Chapter 22 Depth of Betrayal #2
“No,” she finally said, “somewhere private. Isolated.” She sank back into her seat and tapped her chin. “Off the beaten path, but not so far away that it’ll take us long to get there. I’m not giving Kat my whole day.”
“You still have that meeting with Grigoriy later.”
Shit. “Exactly.” She’d finally thought to call the last remaining brigadier once the coffee and potatoes had hit her system that morning, but she’d still been a bit surprised he’d actually answered the phone.
Given that they’d never spoken, and everything that had happened in the past handful of days, she had half expected the man would ignore her outright.
Instead, he’d agreed to meet her at the house that afternoon, after his lunchtime crew meeting.
He hadn’t committed to anything beyond meeting for a face-to-face, but that was fine.
Except now it meant that wherever she chose to meet Kat, she also had to make sure she could circle back to the house no later than twelve-thirty. And that was probably pushing it.
“Let’s keep our options within a half-hour’s drive, factoring in traffic.”
Otto scrolled through his phone, tossed out a few suggestions, and finally they landed on another cringeworthy cliché that better fit her needs.
A comparatively small warehouse on a larger concrete lot, the entirety of which was owned and neglected by a company the Nikolaevs had long ago paid off.
The warehouse was on the outskirts of the city, so Evelina instructed Otto to set an alarm on his phone to make sure they left not a minute later than noon.
She relayed the location to Kat and stressed that her schedule was tight, so it was immediately or not until another day or more, and Kat promised to be there within half an hour. So Otto pulled back onto the road with only a low grunt to express his opinion.
Evelina dropped her phone back into the console once her own reminder was set—better safe than sorry—and returned her hand to Otto’s thigh just as an excuse to touch him.
She was nervous and excited and something close to petrified all at once.
It wasn’t all that much different from how she’d felt when she had first read that string of text messages.
Otto lifted her hand, threaded their fingers, and pressed his lips to her skin. He gave her a squeeze, teased her knuckles with his tongue, and then resettled her hand over his thigh like it belonged there.
The pressure in her chest eased.
They drove in silence until Otto turned into the lot.
He made a slow circle through the mostly empty space and Evelina watched his head swivel side to side as he canvassed the area.
There wasn’t much to see. The warehouse—not as run-down as she’d imagined, not as large as any she’d seen in movies—set back on the lot, a pair of rusting shipping containers on the far side of the property, and what looked like a rental SUV parked up near the front.
If anyone happened to drive by, it would probably only look like investors were actually checking in on the place. Or maybe like someone was selling it.
Otto parked a short distance from the building’s side entrance, cut the engine, and clamped his hand over hers before she could retract it.
“I know you want this to at least help shit make sense somehow,” he said, voice rough, “but don’t let your love for who you thought she was or who you wanted her to be blind you to whatever she shows herself as in there. ”
Evelina tried for a smile, hoping to reassure him, though it was somewhat more strained at the looming prospect of his words. “I won’t. I promise.” She leaned forward before he could slip from the car and kissed his cheek. “I promise.”
He met her stare, nodded somberly, and finally climbed to his feet.
She had her phone tucked into her purse by the time he got her door open, and it felt like seconds morphed into hours as they approached the door.
The unassuming door became an unassuming hallway, because it was not the main entrance, and her heart beat louder in her ears as her anxiety spiked.
She wasn’t supposed to feel so nervous going to meet her friend.
Except, Kat wasn’t her friend anymore. Not really. She didn’t know what label Kat fell under anymore.
The hallway spat them out into a large main space, clearly the heart of the warehouse based on the sudden added height to the ceiling overhead.
Evelina cast a brief glance around, berating herself for why she might have expected it to be anything other than an empty structure of steel beams, before Kat pushed off the opposite wall.
“Hey.”
Evelina drew a breath as she eyed the young woman whom she’d so recently considered her dearest friend.
Kat’s hair was a mess, like she hadn’t combed it in days, and her eyes were red and baggy.
She was dressed down and casual, much more than usual, and fidgeting with her hands in front of herself.
She’d looked more composed after throwing her guts up into a convenience store toilet twenty-four-hours earlier.
Had it even been twenty-four hours? No. No, it had not. Not quite.
Evelina swallowed. “So, I’m here. You’re here. I want to say ‘it’s good to see you’ but I’m still really pissed at the whole assassination plot thing. And the whole ‘bestie sleeping with my bastard cousin behind my back’ thing.”
Kat let out an awkward laugh and reached up, tucking a hand behind her head.
“Hands where I can see them,” Otto snapped.
Kat froze, her eyes blowing wide. “Seriously?” She pulled her arm slowly back into view and down to her side. “What do you expect me have tucked in my hair, a freaking throwing star?”
“Now that you mention it.”
Kat’s jaw dropped.
Evelina gave herself a mental smack and said, “You knew how this would be, Kat. You know what we saw. And I only have like an hour, so if we could skip the not-so-righteous indignation and get to the explanation?” She actually had closer to ninety minutes, but she recognized she would probably need some time to clean herself up when this meeting was done. It was a white lie she could live with.
Kat pulled her lips into a pout for a moment, then turned her focus back to Evelina. “Right. Okay.” She closed her eyes and her whole upper body lifted with an indrawn breath. When she opened her eyes again, a tear rolled down her cheek. “I’m sorry.”
Evelina arched a brow when Kat added nothing more. “You’re sorry?”
