Chapter 24
ALEXEI
Pulling on a t-shirt, my damp hair scattered droplets across the bedroom floor; I’m fresh from the gym, my heart still thudding inside my chest, but it’s done little to salve the pressure of everything that was going on inside my head right now.
It’s been weeks since the attack on the house, but I can still remember with stark detail how it had felt, to see Cara and Nina taken like that, to know that it had happened because of me.
It doesn’t seem to matter how much I try to convince myself that everything is safe, or how many times Cara pleads with me to grant them a little more freedom.
I’m paranoid, looking around every corner and expecting something terrible to happen.
But... Nothing has happened. Not yet, at least. It feels like the whole city has been holding its breath, waiting to see how I’ll respond to the outright threat against me. Vinski is dead, his men slaughtered, and his crimes have been repaid in kind.
And anyone who tries to pull the same shit will be treated the same way.
I’ve sent that message loud and fucking clear.
So when does the fear recede? When does that feeling like everything is waiting to be ripped from my ease?
I wonder, briefly, if this is how my father felt after what happened to my mother, that constant threat of things hanging over his shoulder, the certainty that whatever stillness there was had to shatter at one moment or another. ..
“Alexei?”
I look around sharply, wondering who the hell has decided to interrupt me in my bedroom—and find Cara standing there, out of her quarters, her arms wrapped around herself nervously. I turn towards her, striding to close the distance between us, my brow furrowed.
“What are you doing here?”
“I–I need to talk to you.”
“Where are Max and Nina?”
“Marsha is keeping an eye on them,” she assures me. “They’re in their quarters, trust me. I just... I needed to speak with you alone for a bit, that’s all.”
I eye her for a long moment. If she thinks she is going to be able to spin the same shit she did to me the other day, then she has another thing coming.
I’m not going to ease up on security, I’m not going to let her or the children out of the house, where I can’t keep a close eye on them.
As far as I’m concerned, they are right where they need to be, and I’m not going to allow them to put themselves at risk going out into the world like that.
“About what?”
She draws in a deep, shaky breath, her hands twiddling at her sides. “I... I’m pregnant.”
For a beat of silence, we both just stand there, trying to make sense of it, of the enormity of what she has just said to me.
“You’re what?”
“I’m pregnant again, Alexei,” she explains softly. “I took a couple of tests yesterday, and I’m sure of it. I need to get to a doctor to confirm it and figure out how far along I’m, but I know it’s true. I know this is happening. And I know it’s yours.”
My muscles are rigid with tension as I wrap my head around it, the enormity of what she is saying to me. Pregnant. My gaze flicks down to her belly. It’s the first time a woman has come to me to tell me they are with child before I couldn’t tell at a glance myself.
I let out a deep breath. “You found out yesterday?”
She nods.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Jesus, Alexei, I needed a second to figure out how I felt about it before I came to you,” she protests.
I lift my chin. “And what exactly do you feel about it?”
“I...” She looks down at her belly, her teeth digging into her bottom lip. “I want to keep them, Alexei. Even if you don’t want to…”
“I do.”
I don’t even have to think about it. The moment I laid eyes on Nina, something in me had shifted, something accepting that I was no longer a father to a single child any longer but that there were more I needed to step up and look out for.
Another child makes sense to me; a wider family, more siblings for Max.
She lets out a long breath. “That’s what I was worried about.”
Anger flashes through me. What does she mean, that’s what she was worried about? Worried that I was going to want to be part of their lives? Isn’t that what she wants? She told me that I was a good father to Max, has she changed her mind on that now there is a baby in the picture?
“Why?” I demand, taking a step towards her. “You think I can’t take care of this child?”
She sighs, running a hand through her hair, and shakes her head. “It’s not that,” she admits. “It’s that... that I think you’re going to take care of this kid in the same way you have Nina and Max. And I don’t want to raise my child in this prison.”
“Prison? Cara, I’m trying to keep you safe.”
I know you are,” she replies softly. “I know you are, Alexei. But you have to understand, if you cut these kids off from the world, they’re never going to know how to handle themselves as they start to grow up.
I mean, how do you think they’re going to get through college, if they haven’t even stepped foot outside of this place?
If they’ve hardly attended school, or met people their own age, or experienced any kind of life. ”
“I’ll have security on them in college,” I reply. “If they decide to go.”
