Chapter 19
Alyona
Devin’s in the ER. I thought you should know.
The book slips from my fingers and thuds softly against the tiled floor. Asimov’s text stares up at me from the too-bright screen, and I’m halfway out of the chair before I even register that I stood up. My phone is clenched so tightly in my hand that the edges bite into my palm.
The solarium is glass, pale stone, and soft lighting. It’s the kind of space that feels separate from the rest of the house. It’s gorgeous during the day, but I prefer it at night when it’s cooler, and no one comes here.
The calm fractures the moment the words on the screen finish sinking in.
No explanation, no details. I start typing back quickly, but then I realize that Asimov likely doesn’t know much either.
My heart slams hard enough that it steals my breath away, and I swipe the phone again as if more information might magically appear if I look hard enough. Nothing. Just that one line, sitting there like a bruise.
I don’t bother gathering my things. I move, fast and reckless. My bare feet slap against the cool floor as I dash through the quiet halls of the house. Somewhere behind me, a door opens, and somewhere ahead, voices hush.
I burst into the main hall, breath coming shallow. “I need a driver,” I say, not stopping, not slowing. “Now.”
The man at the security desk—which is disguised to look like a casual foyer entrance—looks up, startled. For a split second, I see the calculation flicker in his eyes. Then it settles into something smoother, more deferential.
“Yes, Miss Demsky.”
Another guard is already moving, hand to his earpiece. I realize with a jolt that I am being obeyed without question.
No one asks where I’m going or tells me to wait for Kazimir. The machinery of this place shifts around me, efficiently and without question. It’s as if this is exactly what would happen if the real fiancée of the Bratva boss demanded a car in the middle of the night.
Kattrina, one of the maids, appears with a pair of my shoes. I put them on in a hurry and force a smile. It’s then I realize that I’m still clutching my phone.
The irony lands sharp and bitter as I stride out onto the porch. The night air wraps around me, but I don’t feel powerful, I feel sick.
Devin is in the emergency room, and nothing about this feels fake at all.
The emergency room smells like antiseptic and old coffee, the kind that coats the back of your throat and makes it hard to breathe.
Or makes you not want to breathe. I pace the narrow strip of tile between two plastic chairs.
My phone is still clenched in my hand even though no one is going to text me.
On the drive over I sent a message asking Asimov if Cinn knew, and he said yes, but she’s not here. Maybe that means it’s not that bad? Maybe Cinn is just heartless. I know one was more likely than the other, and it makes my heart ache.
Every time the double doors at the end of the corridor swing open, my heart stutters, and my body jerks toward the sound like I’m bracing for impact.
Devin should not be back there alone.
It’s more than that, though. All over again I’m 17 in Europe, in the hospital after the car accident.
My grandfather had them pull me out of school and drop me off there, even though he wasn’t there himself. So it was me the doctors talked to, even though they shouldn’t have; I’d lied and told them I was 18. Old enough to handle the details of my mother’s life hanging by a thread.
And when the thread was cut, I was still there alone. Still breathing in antiseptic air and growing chilled in the waiting area.
I don’t hear Kazimir arrive, but I feel him.
The air shifts, pressure snapping tight along my spine, and I turn to see him cutting down the corridor toward me, tall and unyielding beneath the buzzing fluorescent lights.
His expression is dark with fury, jaw set hard, eyes locked on me with the kind of focus that usually makes people shrink back.
It’s then I realize that I fucked up. I left without telling him, and he made it clear that I’m not to do that. I stare at him while he approaches me, his eyes are narrow. He reaches the space in front of me and asks in a low, dangerous voice:
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“I got a text,” I answer faintly, no idea what else to tell him. Because I don’t know anything else. I’m not her next of kin and I’m not listed as an emergency contact, so all I can do is wait.
“You left without telling anyone.”
It’s obvious from his clenched fists that Kazimir is trying to keep himself in check.
A quick glance around the waiting room shows the usual suspects: a woman with a limp pacing in a zoned-out kind of way, a young couple where the guy is clutching an obviously hurt forearm, a handful of sick people, a diabetic, a family waiting the same as I am.
“I did,” I insist weakly, wondering if he’s keeping from snapping for my sake or theirs. “I told the guy at the front, and the driver knew and so did some of the other employees—”
“You didn’t tell me.”