Pyotr stepped out from the alcove just beyond Kat. “Yes, it’s annoying, isn’t it?”
Something clicked in the air behind them before Grisha’s voice joined the conversation. “What was that you said a moment ago? Keep your hands where I can see them, Otto. I’d hate to have to add you to the list of people Evelina’s had to grieve this month.”
Nausea rolled through Evelina’s stomach as her lung function crawled to a stop and her heartrate doubled.
Understanding slammed into her with all the clarity only hindsight could offer.
“You lied to me.” And that shouldn’t be her hangup, not with a gun once again at Otto’s head, but Kat had no goddamn right to be standing there crying over her own treachery. Not anymore.
Pyotr tipped his head back and laughed, a full, belly-shaking laugh that carried through steel rafters overhead.
“Oh, Evie,” he said as he composed himself.
“You still don’t understand.” He laid a hand on Kat’s shoulder and smirked.
“I’m the one who sent her stumbling into your path all those years ago.
This whore’s been spying on you in exchange for my dick and better security at that disgusting bar from the start. ”
Evelina’s head spun. No. It couldn’t be true. All those years … all the memories … all the gossip … all the secrets…. It had to be a lie. Her desperate gaze clashed with Kat’s tearful one and Kat smiled weakly as she lifted both hands to her nonexistent baby bump.
“I didn’t set out to hurt you, Lina,” Kat said. “It’s just that I love Pyotr.” Her smile widened, the expression becoming something almost forced, and her gaze flicked away for just a second. “And we’re going to be a family now.”
She wasn’t denying it. Kat wasn’t denying the awful accusation Pyotr had made at all.
“Why,” Evelina choked out. “Why the hell would you do something like that?” It wasn’t what she should be demanding, let alone what her mind needed to be dwelling on.
But maybe if she let herself react initially, she could figure out a way to get her and Otto out of the damn warehouse without either of them taking a fatal injury.
Preferably any life-altering injury at all.
“Why?” Pyotr mocked. “The fact that you didn’t try doing the same to me just proves how far behind the fucking eight-ball you are, Evie.” He moved a half-step away from Kat and simultaneously drew a gun from his back. “You haven’t been preparing like I have.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Evelina snapped, her temper finally rising. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t hyper-focused on sabotaging your future for the entirety of my fucking life, you miserable, narcissistic bastard.”
Pyotr only continued to smirk. “Yes, I know. You had it so hard. Taking a few lumps from your daddy when you mouthed off, forced to watch your failure of a mother sob over children she never knew three times a year, and being allowed nearly every freedom while you waited on tenterhooks to be assigned some husband you didn’t want. Do I have that about right?”
There was nothing quite like hearing a crudely abridged version of things she knew she’d cried about to her bestie on multiple occasions to throw cold water in the face of her bleeding heart.
Evelina pulled in a deep, ragged breath and squared her shoulders.
There was no sense going for the gun in her purse—she or Otto would be dead before she’d have it in-hand and properly aimed. So, she opted for a different approach.
“If you’ve been preparing to square off against me all this time,” she said, “then I assume you’re ready to confess to being the one who killed Otets?”
A momentary silence fell over the group, before pride lit Pyotr’s eyes. “Did you figure that out all on your own?”
“You aren’t exactly a world-class actor.”
Pyotr snickered and swiftly swung the pistol around to brush the barrel along Kat’s face.
Evelina sucked in a breath at the same time as Kat let out a startled squeak.
“But this one is, isn’t she?” Pyotr said, stroking Kat with the gun as if his finger weren’t resting beside the trigger. “Such a good actress, she even managed to fool me.” He turned a glare on her. “Isn’t that right, blyad?”
Alarm shot through Evelina at Pyotr’s switch. It was the same thing he’d called Kat moments earlier, but the use of the word in Russian held a more venomous tone. And Kat’s wide-eyed expression indicated she hadn’t expected it, either.
“Wh-what?” Kat asked, attempting to lean away from the gun. “No, P, I would never—”
“But you did,” Pyotr snapped. “You were supposed to kill her.” He pointed with his free hand to Evelina. “And you lied to me, Katenka.”
“No, I didn’t!”
“You swore to me you’d keep up with your pills.” Pyotr grabbed hold of the collar of Kat’s loose-fitted shirt, forcing her to hold still as he kept the barrel of his handgun in her face. “I didn’t give you permission to get pregnant, Katenka.”
Evelina watched his nostrils flare as he spoke, her own gut churning. She didn’t know what to do. Didn’t know what she could do that didn’t jeopardize Otto. But she also didn’t want to stand there and watch her psychotic cousin kill his own pregnant lover.
Another tear rolled down Kat’s cheek. “Th-these things … just ha-happen….”
Pyotr clicked his tongue and released her shirt to take a step back. He let his other arm extend, keeping his gun at her face.
Kat held herself immobile.
“Pyotr,” Grisha called, “the girl is pregnant. And not the whore you came to kill.”
For a split-second, Evelina felt a twisted gratitude to the asshole.
Pyotr turned his head in their direction, his arm slackening slightly. “Is there some rule I can’t kill both? I won’t have this slut trying to tie herself to me right when I’m claiming my dest—”
A single gunshot burst through the space, deafening Evelina to everything beyond the immediate ringing in her ears. But she had a bird’s-eye view of the hole that ripped out the back of Pyotr’s head, sending his body stumbling backward before it could drop lifelessly to the ground.