Chapter 38 Katarina
KATARINA
Sergei Stoyanov lived in a castle, or that’s what it felt like, anyway. I hadn’t seen much of it, considering that as soon as we’d gotten here, I’d been shown to my room, Tatiana to another, and been locked inside. I prowled the confines of my cage, frustration building in my chest.
Why had I taken the dog tags off? Why had making Massimo understand how deeply I resented being controlled been the most important thing, at a time when danger lurked around every corner?
I sank down on the bed. Because I was stupid.
It was clear at this point. I’d lived quietly in Hallow Hall for years, as obedient as an abused dog, scared that they’d hurt my mother, when she’d been dead nearly the entire time.
I’d let the injustice of what had happened to Mira continue for so long, when I should have been brave enough to die to bring it to light.
I’d pushed Massimo away, and over the phone, no less.
I got back up to walk the perimeter of the room.
It was richly decorated but had none of the antique, artistic charm of Massimo’s townhouse.
I looked out the window for the hundredth time.
Bars slanted across it, and past them, I could see the bare branches of trees.
We were outside the city. Somewhere quiet and elevated.
Torino’s city lights twinkled in the distance.
A road ribboned below, but no vehicles had passed in hours.
I walked around the room again. When the knock sounded on the door, I jumped. The walls were thick, and sound didn’t reach me easily.
The door opened, and a security guard in a black suit and shirt stood there.
“The director is waiting to see you,” he said stiffly.
I nodded, not about to argue about leaving this room.
I followed him, my thoughts jagged and anxious, little shards inside my head.
Sergei was my father. And Tatiana’s. It explained a lot, but it was still shocking.
I couldn’t wrap my head around it. My mother had told me that my father had died in Bulgaria, and it was part of the reason why we’d moved to Italy.
Had she known that Sergei was alive and well and living in the same city as us?
Yes, of course, she had to have known. Why had she kept it from me?
We went down a grand sweeping staircase and entered a luxurious living room.
A woman reclined against a sofa, dressed as if she was about to go to a gala dinner. Sergei stood, stiff-backed, in front of the fireplace. He turned.
“Ah, Katarina, you’re here.” He smiled at me.
I stopped just inside the door like a puppet whose strings had been cut, unsure what to do next.
“Come in, come in. Would you like a refreshment?” He glanced meaningfully at the woman on the couch, but she was engrossed in her phone and ignoring him. She looked to be about my age, maybe one or two years older.
“This is Rada, my fiancée,” Sergei said. “Rada, my daughter Katarina.”
Rada waved her fingers at me passively, though she didn’t lift her eyes from the phone.
“Sit,” Sergei said.
I walked into the room and sat on the edge of the brocade sofa. He watched me expectantly.
“Where is Tatiana?” I asked. “I haven’t seen her since we got here.”
“She’s well and being cared for. It seems I was remiss in thinking Hallow Hall could provide a good education for a girl her age. She is quite behind, but it’s not a problem now. She will have the finest tutors this city has to offer.”
“Where is her mother?” I heard myself ask before I could question the wisdom of it.
Sergei took a moment to answer. “She is Italian and lives in Palermo. She wasn’t well enough to take care of a child, so Tatiana was put into my care.”
“And you sent her to Hallow Hall? That’s your idea of care?” A jagged laugh left me.
Sergei frowned at me. “Why not? Hallow Hall is the ideal place to keep a young girl and woman untouched by the foulness of society. She could grow up there with her immortal soul intact and her purity untainted. As my daughters, your safety was of the upmost concern to all who worked in Hallow Hall.”
“Her purity? She’s six.”
Sergei shrugged. “And yet, there are men who would seek to soil her body with their own sick desires.”
“Your business partners, perhaps?” I shot out.
Silence fell around the room.
Sergei frowned at me. “What are you implying, Katarina?”
I swallowed a knot of fear and anger. “Nothing. Just wondering how old Rada is?”
Sergei scoffed and shook his head. “That’s none of your concern. I’m starting to get worried that you lost your sense of decorum during your stay at Hallow Hall. I trusted Vargas to provide for your spiritual and emotional education, but . . . I’m wondering if he was lacking.”
“He certainly didn’t lack the evil to cut babies out of pregnant teens and harvest their organs,” I spit, standing. Suddenly, I couldn’t take being in the same room as this man.
“What are you talking about?” Sergei demanded.
“Are you honestly going to try and tell me you don’t know what went on at Hallow Hall? You don’t know what they were doing to their patients?”
Sergei shook his head, concern clouding his face.
“What’s she talking about?” Rada said, sounding worried.
“I don’t know, sweetness. I don’t know.”
He moved closer and reached out a hand to touch me, but I pulled back.
“Katarina, if you felt there was something wrong at the institute, why didn’t you say something?”
I opened my mouth to protest. To explain why I couldn’t sound the alarm on the whole operation, but all my words sounded like excuses.
“It’s not that simple. They were all in on it, and I have no way to know that you weren’t, too,” I said, and wrapped my arms around my middle. “I want to see Tatiana.”
