66
Shoot
A s soon as the vodka and pills came out of my mouth, I smashed the Grey Goose bottle right into his head.
I knew my brother had a hard head, but not hard enough for the glass to shatter and him to still be standing.
Yuri roared half-blind and furious, because, although eyeballing is fashionable, the thing about drinking alcohol through the eyes, my brother didn't seem to like it.
" Súk a!" he spat, striking my face violently.
The metallic taste of blood flooded my mouth.
I saw him reach for his weapon. He would have grabbed it if Cheng hadn't taken hold of a frying pan without Yuri noticing. The Chinese woman was close enough to hit him in pure Rapunzel style.
My brother fell to the ground onto the shattered glass.
A barrage of gunfire thundered against the door. Cheng and I looked at each other without understanding. Yuri had told us that his men had no idea we were in that place.
"Take cover!" I exclaimed, looking at the Chinese woman, who made the bad decision to squat down.
Yuri had pretended to lose consciousness, I knew it when I saw his hand rise to stab a long, thick shard of glass into the Asian woman's neck.
I had never seen Cheng's eyes wider. She reached for the glass and dislodged it, causing a stream of blood to gush from the wound.
Everything was happening too fast. I didn't have time to help her, compress the wound, and take her to the doctor as I would have liked.
I lunged at Yuri and received a hard kick in the abdomen.
" Súka !" he insulted me again, calling me a bitch. "You'll pay for this," he swore, drawing his weapon. The door flew open thanks to the kick of...
"Romeo!" I muttered, releasing the little air I had left due to the violence with which he had struck me.
My husband aimed at where I was, but Yuri was quicker and pulled the trigger. He was always very fast. My husband's figure disappeared from the frame. Had he hit him?
I didn't even wait to find out, I had to deal with that monster I had as a brother.
I threw myself on him. It didn't matter the stomach pain I was suffering from the blow I had received; I wasn't going to step aside. If anyone deserved to die, it was Yuri, not my husband.
"Get off, dirty traitor! I knew Irene was telling the truth, that you had fallen in love with that fool! You have sunk very low, Kalinka! You don't deserve to reign by my side."
"Of course, I don't want anything that comes from you. You disgust me!"
Yuri rolled, taking me with him. We struggled violently. That fight had nothing to do with the training of our childhood.
There was no trace left of that beloved brother I had preserved in my mind. My heart told me he was now the enemy.
"Let her go!" Romeo shouted, walking towards us and aiming his weapon. My eyes searched his, and I prayed not to see contempt in his gaze. I only found determination and thirst for blood. At least, he hadn't shot. Did that mean he still didn't want to hurt me?
Yuri used me as a shield and forced me to stand in front of him.
“Well, well, well… Are you still alive, bastard?”
“You didn't think I was going to make it that easy for you.”
Cheng was on the ground, still alive, but all she could do was press the wound on her neck to avoid bleeding out. She crawled towards a corner out of Yuri's reach.
“Didn’t we agree to face each other alone? Are you hiding behind a woman again?”
“I already told you I'm not an idiot and I'll do whatever it takes to survive.”
“Leave her and face me like a man.”
“No,” he clicked his tongue. “My sister and you will never play happy couples again, better dead than with you,” Yuri snapped, turning me to headbutt me.
I howled in pain. He had hit me hard on the forehead. His weapon pressed against my temple, my head was throbbing, and I was panting, looking for a small gap to take control.
He turned me around again so that my husband could see my expression of pain. Yuri was enjoying it.
I noticed the side of his shirt was stained red. Damn! Yuri had hit him. I hoped it was just a scratch and that it hadn't affected any organs.
“Kill him!” I spat. I felt dizzy from the blow, but still, I tried not to let him notice. My eyes searched for the darkness in his. R seemed to hesitate about whom I was referring to, whether to him or my brother. “ Amore ,” I used our word to clarify it, “finish Yuri, avenge everything he has done to us and forget about everything else,” I pronounced softly.
“You bitch! What I've done to you?! I wanted to give you a kingdom!” he accused me.
“There is no kingdom without a queen who wants to rule. The best place for you is hell, you are not the Yuri I knew, maybe you never were, and that brother only existed in my imagination. If I had a weapon like you, I would give you the coup de grace myself.”
“Ungrateful dirty woman. With everything I've done for you.”
“You for me?! I've only been a means to your end, I never really counted for you or for dad, now I know. Shoot him, Romeo!” I incited my husband.
“If you shoot, she dies,” my brother warned him without a tremor in his voice.
“And if you don't shoot, we both die,” I counterattacked. “Do it, don't even consider obeying, don't care what might happen.”
“Why?” R questioned, focusing all his attention on me.
“Because I was wrong, because I should have told you the truth as soon as Yuri revealed his plans to me. Because with all the smartness I think I have, I should have seen that I never mattered to him; instead, you only needed two weeks to give me what he denied me all his life.”
“You ungrateful bitch,” Yuri spat, hitting my side and momentarily lowering his weapon to silence me. Romeo took a step towards me, but he stopped him by aiming at me again. “Don't you dare move.”
“R, you have always respected me and given me wings to be myself. And because of that, if I have to choose, I choose you over me, and I think it's the first time I feel this strange need to be generous enough to cross that limit. Take advantage now because I doubt it will happen again.” My heart was racing, perhaps this was the last chance I had to make him understand my feelings towards him, I wasn't going to waste it. At least, I would leave this world knowing I had told him what I wanted. “No one has made me feel more valid, loved, and capable than you, so I owe you. And I swear if I manage to stay in this world, I won't have enough days in the calendar to show you how sorry I am.”
“Shut up already, Kalinka, you sound like a cheap soap opera actress,” he spat.
“Listen to me,” I murmured, ignoring my brother so that Romeo would focus his attention on me. “Use all that hatred you feel for everything I’ve done to make sure my bastard brother ceases to exist, you owe it to yourself.” I was really convinced of what I was saying to him. “Shoot, amore , he deserves it.”
"You disgust me, Kalinka! You have become weak, cowardly, and sentimental! You didn't deserve the space I wanted to give you. Father always said, women are only good for fucking, raising children, and having a Visa. Pretending otherwise is a waste of time."
"And what the hell do you know? You're scum, Yuri, a miserable piece of shit with delusions of grandeur."
"Shut up, stupid bitch! I won't let you keep talking, your moment of glory ended a long time ago."
My brother wanted to drag me towards the door, using the same tactic as in the hospital. I couldn't let him go through it. Romeo was aiming at him, moving cautiously, but still not shooting, and that wasn't good.
"R, look at me. I'm not pregnant, I lost the baby two days ago, there’s no reason for you to hold back."
"She’s lying! She’s still pregnant with that monster." Yuri was getting angrier. He grabbed my arm and twisted it behind my back.
I swallowed the scream and kept talking, it was the only way to get R to react for once.
"I miscarried because of the medications you gave me, I didn't tell you because I also know how to keep an ace up my sleeve." I saw the confusion in Romeo’s eyes, I just needed to stretch the tension a bit more. Yuri kept pressing my arm, if he continued, he would break it. I had to act. "Do it, R. Don’t stop, shoot point-blank. And never forget that my heart has always belonged to you, even if I didn't know it myself. I love you, amore ."
I bit my lip and did what I had to do, an unexpected twist that allowed me to drive my elbow with all my strength into my brother’s abdomen. With that move, I could make a forward escape.
"Now!" I shouted, placing myself in the possible trajectory of Yuri's bullet to kill him.
I fixed my gaze on my splendid husband and thought I was lucky to have known him and to feel loved by someone so magnificent.
Maybe it was the last time I would see R, but also my brother.