“No, that’s what I’m talking about,” she implores me. “You just can’t see it, can you? If you force them to live under your thumb—”
“I’m not forcing them to do anything. If they think they can handle life when they get to that age, then they can leave. I’m not going to stop them.”
“And you think they’ll have any idea of what to do with themselves when they get out into the real world if you keep them like this?
” she protests. “This is all they’re going to have known, of course this is going to seem normal to them.
I–I know how it feels, being raised like that, how hard it is to shake that off and live a normal life.
I always promised myself I would never let my kids live the same way. ”
“This isn’t the same as your childhood,” I remind her, trying to keep my voice steady, though the emotion threatens to rise up and out of me before I can stop it. “Can’t you see that? I know that you want to look out for them, but this world, it’s not kind to people like them-”
“I know,” she murmurs, dropping her chin to her chest. “But it doesn’t matter to me what the reason behind it is. I know how it feels, what it’s like to live like you have no existence outside your home, like that’s the only thing that matters...”
“Isn’t family the most important thing?” I argue. “I should just take my hands off the wheel, let anything happen to my kids?”
“That’s not what I’m saying and you know it,” she retorts. “I’m just saying that I want to give them a chance to live something closer to a normal life than the one they have now. And you don’t seem willing to even consider that.”
“Because I’ve seen what’s out there.”
“Alexei, I was kidnapped by one of your enemies recently, in case you forgot,” she fires back.
“I’ve seen it all too. Close up and personal.
And I still don’t think that Nina or Max or this baby, for that matter, will be better off locked away in here their whole lives.
And I’m not willing to raise my children like that. It’s that simple.”
Her voice is full of certainty, like a woman who knows what she wants and refuses to budge from it.
I close my eyes for a second, clenching my jaw.
I know that she is just trying to get through to me, to get me to see things from her perspective, but she is not giving me the chance to explain myself.
“Please, Alexei, just promise me you’ll think about it,” she implores me.
“I’ve already thought about what’s best for my children,” I reply harshly. “And I’m not going to change my mind on that.”
“But why?” she pleads with me. “You’ve got to be able to see where I’m coming from, right? I mean, you must have had more freedom than this growing up, you know how to handle yourself in this world, after all...”
Something at the back of my mind darkens, as memories stir, unbidden, from where I normally keep them locked away.
Hearing my father’s wailing as he realized that he had lost her, sensing the weight of it, the weight of his loss, that numb certainty that I would never see my mother again.
I had sworn, in every way I could, that I would never endure such pain, that I would never let the people I cared about be exposed to the same danger that had taken her from me.
And nothing is going to change that. Nothing.
“I learned the hard way,” I growl in return. “And I’m not going to leave Max or any of the children to learn the same way.”
Her face drops. It’s not the answer she wanted, but surely, she can see that it’s the one she was always going to get.
I’m never going to just take my hands off the wheel and let this world do what it wants to me, I know better than that.
I’ve seen what goes down when you are not careful in this life, and I’ll be damned if I make the people I care about pay the price because I got a little too comfortable.
“What happened, Alexei?” she asks, her voice dropping further, as though aware that she is skirting the edge of stirring up some shit she doesn’t want to know about. I deliberately miss the point, shaking my head.
“You know what happened. You and Nina were taken.”
“By a man you killed,” she points out. “This isn’t just about us. I know it’s not. So what happened to make you like this, Alexei?”
There it is, her words harsh and impossible to ignore. Suddenly, I feel exposed, as though a part of me has been splayed open in front of the world whether I want it or not.
“There are things you don’t need to know about,” I mutter in return. “Go. Rest. I’ll call the doctor to come check on you in a couple of days.”
“No, we’re not done here.”
“We are, Cara.” I put my arm around her and steer her to the door, even as she continues to protest.
“You’re not listening to me-”
“I’ve heard everything I need to. You can’t stress yourself right now. Think of the baby.”
She glares at me for a moment, and I can see it written all over her face, how angry she is, how much she wants to rebel against me in any way she can. I might not know what has made her this way, but I know I need to stand my ground.
“If something happened to any of you,” I murmur, as I gaze down at her for a second. “I would never be able to forgive myself.”
“And if nothing happened to any of us ever again,” she replies, her voice laced with sadness. “Would you like it better that way?”
But before I can answer, she has turned to head off down the corridor, clearly sensing that whatever attempts she has been making to get through to me have fallen on deaf ears..
And, in the silence that follows, I wonder if I’ve just made a mistake that I’ll not be able to walk back.