Chapter 23 Sophia
SOPHIA
The safe house feels like a tomb. I stand at the window, watching the rain streak down the glass, my reflection a ghost staring back at me.
Behind me, I hear Mikhail pacing, his boots heavy against the hardwood floor.
He’s been doing that for the past hour, ever since we discovered Tony was gone.
“This is my fault.” The words escape before I can stop them, my voice barely above a whisper.
The pacing stops. “What did you say?”
I turn to face him, and the fury in his green eyes makes my stomach clench. “I said it’s my fault. I let him go. I believed he was ready, that he’d broken free from Lorenzo’s conditioning, and I was wrong.”
“You’re damn right you were wrong.” Mikhail’s voice is cold, controlled, which somehow makes it worse than if he were shouting. “I told you he needed more time. I told you he was still dangerous. But you insisted on treating him like your brother instead of the weapon Lorenzo turned him into.”
Heat floods my face. “He is my brother! He’s not some weapon or tool or enemy combatant. He’s Tony. He’s the person who used to make me laugh when Dad was drunk, who taught me how to ride a bike, who promised to always protect me.”
“That Tony is gone.” Mikhail moves closer, and I see the exhaustion etched into his features, the dark circles under his eyes.
“The man who escaped tonight is Lorenzo’s creation.
And because you couldn’t accept that, he’s out there right now, probably reporting everything he learned about our operations. ”
“You don’t know that.” But even as I say it, doubt creeps in. Had it all been an act? Had he truly not seen how Lorenzo had influenced him?
“Don’t I?” Mikhail’s laugh is bitter. “I’ve been in this world my entire life, Sophia.
I know how conditioning works. I know what it takes to break someone and rebuild them into something else.
Your brother has been Lorenzo’s prisoner for six years.
Six years of manipulation, of lies, of psychological torture.
You think a few days of showing him evidence is enough to undo that? ”
“So what was I supposed to do?” My voice rises, anger replacing the guilt. “Just give up on him? Let him stay broken? He’s my brother, Mikhail. My family. The only family I have left.”
“The Artyomovs are your family now. I am your family now.” The words come out quiet, almost hurt, and something in my chest cracks.
“That’s not the same thing.”
The moment the words leave my mouth, I want to take them back.
I watch Mikhail’s expression shutter, retreating behind the cold mask he wears when he’s been wounded.
“I see.” He turns away from me, moving to the small kitchen. “So I’m what, exactly? A convenient protector? A warm body in your bed? The monster you’ve learned to tolerate?”
“That’s not what I meant.” I follow him, my hands shaking. “Mikhail, please. You know that’s not what I meant.”
“Then what did you mean?” He spins to face me. Fury is there, hot and raw. “Because from where I’m standing, it sounds like you’re saying that the man you married, the man who’s killed for you, bled for you, would die for you, doesn’t count as family.”
“You’re twisting my words.”
“Am I? Or am I finally hearing the truth?” He slams his hand against the counter, and I flinch. “You blame me for this. For Tony’s escape. For his conditioning. For everything.”
“I blame you for shooting him!” The accusation explodes out of me, months of buried resentment finally breaking free. “He had a gun to my head, and your first instinct was to put a bullet in him. My brother, Mikhail. You shot my brother.”
“To save your life!” His voice echoes off the walls. “He was going to kill you, Sophia. His finger was on the trigger. I had maybe half a second to make that shot, and if I’d hesitated, if I’d tried to talk him down or find another way, you’d be dead right now.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.” He moves closer, anguish mixing with the anger. “I’ve seen that look before. The look of someone who’s made peace with what they’re about to do. Tony wasn’t bluffing. He wasn’t hesitating. He was going to pull that trigger, and I couldn’t let that happen.”
“That’s the problem.” I pull away from him, wrapping my arms around myself.
“You’re so focused on protection that you don’t see how your violence destroys everything around us.
You shot Tony. You tortured my father. You’ve killed so many people I’ve lost count.
And you justify it all by saying it’s to Nicole safe, to keep me safe. ”
“It is to keep you safe.” His voice drops, dangerous and low. “Every decision I make, every person I eliminate, it’s all to protect you and the family from the monsters in my world.”
“But you’re one of those monsters!” The words hang between us, brutal in their honesty. “Don’t you see that? You’ve become exactly what you swore to destroy. You’re no different from Lorenzo or Adrian or any of the other men who’ve tried to hurt us.”
Mikhail goes completely still. When he speaks, his voice is barely audible. “Is that really what you think of me?”
I want to take it back, to tell him I didn’t mean it, that I was just angry and scared and lashing out.
