a problem. All that matters is that he doesn’t go anywhere near Sofiya. If he does, then I will kill him.”
“And you’ll have a problem on your hands. A war.”
“Yes. Keep an eye on him. Report back to me if he gets up to anything. I want Alek kept on a tight fucking leash or he’ll be killed if he escapes.”
“Got it.” Ivan places his hand on my arm. “Just…”
“What?”
“Just don’t go home to Sofiya like this. Not when you’re angry. I don’t want her in your path when you’re angry.”
“I won’t kill my wife, Ivan. I’m not my father.”
His eyes go wide. “What?”
Clearly, he didn’t know about my father. Shit. That was information I gave only to Sofiya. Our conversation earlier today got to me more than I realized.
“Never mind,” I grumble and walk away before Ivan can get into my head even more.
Sofiya
With Dimitri gone, I know it’s time to do some digging. I need to find where Katya is living in this house. Because she has to be somewhere.
Ann is in the kitchen, working on dinner, even though it’s only noon.
“Why do you start so early?” I ask her.
She gives me a look as she braises a roast. “Because this takes hours to cook. I need to focus. So if you wouldn’t mind…”
“I got it. Ann, just one question. Where is Katya?”
“I told you once before. That’s not for me to tell you.”
“But she lives in this house. She’s not dead.”
“Correct.” Ann doesn’t look at me once as she continues to cook.
“Then I’m going to find her.”
“You’re going to get into trouble with your husband. If he wanted you to know where Katya is, he would have told you.”
“I’m his wife. I have the right to know.” The last thing I should be doing is going against Dimitri’s wishes but I need to know where he’s keeping his sister.
So, I start looking around the house. I check every room, twice even, but I don’t find any sign of where Katya could be.
And that’s when an idea hits me. A secret room. There has to be.
I go into Dimitri’s office and look through his desk. The only drawer that’s locked is the bottom one. There has to be something in there.
After looking around his office, I find a spare key hidden under a potted plant. The bottom drawer opens right up to reveal…
A rolled up scroll. When I unroll it, I see that it’s a blueprint. A blueprint to the house.
It takes me a long moment to study it but when I do, I realize there is a hidden room to the house. It’s on the second floor, near the master bedroom. I shudder at the thought. Is Dimitri keeping Katya inside the walls? But no. She’s not dead. Ann said so.
And if Dimitri didn’t want me to be suspicious of him and his sister, he would have just said she was dead and left it at that.
Though, he did imply that he was the one to kill his father, even if his father died of a ‘heart attack.’ Maybe it’s the same with Katya.
Maybe he did kill her and everyone is covering up for him.
My heart is pounding as I head back upstairs. I find the guest bedroom where the supposed extra room is located on the other side. I study the wall. There’s nothing on the wall to indicate that there’s a private door hidden somewhere. Maybe the room was closed off. Katya entombed inside.
No. Don’t go there, I tell myself.
I press my ear to the wall and listen but I don’t hear anything.
When I’m about to pull away, I finally hear something: music.
A faint low sound but it’s there. I go into the master bedroom on the other side of the supposed secret room just to make sure no one is here but no one is.
The master bedroom is empty. I place my ear back to the wall, now in the master bedroom, and listen once more.
There it is again: the music.
It’s so faint that if I didn’t have my ear pressed to the wall, I wouldn’t be able to hear it. But I do hear it. Because Katya is in there.
I study the master bedroom wall, paying attention for anything that might look like a door.
And that’s when it dawns on me. The bookshelf. Of course it’s the bookshelf. A large bookshelf covers half the wall. I try pushing it out of the way but it’s bolted to the wall. It’s not going anywhere.
So there has to be a way inside. Dimitri has to give Katya food.
That’s when I start pulling down every book on the shelf. Can it really be like this? An actual secret door that opens up from a book on a shelf?
I try a book in the middle and that’s when the bookshelf moves. It moves away from me and opens a crack. I push it open the rest of the way to reveal a white door behind it.
An entirely other room.
I knock on the door, unable to get myself to push it open.
The music stops. “Dimitri?” a female voice asks.
I shiver. I’ve been sleeping in this room for the past few days now and his sister has been locked inside a room adjacent to this and I didn’t know? I almost throw up.
I try the doorknob and find it unlocked.
Pushing the door open, I see that I’m standing on the threshold of a very pink room.
A young, innocent room. Stuffed teddy bears on the bed.
The walls are a pretty pink wallpaper with butterflies.
The bed even has a soft, golden canopy on it that’s see through.
And that’s where I see a young woman sitting, on the bed, staring back at me with utter shock on her face.
“You’re… you’re Katya,” I whisper.
She’s young, around my age, with long dark hair and bright blue eyes. She’s so pretty it almost hurts to look at. It’s undeniable that she’s Dimitri’s sister. They look so much alike.
“Who are you?” she asks.