Chapter 52
Ayla
My hand is still shaking when I drop the phone onto the bed.
The silence after the call is obscene.
Too loud. Too empty. Too full of his voice.
I sit there for one second too long, sheet tangled around my waist, lungs pulling air that doesn’t feel like enough. Then I force myself up. Off the bed. Onto my feet.
Move.
That’s the only thing that’s ever helped when panic starts trying to build a room inside my ribcage.
I pace once.
Twice.
The bedroom feels wrong now. Too intimate. Too full of Maksim. His watch on the dresser. His shirt half-folded over the chair. The smell of him in the sheets. Even the faint memory of the closet door opening and closing earlier.
All of it feels like evidence of something fragile I was stupid enough to touch with my bare hands.
Did he tell you he loves you?
I squeeze my eyes shut so hard it hurts.
No.
No, he didn’t.
That shouldn’t matter. It shouldn’t. I know what he’s done. I know what he’s put on the line. I know the shape of him better than almost anyone now. The way he protects. The way he claims. The way he looks at me like I’m carved under his skin.
I am carved into his skin.
But Gabriel knew exactly where to press. He knows where I’m weakest.
I go to the bathroom and splash cold water over my face. Once. Then again. I brace both hands on the sink and look at myself in the mirror.
My hair is wild. Marks on my throat. Eyes too wide.
You look like a woman who got comfortable.
The thought slips in so quietly it almost sounds like my own.
I stare harder. Maybe I have. Maybe I forgot what my plan was.
Survive. Leave. Start fresh.
My stomach turns.
Maksim said no one wants me dead.
But that isn’t the same as no one wants me gone.
And if Gabriel’s right—if the men only obey because they fear Maksim, then what happens when enough of them decide I make him weak? What happens when his attention splits one second too slow because of me? What happens when someone gets close enough to use my existence as leverage again?
I know the answer.
I’ve already seen versions of it.
Men bleed. Women get hidden. Weak points get carved out.
I dry my face with a towel and force my breathing to even out.
Vasilisa and Adriana are coming.
I should get dressed. Fix my face. Smile politely. Pretend none of this got under my skin.
Instead I walk back into the bedroom and look around like I’m seeing it for the first time.
My bag is in the corner.
I stare at it.
No.
Yes.
My chest tightens so fast it burns.
If I stay, I become something that can be used against him. If I go, maybe Gabriel loses his easiest route in. Maybe Maksim can focus on the war instead of guarding me like a second front.
He’ll be furious. The thought lands immediately. Furious enough to tear the city apart looking for me.
Which means I can’t leave a trace. Can’t leave a note. Can’t leave anything that gives him something easy to follow before I’m gone.
I hate that my brain already knows how to do this.
I cross to the dresser and pull on clothes fast. Jeans. Black tank. Boots. Jacket. Then I go to the closet.
Hands moving now. Faster than my head can keep up with. I pack jeans, black sweater, two shirts, underwear, socks, my knife. I grab my handgun, take an extra magazine, some toiletries. Cash from the back of the drawer where I keep emergency money Maksim gave me.
Money.
My escape cash is still at my old place.
Fuck.
I shove the drawer shut and one of his shirts gets caught.
My fingers brush the fabric. I stop. Just for a second.
It still smells like him.
My throat tightens. I jam it back in too hard, like that fixes anything.
This isn’t running from him.
It’s leaving before I become the crack in something he built. Because Gabriel was right about one thing, and I hate him for it. Maksim’s men do not trust me.
Some tolerate me. Some respect the mark. Some respect him enough to keep their mouths shut.
That is not the same as belonging.
And if I stay long enough to become the thing that makes his own people question him—
I can’t do that.
Not to him.
Not to me.
I sit on the edge of the bed for one dangerous second, bag open beside me, and press my palms to my thighs until the wave passes.
He asked me to marry him in the woods with his hand on my tattoo and his body still shaking from coming apart inside me. He has carved me into his life in every language but one. I laugh once under my breath. Of course this is what breaks me.
Not blood. Not violence. Not being marked in front of a room full of men.
Just the quiet ache of wanting one impossible, stupid thing from a man who doesn’t know how to say it.
My eyes burn. I blink hard and stand again.
No.
I am not doing this, crying in his room.
