Chapter 34 – Ivan #2
I brushed my thumb across her knuckles, watching goose bumps rise on her arm despite the warm water.
“We’re quite a pair,” I said, a hint of dark humor in my voice. “Both running from the same thing.”
“And now?” she asked, vulnerability clear in her expression.
“Now I’m done running.”
The words felt like a vow, and I meant them as one. “Grey is still out there, and instead of hunting him, I’m here. With you.”
“Cara is still in danger, and instead of being out there, I’m here. With you,” she said.
“Do you regret it?” My voice was steady, but I caught the slight tension in her shoulders.
“Do you?”
“No.” The certainty in my voice surprised even me. “I made my choice. You. Over everything else.”
A small smile touched her lips, genuine this time. “That’s quite a declaration from someone who wouldn’t even look at me this morning.”
“A lot has changed since this morning,” I answered.
“So what now? What happens after…this?” She gestured vaguely between us.
It was a fair question, one I had no clear answer for. My entire life had been my family and the Paraskia. Now I’d walked away from it for her in a way that made my future uncharted territory.
“I don’t know,” I admitted.
She smiled then, a genuine smile that transformed her face and made something in my chest constrict. Without thinking, I reached for the washcloth hanging nearby, dipped it in the warm water, and began gently washing her leg.
She tensed momentarily, then relaxed into my touch.
The simple act felt strangely intimate—more intimate in some ways than when we’d had sex.
And God, her legs were sexy as hell, but this wasn’t about desire, at least not totally.
This was about being in the moment. About care.
About tenderness I hadn’t known I possessed.
The contradiction wasn’t lost on me. Perhaps this gentleness had always existed within me, dormant and waiting for someone worthy of receiving it.
As I continued with the other leg, I felt something shift in me. The steam swirled around us like a protective barrier, creating a sanctuary—a safe space with just the two of us.
“You were eight years old when you saved my life,” I said quietly, my voice barely audible above the occasional drip from the faucet.
Her body went absolutely still under my hands. Her eyes, when they met mine, were simmering with emotions.
“You knew?” she whispered.
I set the washcloth aside and focused fully on her. “I know it was you. You reported it to the authorities halfway across the world. That report led to a raid that freed twenty-three children from a fighting ring. Me being one of them.”
She stared at me. “How long have you known?”
I shrugged. “I’ve known for a while. I had Grey’s file about you. From there, I found the report. You reported a URL to the authorities.” I hesitated, then continued.
Her hands emerged from the water, gripping the edges of the tub so tightly, her knuckles whitened. “So you were…were you the boy I saw? The one who was fighting?”
I shrugged, the memories rising like shadows. “There were a lot of fights. I don’t know which one you witnessed.”
“A teenager protecting younger kids,” she said, her voice distant with recollection. “There were a lot of opponents, and that boy was bleeding, but he wouldn’t stay down.”
Something cold slid down my spine. I remembered that fight with perfect clarity.
Three older boys sent against me at once.
A test of my progress, they’d said. I’d been sixteen, already an efficient killer, but one day, I just refused to kill again.
They’d punished me severely, but I didn’t budge no matter what they did to me…
until they found my weakness…Nina and Mila, two little girls, there to be slaughtered.
“That might’ve been me,” I confirmed, my voice rough.
“I never forgot how determined you looked. How…unbroken.”
A bitter laugh escaped me. “I was very broken, Shorty.”
“My God,” she whispered. Her eyes filled with tears which didn’t fall. “All these years…I always wondered if you survived. If any of you did.”
I reached for her hand again, needing the connection. “I survived. We all did, Roman, Anton, Nina, Mila, and I.”
“Holy shit, I didn’t know that,” she murmured. “So the Zotov siblings…”
“None of us is actually related by blood,” I explained. “But we’d protected each other. Formed a bond. Grey let us stay together—one of his few mercies.”
I took a deep breath. “Grey was the top dog on the raid—made it look like he was rescuing us. For fifteen years, I believed he’d saved me.
” The admission felt like releasing poison from my system.
“He pretended to rescue us, but you’re saying he was the one who put us there in the first place?
” I laughed, a hard, self-deprecating laugh.
Her grip on my hand tightened. “You couldn’t have known.”
I nodded. “I know.” But the bitterness of that betrayal still burned. “If you think about it, it’s the perfect recruitment strategy,” I said, unable to keep the bitterness from my voice. “Break children, then appear as their savior. Create trauma bonds that ensure loyalty.”