But the words stick in my throat because part of me, a small, terrible part, wonders if they’re true.
“I think,” I say carefully, “that you’ve been shaped by violence for so long that you don’t know how to solve problems any other way. And I think that scares me.”
“I don’t know how to be anything other than what I am.”
I move to him slowly, kneeling beside his chair. “Then maybe it’s time to learn.”
He looks at me, and the vulnerability in his eyes twisting my insides. “What if I can’t? What if this is all I am, all I’ll ever be?”
“Then we figure it out together.” I take his hands in mine, feeling the calluses, the scars, the evidence of a life lived in violence. “But Mikhail, you have to stop making decisions for me. You have to trust that I can handle the truth, that I can make my own choices, even if they’re dangerous.”
“Even if those choices get you killed?”
“Even then.” I squeeze his hands. “Because I’d rather die making my own decisions than live as your prisoner, no matter how gilded the cage.”
He pulls me up into his lap, his arms wrapping around me.
“You have to let me help save Tony. He’s my brother, Mikhail. I can’t just abandon him.”
Mikhail is quiet for a long moment, his hand rubbing slow circles on my back. “What if you’re wrong? What if there’s nothing left to save?”
“Then at least I’ll know I tried.” I pull back to look at him. “Please, Mikhail. I need to do this. I need to try to save him, the way you tried to save Nicole.”
His jaw clenches at the mention of his sister, but he nods slowly. “Okay. But we do this together.
We move to the bedroom, both of us exhausted from the emotional battle.
Mikhail strips down to his boxers, and I can’t help but trace the scars on his body with my eyes.
The long one across his abdomen from the knife fight when he was nineteen.
The circular one on his shoulder from the bullet three years ago.
Each mark tells a story of survival, of violence, of a life I’m still learning to understand.
He catches me looking and gives me a tired smile. “See something you like?”
“I see a man who’s been through hell and somehow still standing.” I slip into bed beside him, and he pulls me close, my back against his chest.
“That’s because I have something worth standing for now,” he murmurs against my neck.
Within minutes, his breathing evens out, and I know he’s asleep. But I lie awake, staring at the ceiling, my mind racing.
Mikhail will never truly let me put myself in danger.
He’ll always try to protect me, even if it means going against my wishes.
And Tony is out there somewhere, probably with Lorenzo, probably being fed more lies about how I betrayed him.
The phone Elena gave me weeks ago is still hidden in my bag.
I’ve kept it charged, kept it secret, just in case.
Now I pull it out, the screen glowing in the darkness.
I dial the number we’d found when searching Tony’s phone, surprised when he picks up on the second ring.
“We need to talk,” I say quietly, casting a glance a Mikhail. “You shouldn’t have left like that.”
There’s a sigh on the other end. “I know, but it was the best way I knew to keep you safe.”
“We could have kept you safe. We could have worked together.” My voice, still low, is urgent, almost pleading.
“We can’t stay on these phones. A few more seconds and they’ll be able to trace them. Meet me at the house.”
I hang up and look at Mikhail’s sleeping face, peaceful in a way it never is when he’s awake.
I should wake him. I know I should, but I can’t.
I don’t want to put his life in danger—well, more danger than usual—and I feel that if I just have a chance to talk to Tony, alone, that I will be able to get through to him.
I grab clothes from the dresser. Mikhail stirs but doesn’t wake, and I freeze, holding my breath.
When his breathing evens out again, I finish dressing and grab my jacket.
The safe house is quiet as I make my way to the door. The guards are outside, but I know their rotation schedule.
There’s a two-minute window when they’re both on the far side of the building. I wait, counting the seconds, then slip out into the night.
The old Moretti house is on the other side of the city, in the neighborhood where I grew up.
I haven’t been back since my father died, haven’t wanted to face the memories.
But now I drive through familiar streets, past the park where Tony taught me to ride a bike, past the corner store where we used to buy candy with change we earned from doing chores.
The house looks smaller than I remember, more run down.
The windows are dark, and the front door hangs slightly open. Every instinct screams at me to turn around, to go back to Mikhail and tell him everything.
But I think of Tony’s face, of the brother I lost and found again, and I force myself to keep walking.
I push open the door, and it creaks on rusty hinges. “Tony?” My voice echoes in the empty space. “Tony, are you here?”
A light flicks on in the living room, and I see him. Tony stands in the center of the room, his dark hair falling into his green eyes, his posture tense. For a moment, hope flares in my chest.
Then I see the man standing behind him, and my blood turns to ice.
Lorenzo steps out of the shadows, his blue eyes cold and calculating, a smile playing at his lips. “Hello, Sophia. So good of you to join us.”