Sergei nodded. “Of course, right away.” He gestured to one of his men in the corner, then reached out and touched my arm.
“Please, daughter, believe that I mean you no harm. I’ve only ever tried to protect you from the world.
When your mother passed, God rest her soul, I knew you needed to stay in Hallow Hall longer, to be safe. ”
I just stared at him.
He sighed. “You don’t believe me? Your mother was the one who wanted you admitted in the first place. She’d heard rumors of loose behavior, and she was worried.”
“How easy it is to blame the dead,” I murmured. I knew well enough the sins my mother had committed against me. I didn’t need this guy trying to control our story.
Sergei nodded again. “I know, she isn’t here to defend herself, sadly, but she was just worried. She wanted you to get better from the voices you were hearing in your head.”
I shook my head, not trusting myself to speak. The past was a tangled forest, dark and dense and easy to get lost in. I couldn’t sort through those twisted branches. I didn’t know which way to cut. I had no place to start from.
“I don’t hear anyone in my head,” I ground out. Fucking Ivan had been drugging me. The voices had never been real. I didn’t feel like sharing that particular violation with Sergei night now.
“Then it worked. Your mother would be so happy to know that.” Sergei reached out to pat my hand.
I drew it back out of reach.
“Kat?” A small voice tugged at me from the right.
Tatiana stood in the doorway. I pushed away the fear and anger crowding my throat and coloring my words and reached for her.
“Tatiana, come here,” I called to her.
She was a blur, she flew to me so fast. She threw her arms around my middle and stole my breath.
“You stayed!” Tatiana exclaimed joyfully.
“Of course I stayed. You’re here,” I said to her quickly, giving her a hug.
“There was a fire!” she exclaimed.
I guided her onto the sofa next to me. “I heard! Was it scary?”
She nodded. “It was really scary. I ran away first. I smelled it. I looked for you in your room, but you weren’t there.”
“You looked for me? The first thing you do in a fire is get outside. Adults can take care of themselves.”
Tatiana nodded. “I hid, but Massi says I didn’t choose the best place.”
“Massi?” I repeated, a dull ache blooming in my chest. God, I missed him. I’d do anything to see his face right now.
“Massimo. He came for me, you know? When it was scary and hot everywhere. I don’t remember well. I was coughing so much. He carried me. I woke up in the ambulance, and guess what?”
“What?” I was aware of Sergei’s gaze on my face but didn’t want to turn and be reminded of where I was. I smoothed Tatiana’s hair back. It was clean and shiny for once, though I didn’t like the idea that someone here at this house had bathed her.
“Massi was still there. I opened my eyes, and he said . . . ‘Knock, knock.’”
My smile was unforced for the first time all day. “Hmm, and what did he say?”
She giggled. “He said, ‘I’m Colin.’ I said, ‘I’m Colin who?’ And he said . . . ‘I’m Colin an ambulance.’” She fell about in careless giggles.
I hugged her close.
The sounds of a game emanating from Rada’s phone caught her attention. She got up and hesitantly approached the young woman.
“Are you playing a game?”
Rada barely glanced up from the screen.
“Mm-hmm.”
“Can I play?”
“No.”
Tatiana stepped away, disappointed. I was just about to say something when Rada spoke again.
“You can watch me, though.”
Tatiana climbed up onto the sofa beside her, and Sergei passed me a glass with ice and a pale-amber liquid.
“Here. It’s a mocktail, give it a try.”
I held it with no intention of drinking.
“Now, that’s an interesting story Tatiana has . . . a man who saved her. A man I had no idea was working at Hallow Hall. A man whose story doesn’t add up.”
I met Sergei’s gaze unflinchingly. “What man?”
“Massimo, she said his name was.”
I shrugged. “Oh, right.”
“Did you know him well?”
“Hardly at all.”
Sergei nodded and then pursed his lips. “Well, he’s an interesting man. Very interesting. A useful kind of man.”
“I wouldn’t know.”
Sergei looked at my drink. “Not thirsty?”
I didn’t respond.
He sighed. “Very well. Let’s get you turned in for the night. Rada and I have a dinner to get to. The chef in the kitchen will prepare you whatever you need. Eat together,” he said, looking between me and Tatiana. “It warms my heart to see my daughters getting along so well.”
When I failed to respond, he gave a resigned dip of his chin.
“I know you are angry at me. I understand. I relied on Vargas and the safety of Hallow Hall for too long. You should have come to live with me long before now, but honestly, it wasn’t safe. Men like me have enemies aplenty.”
“Aren’t you just the director of a business?”
He smirked slightly. “I’m a powerful man, daughter, and plenty of people would like to see a powerful man fall. I’m sure you’ve heard that proverb?”
I shook my head. He took Rada’s arm and started toward the doors.
“I’ve heard another, though, about power.”
He stopped on the threshold as Rada huffed about the delay.
“‘The bigger they are, the harder they fall.’”
He studied me for a moment and then turned away.