Chapter 25 #2
Her eyes flash. “And you weren’t?”
“This is not about me.”
“It’s always about you,” she says, voice rising. “Your business. Your enemies. Your rules. Your anger. I was supposed to tell you I loved the one man you had decided was unforgivable? What would you have done, Viktor? Congratulated me?”
I don’t answer. Because we both know what I would have done.
I would have ended it. Or tried to.
That doesn’t make the lie easier to swallow.
I ask, “Why did you speak to Sienna on the plane?”
Anna’s face closes again.
“Tell me.”
She exhales, slow and uneven. “Mikhail and I had fought.”
“About what?”
“You.” Her mouth twists. “The deal. The way he kept trying to prove he could stand across from you without flinching. I told him he was becoming obsessed with beating you. He said I was still afraid of my brother.”
The anger in her voice is old, but the hurt is fresher.
“I was upset,” she says. “Then I saw her.”
“Sienna.”
“Yes.” Anna looks at me now. “I was only a few rows ahead of you. You didn’t even see me,” she says. “You were so caught up in her.”
The words sit between us.
I remember the flight in pieces. Sienna’s nervous laugh. Her mouth. Her body in my hands. The way she disappeared before I could find her again.
Anna was there.
She looks at me, tired now. “I told her you weren’t safe. I told her to stay away.”
“And the champagne?”
She looks down. “I told the caterer to bring it out,” she says. “That’s all.”
“That’s all?”
“Yes,” she hisses. “Like I said, was trying to keep Mikhail away from you. I was trying to keep you alive. I was trying to keep my own life from being ripped apart. And this is how you treat me?”
“I don’t trust you,” I say.
The hurt shows clearly on her face.
“Where is he now?” I ask. “Mikhail?”
“Away,” she says.
“Bring him to me,” I say quietly.
“Why?” she says sarcastically. “So you can kill him?”
“You should have come to me.”
“I know.”
“No,” I say. “You don’t. Because if you knew, Sienna would not have been the one warning me about my own sister.”
Anna flinches.
Good. I want it to hurt.
Because it hurt me.
“Find Mikhail,” I tell Yuri.
Anna goes still. “Viktor.”
I don’t look at her. “Before tomorrow, I’m going to kill him.”
Her face drains. “No. You can’t.”
“I can.”
“Please.”
That word makes me look at her.
Anna never begs. Not me. Not anyone.
For half a second, something in me almost softens. Then I remember the footage. Her lies. Voronin on my property. Sienna bleeding in my arms.
“Yuri,” I say.
He nods once. “I’ll find him.”
Anna reaches for my arm, but I step away before she can touch me.
“I’m going to the hospital.”
I leave her there with Yuri and walk out.
I’m halfway to the front hall when Ethan appears near the stairs, pale and hollow-eyed, still in the same ruined clothes from the morning. He looks like he hasn’t slept. Good. He shouldn’t.
“Where are you going?” he asks.
“To the hospital.”
His mouth twists. “Of course.”
I keep walking.
He follows. “For her?”
I stop.
The silence between us is enough warning. He ignores it.
“What is it about her?” he says, voice rising. “Seriously. Why do you even like her fat ass? Why her? Why do you keep choosing her over me?”
I turn around slowly.
He’s breathing hard, eyes bright with something ugly and wounded and almost childlike.
“My own father,” he says. “Choosing her.”
I look at him for a long moment. “I thought you were in love with her.”
His face changes. Then he laughs, bitter and small. “I said that to stop the wedding.”
There it is.
Not love. Not regret. Just one more weapon he picked up because it was close enough to cut.
Something in me goes quiet. “You used her.”
“She was already there,” he snaps. “She always is. Standing there looking helpless, and everyone falls for it.”
I hit him.
Once.
Hard enough that he drops to the floor and stays there for a second, stunned, one hand against his mouth.
I stand over him, breathing evenly, and feel no regret at all.
Then something slips from his jacket pocket.
A torn piece of paper. Small. Folded badly.
I shouldn’t look, but I do.
Because the handwriting isn’t his.
It’s Sienna’s.
A diary page, torn from something private. A few lines, rushed and uneven, as if written by someone trying to make sense of fear before it swallowed her.
How do I tell Viktor he’s the father of my baby?
The words stop the room around me.
I read them once. Then again.
Ethan is still on the floor, silent now.
“Where did you find this?” I demand.
He doesn’t say anything.
“Tell me,” I say, louder this time.
He flinches. “I didn’t. I stole it. I just wanted to know what she was writing about.”
It all makes sense to me now. “So that’s why you made a scene today,” I say coldly. “It was never about her.”
He hiccups. “No, no it’s not about that. I love her.”
“You don’t love Sienna.”
“How can you say that?”
“You don’t love her,” I say again. “And you know how I know it? Because I love her. I love her God damn it.”
His eyes widen. “You’re insane. I fucked that girl.”
“She’s not your property, and I will not hear of it if you imply otherwise. I’ll bury you myself if I have to.” I lean over him. “Your mother has spent your whole life softening the truth for you.”
His jaw tightens. “Don’t bring her into this.”
“She hid your mistakes. Explained away your cruelty. Called your selfishness confusion, your cowardice pressure, your lies pain.” My voice stays calm. “And I let her. That’s on me.”
Ethan looks away.
“No,” I say. “Look at me. I let it happen because it was easier than fighting both of you. But that ends now. You don’t get protection from the consequences anymore.”
“You’re fucked up,” he says weakly.
“Maybe,” I say truthfully. “But I meant every word I said. Sienna is the most important person to me. And if you don’t agree, you’re free to walk out of my protection.”
I look down at him, the paper clenched in my hand with only one thought in my head.
I have to get to her.