My phone buzzes with a message.
Vasilisa
Running late, sorry! The baby is making Adriana a little sick. Give us twenty minutes.
Twenty minutes.
Good.
That means I don’t have much time to think.
I send back a lie before I can stop myself.
No worries. I’ll be here.
Then I shove the phone into my pocket.
I head down to the garage, grab one of Maksim’s car keys.
It would be easier if I hated him.
It would be easier if I doubted him.
Instead I just doubt the world around him. The men. The structure. The cost.
And myself.
I toss the bag in the passenger seat and begin to pull out of the garage and freeze.
Katya.
She’s just outside the opening in workout clothes, one hand wrapped around a water bottle, her brows drawing together the second she sees me behind the wheel.
For one stupid second, I consider hitting the gas anyway.
Instead I crack the window.
Katya steps closer. “Where are you going?”
My grip tightens on the steering wheel. I force my face into something blank, bored, harmless.
“I’m meeting Vasilisa and Adriana.”
Her eyes flick to the bag on the passenger seat. Then back to me.
“Where?”
I shrug like I haven’t spent the last ten minutes detonating my own life in my head. “Some restaurant.”
That gets me a frown.
Not suspicion exactly. Something quieter. Sharper.
Katya glances toward the house, then back at me. I can almost see the thought taking shape—whether to text Maksim, whether I’m lying, whether stopping me is worth the fight.
Then she steps back.
“Okay. Have fun,” she says, too casual to be real.
I nod once, roll the window up, and pull out before she can change her mind.
Quickly I drive out of the compound, the gate opens.
Then closes behind me.
The second I’m on the road, my pulse starts climbing again.
Katya might tell him.
Actually, no. She probably will, not because she thinks I’m running, but because that’s how this world works—women mention where they’re going, men know, security tracks it, nobody disappears by accident.
Which means I need to move fast.
I keep both hands on the wheel and force myself to breathe evenly.
I make it to my old apartment in less time than usual. I hop out of the car and rush inside.
The apartment is still ugly in all the same familiar ways. Stained ceiling. Cheap cabinets. The smell of old water and bad insulation.
It should make me feel steadier, coming back to a place I survived on my own.
It doesn’t.
It just feels small.
Like I already outgrew it the second I let myself belong somewhere else.
I grab my old backpack, pull out the seventeen thousand and shove it into my bag. I zip the bag, sling it over my shoulder, and leave.
The second I’m in the car again, I lock the doors.
My phone is already in my hand before I start driving.
I pull up flights with shaking fingers and book the first one to Chicago that leaves soon enough to be useful and far enough to be loud. On his card. Expensive. Stupid. Obvious.
Perfect.
If Maksim starts looking fast—and he will, he’ll see the booking. He’ll chase the thing that looks like me running in a straight line.
Chicago can be my ghost.
I send the confirmation to my email, then log out of everything I can think of while stopped at a red light, pulse hammering hard enough to numb my fingertips.
Then I order a rideshare to the airport.
Another layer. Another wrong turn. Something bright for him to chase while I keep moving.
By the time I ditch the car in a parking garage, I’m numb.
I crush my phone under my boot beside the car and walk the rest of the way to the train station.
The station smells like burned coffee, wet concrete, and too many people trying not to look at each other.
I keep my head down and move with the crowd, backpack over one shoulder, duffel gripped tight in my hand. Every second I expect to hear my name barked behind me. Expect one of Maksim’s men to catch my arm.
Nothing.
Just the screech of a train pulling in somewhere below and the tinny crackle of overhead announcements.
I buy a ticket in cash. Pick a line at random. Then I step away from the machine and make myself breathe.
In. Out.
My palms are damp.
I hate this already.
Not the leaving. The shape of it. The old instinct coming back too easily. Head down. Move fast. Don’t get attached to any one exit. Clock every face twice. Know where the cameras are. Know who’s looking too long.
It slides over me like I never stopped doing it.
I tell myself that’s good. Useful.
It doesn’t feel good.
It feels like something I fought too hard to crawl out of.
I head toward the lower level, boots hitting the concrete stairs too fast, and slow myself before I start drawing attention.
The air changes the farther down I go.
Cooler. Staler. Thick with metal and damp concrete and the electric stink of old tracks.