Is there an edge of hurt to his voice? I glance up, but Kazimir is looking over my head instead of at me.
“I don’t know what’s going on,” I ramble. “One of the guards from The Foundry texted me that Devin was here, but no one has told me anything else. I don’t know what happened, there’s nothing on the news sites, at least—”
But I’m still thinking of that night only days ago, of blood spraying from the politician’s nose, the fight that broke out, the fear. What if it happened again, but Devin was stuck in the middle of that kind of violence? What if someone other than Kazimir pulled a gun in that very room?
Strange that I trust him so explicitly with a weapon, and no one else.
His eyes flick toward the nurses’ station, fast and assessing. “Who did this?”
“That’s not the point,” I say, my voice climbing, cracking under the strain of holding everything in. “The point is that this keeps happening. It keeps happening and nobody ever stops it.”
“Aly—”
“No,” I cut him off, heat surging, tears burning hot behind my eyes. “You don’t get to calm me down. You don’t get to stand there and tell me this is about safety when all it ever does is move the danger somewhere else. What if someone came back because you--? Because I--?”
A nurse glances over. Someone coughs.
“She works her ass off,” I say, words spilling faster now, messy and desperate.
“She takes shit from drunk men and entitled men and violent men because that’s how you survive when you don’t have money or connections or someone powerful watching your back.
And one day she’s going to push back against the wrong one and end up in a body bag, and everyone will just shrug and say she should have known better. ”
My voice breaks hard, the sound ripping out of me before I can stop it.
“You lock me in a beautiful house and call it protection,” I say, chest heaving, “but she’s still out there. Women like her are still out there. Getting hurt. Getting killed. And it's always men with power who walk away untouched.”
The silence that follows is suffocating.
Kazimir’s expression changes slowly, like a storm draining out of the sky. The anger bleeds away, leaving something stripped and raw beneath it. His shoulders lower. His jaw unclenches. When he looks at me now, there is no dominance, no command.
“I hear you,” he says, so softly I almost miss it.
Then he steps back.
He turns and walks away down the corridor, long strides carrying him out of sight without looking back.
I sit there shaking, digging my nails into my palms, and staring after him. I wonder if I’ve just said the one thing neither of us can ever take back.
Eventually the adrenaline starts to burn off, leaving something that feels sour and aching. The double doors open again and Kazimir reappears with a set look on his face. He’s obviously more contained, controlled.
This is the man I saw those first months in America.
This is the leader of the Bratva. This is my father’s boss, the nightmare that haunts other men’s dreams.
This is the man who was under me a week ago, encouraging me to take it, reminding me that he is my first. And he’s walking back toward me.
When he reaches me, I almost melt in relief. But his whisper catches me off guard, clinical and straight forward: “She came in unconscious. Multiple contusions. Bruising. No internal bleeding.”
My breath catches in my throat. “How do you—”
“She’s awake now,” he continues. “Her wrist is sprained, and they’re following concussion protocol, but they’ll likely let her go home tomorrow morning if everything looks good.”
Okay. She’s okay.
I press my fingers to my mouth, nodding because if I try to speak, I will fall apart.
“I spoke to the attending physician,” Kazimir adds. “And hospital administration.”
Of course he did. How, I have no idea, but I’m starting to believe this man gets what he wants. Hinto. This other syndicate leader; he’s insane going up against a Baranov.
“They will let you go back and see her.”
I stand too fast, dizziness washing over me. Kazimir’s hand lifts reflexively, stopping just short of touching me, hovering near my elbow as if he’s forcing himself not to make contact. Then he drops it.
“This way.”
He doesn’t walk beside me so much as slightly ahead. His presence cuts a clean path through the chaos of the ER. A nurse meets us at the doors, glancing between us. She’s clearly aware of who he is or at least what he represents. She waves us through without question.
The room is curtained off, dimmer than the hallway, and Devin is propped up in the bed. Her hair is matted, and a faint purple bruise is blooming along her cheekbone and jaw. Her wrist is wrapped, splinted.
She looks so small and scared.
Her eyes snap up when she sees me, and the sound she makes is a half laugh, half sob. It breaks something open in my chest.
“Al,” she breathes.