“I’m sorry, I—”
“You were the actual reason we got out of that hellhole alive.” I let my thumb trace circles on her wrist, feeling her pulse race beneath the skin. “You saved us, Isabella. A Mafia princess who saw something wrong and had the courage to report it.”
She shook her head slightly, processing. “I was only eight. I didn’t really know what was going on. We’d just buried my grandfather that day; I’d snuck off to my grandpa’s library during the reception.”
I listened intently, noted how her voice changed as she spoke, becoming smaller, younger.
“I was hiding under a sofa, reading a book I’d taken from the shelves. Then someone came in—” She stopped abruptly, her body language shifting.
My instincts flared. “Who came in, Isabella?”
She swallowed visibly. “Uncle Marcus. He came in with his laptop, started watching. I tried to stay hidden, but there was dust under the sofa. I sneezed.”
The way she’d hesitated before she said his name—Marcus—made something primitive rise in me. A cold, calculating rage. I forced it down, keeping my expression neutral.
“He made me sit beside him,” she continued, her eyes focused somewhere beyond me. “Made me watch the feed with him. I saw you fighting. Saw what they were doing to you and the others.”
Her words painted a picture I hadn’t anticipated. Marcus had been involved with the fighting rings. He’d been watching us. Enjoyed our suffering.
“You were brave,” I said quietly. “Braver than most adults would have been.”
A shadow crossed her face. “Not brave enough,” she whispered, almost to herself.
I frowned, sensing there was more to the story. “What do you mean?”
Isabella’s expression closed off slightly, her gaze dropping to the water. “Nothing. It was a long time ago.”
The change in her demeanor was subtle but unmistakable.
Whatever she wasn’t saying, it was significant.
I should push. “I never knew,” I said instead, shifting the focus back to my experience.
“None of us knew the fights were being streamed. We thought…we thought it was just for the people in the room. The sick bastards who came to watch in person.”
A shudder ran through me at the memory. The cage. The cheering. The smell of blood and fear. The way the younger kids looked at me, expecting protection I couldn’t provide.
“Instead of watching the stream, I focused on the URL. I’d just learned about it the week before, and after he left, I found a scrap of paper—wrote down the URL that was on the screen.” Her voice strengthened slightly. “And handed it to a police officer.”
“That took incredible courage,” I said softly. Especially for a young girl from a Mafia family, who probably learned from early on that the police were not the way to go.
She shook her head. “I was terrified. Not just of what I’d seen but of Uncle Marcus.”
The pieces began falling into place, a terrible picture forming. The way she’d reacted to Marcus. Her panic at seeing him again.
“Isabella,” I said carefully, “what did Uncle Marcus do when he made you sit next to him?”
She didn’t answer immediately. Her eyes met mine, searching, assessing. Whatever she saw there seemed to satisfy her.
“He touched me,” she finally said, the words barely audible. “That day and other times. He never… It never went as far as he wanted. Someone always interrupted, or I found a way to escape.”
My vision narrowed, a red haze threatening to overtake my peripheral sight. I had to consciously regulate my breathing, keep my hands relaxed, and calm my expression.
“He never…?” I couldn’t bring myself to finish the question.
“No. He tried a few more times over the years, but Mira and I became experts at avoiding him.” She met my eyes again. “He never got what he wanted.”
Relief washed through me, followed immediately by renewed fury. That he had tried at all, that he had continued to have access to her after that first attempt—it was monstrous.
“I understand if this changes how you see me,” she said, her voice small again.
The statement jerked me from my violent thoughts. “Changes how I see you?”
She shrugged, water rippling around her shoulders. “Damaged goods and all that.”
“Shorty.” I moved closer, taking both her hands in mine. “Look at me.”
She raised her eyes reluctantly.
“What happened to you doesn’t define you. It reveals even more how strong you are.” I squeezed her hands gently. “And it doesn’t change how I see you, except perhaps to make me admire you more.”
“You don’t have to say that.”
“I don’t say things I don’t mean.” I held her gaze steadily. “You are incredible. You survived. You protected yourself and Mira. And you still found the courage to help others—to help me—despite your own fear.”
A single tear escaped, tracking down her cheek. “I still struggle with it sometimes. Like I should’ve done something different or maybe fought harder.”