The lower level opens up in strips of bad fluorescent light and shadow.
Columns. Benches bolted to the floor. A yellow edge near the tracks already blackened with grime.
People scattered in pockets, most of them half-lost in their own phones or staring blankly ahead like this place has already scraped the life out of them for the day.
Normal.
Busy enough to disappear in.
For one brief, stupid second, I could still turn around. Go back upstairs. Go back to the car. Go back to him.
My pulse doesn’t care.
I shift the duffel higher in my grip and keep moving, eyes scanning without looking like I’m scanning.
A train screams somewhere farther down, the sound bouncing off tile and concrete until it feels like it’s inside my skull.
Then I see him.
Dark jacket. Thick shoulders. Standing near a column with his head turned just slightly, like he’s waiting for someone.
My body goes tight.
He lifts his gaze.
Not enough to be obvious. But enough.
A cold, ugly understanding slides into place.
Gabriel’s men.
Of course.
This is what he wanted.
Get me out of Maksim’s house. Get me alone. Let me think I’m making my own choices when I’ve been walking straight into his hands since the second I answered that fucking phone.
Idiot.
I should turn around. Go back upstairs. Go back home.
Instead, I keep walking.
Because if that is one of Gabriel’s men, I’m not letting him follow me wherever the fuck he wants and spring on me when I’m cornered. Better to drag him somewhere quieter. Better to make him come close. Better to put a knife in him and send Gabriel a message with the body.
I angle away from the thicker part of the platform, toward a dimmer stretch broken up by pillars and a dead vending machine humming in the corner. Fewer people. Fewer eyes.
Come on, then.
Behind me, I hear movement. Not rushed.
Certain.
Good.
I keep my pace even, heart hammering hard but steady now. My fingers flex once around the duffel handle, then loosen. Ready.
Someone slams into my shoulder.
Hard.
I twist on instinct, curse already on my tongue.
A guy in a cap jerks back with his hands up like it was an accident. “Sorry.”
Too quick.
Too rehearsed.
The duffel is ripped sideways out of my hand.
“What the fuck—”
I catch the strap before he can tear it free and yank back hard enough to jolt his whole body forward.
His face pinches, not surprised, not apologetic. Just mean.
Not a thief.
A distraction.
The thought hits a second too late.
I drive my elbow forward and catch him somewhere solid. He grunts, grip slipping. I wrench the bag back toward me and reach for my knife—
A hand closes around my elbow.
Firm.
“Don’t.”
The voice is low, roughened by smoke, the accent familiar enough to make something cold crawl over my skin.
My head snaps toward him.
Too close.
I smell cigarettes. Cool air dragged underground.
He doesn’t look rattled. Doesn’t look like some idiot trying to snatch a bag.
He looks calm. Controlled.
Like he’s been waiting for me to make this hard.
“Come quietly,” he says under his breath.
I almost laugh. “Or what?”
I rip my arm, trying to break his grip, but he only tightens it.
The guy with the cap goes for the duffel again, yanking hard, trying to split my focus.
Two to one.
Fuck.
I jerk my elbow back and twist, reaching with my free hand for the knife at my waist.
The man holding me shifts with me, like he expected it. Like he’s done this before.
“Easy,” he says.
“Get your fucking hands off me.”
I bring my heel down hard, aiming for his foot. He moves just enough to take the worst of it. The cap guy swears as I slam the bag into his chest.
For one flashing second, I think I can still get out of this.
Then the third one comes in behind me.
I don’t see him. I feel him.
A rush of air. A body at my back. Then pain detonates at the side of my head.
White.
Blinding, sickening white.
My knees buckle instantly. The whole station tilts in a nauseating lurch, fluorescent lights smearing into long bright streaks overhead.
Sound goes strange. Muffled. Warped.
Somebody catches me before I hit the ground.
I fight on reflex. Try to wrench free. Try to get my hand to the knife.
Nothing listens. My fingers are numb. My mouth tastes like metal.
“Careful,” someone says near my ear, voice stretched and underwater.
The duffel is torn out of my hand.
The platform slides in and out of focus. Concrete. Shoes. A dark sleeve. The filthy yellow edge near the tracks.
Then even that is gone.
And everything goes black.