Chapter 17
Valerie
The basement is cold.
Not just temperature, though concrete walls and no heating make my breath fog in the air, but the kind of cold that seeps into your bones and stays there.
I deserve worse.
Deserve the pliers Lev held. Deserve the knives on that table. Deserve every brutal thing he threatened to do to me.
But he left me alive. Locked in this cell with nothing but a cot and my guilt.
My face throbs where it hit the floor when the guards dragged me down here. I can feel swelling around my left eye, taste blood where I bit my tongue. Small injuries. Nothing compared to what Ethan's endured.
Nothing compared to what I've done to Lev.
I don't know how long I've been down here. Hours? A day? Time moves strangely in the dark.
The door opens and Lev stands in the doorway. Face blank. Eyes cold. He's changed clothes, black suit, no tie, looking every inch the Pakhan.
"Get up." His voice is emotionless. "You're making a phone call."
I stand on shaking legs. "What kind of call?"
"The kind that saves your brother and kills Patrick." He gestures for me to follow. "Move."
I do. Up the stairs on legs that barely work. Through hallways I used to clean. Into his office, still destroyed from whatever rampage he went on after I confessed.
The desk is upright now, cleared except for a phone. A burner, different from mine.
"Sit." He points at the chair.
I sit.
He places the phone in front of me, then pulls out a piece of paper covered in his handwriting. "You're going to call Patrick. Tell him exactly what's written here. Nothing more, nothing less. Understand?"
I scan the script. It's detailed information about tonight's supply run: route, timing, and the number of guards. All false, I assume. Bait for a trap.
"He'll know I'm lying." My voice comes out hoarse from screaming earlier. "He'll hear it in my voice."
"Then better be fucking convincing." Lev's expression doesn't change. "Because if he doesn't buy it, your brother dies. And then you die. In that order."
He means it.
Shit
I pick up the phone with trembling hands. Dial the number I've memorized but hoped never to use again.
Patrick answers on the third ring. "Valerie. Cutting it close, aren't you? Why must you always wait till it’s your deadline? You know I’m not a very patient man."
"I know. I'm sorry. It's been complicated."
"Complicated how?" His voice sharpens. Suspicious already.
"Mr. Volkov's been paranoid. Changing schedules, increasing security. I couldn't get close enough to verify anything until tonight." The lies flow more easily than they should. "But I have what you want."
Across the desk, Lev watches me with those dead eyes. No expression. No reaction. Just watching.
"Go on."
I read from the script. "Supplies run tonight. Three trucks are leaving the east warehouse at 2 AM. Route takes them through the industrial district—Seventh Avenue to the docks. Four guards per truck, plus Mikhail in the lead vehicle."
"And Volkov?"
"Will be in the second truck. He’s personally overseeing this operation because the shipment is high-value." I swallow hard. "Weapons. Military-grade. Worth millions."
Patrick is quiet for a moment. I can almost hear him calculating, weighing whether to believe me.
"You've been radio silent for two weeks." His voice drops lower. Sounding ominous. "Ignoring my calls. Letting your brother suffer. And now suddenly you have exactly what I need? Sounds suspicious."
My heart hammers. "I was trying to find the right moment. Trying to get close enough without raising suspicion."
"Or you fell in love." He says it like a joke, but there's an edge underneath. "Got so wrapped up in playing house with the Pakhan that you forgot whose side you're on. Maybe started thinking good dick was worth sacrificing your baby brother for."
Lev's eyes narrow slightly. Watching my reaction.
"No." The word comes out too sharp. I force myself to soften it. "God, no. I would never—I could never fall for a man like Lev Volkov. He's a monster. A killer. Everything I hate."
I watch Lev's face as I say it. See his jaw clench. See his eyes harden even more, like stone turning to ice. See something flash through his expression too fast to name, but it looks like hurt.
Then it's gone. Buried under that blank mask.
"He's just a means to an end," I continue, twisting the knife deeper because Patrick needs to believe it. Because if he suspects I've turned, Ethan dies. "A job. Nothing more."
"Good." Patrick's voice relaxes slightly. "Because for a minute there, I thought I'd lost you to Stockholm syndrome and good fucking. Would have been disappointing."
"You didn't lose me. I'm just trying to stay alive long enough to get my family out."
"Smart girl." Papers rustle on his end. "Alright. I'll position men along that route. If your intel is good, this ends tonight. Volkov dies, your debt is paid, your family goes free."
He hangs up.
I set the phone down with shaking hands. Stare at it like it might explode.
Lev picks it up, does something to it, and then pockets it.
"You did well." His voice is flat. Empty. "Even convinced me you meant it. That part about hating me, about me being just a job."
"Lev—"
"Save it." He stands. "Patrick bought it. That's all that matters."
"But I didn't mean it…"
"I’m sure you didn’t." He moves toward the door. "Mikhail will take you back downstairs. Stay there until this is over."
"Lev, please—"
"This conversation is over." He walks out without looking back.
Mikhail appears moments later. Gestures for me to follow him back to the basement.
The cell is somehow colder when I return.
Mikhail lingers in the doorway. "I'll bring food and water in an hour."
"You don't have to." My voice sounds hollow. "If Lev wants me to starve, I deserve it."
"Boss didn't say to starve you. Just said to keep you locked up." He studies me for a moment. "You really love him?"
The question catches me off guard. "W-What?"
"Lev. You love him? Or was that all bullshit for Patrick real?"
"I love him." The admission hurts. "I fell for him despite knowing I shouldn't. Despite knowing it would end like this. And now he hates me, and I deserve that too."
Mikhail nods slowly. "For what it's worth, I don't think he hates you. Hate is clean. Simple. What he feels is messier than that."
"Does it matter? Either way, I'm leaving. Either way, I lose him and Mila and everything that mattered."
"Maybe." He shrugs. "Or maybe the boss surprises you. He's done stupider things for people he cares about."
Hope flickers for just a second before reality crushes it.
"He doesn't care about me anymore. You saw him up there. He looked at me like I was nothing."
"I saw a man trying very hard not to feel anything because feeling anything right now would break him.
" Mikhail's expression softens slightly.
"He trusted you. Let you in. That's not something he does.
Ever. And you betrayed that. Doesn't matter that you had reasons.
Doesn't matter that you stopped. The betrayal happened.
And now he's trying to put himself back together while everything inside him is screaming. "
"So, what do I do?"
"You wait. You accept whatever consequences come. And you hope that when the dust settles, there's something left to salvage." He starts to close the door, then pauses. "And Valerie? If you really love him, you'll respect whatever decision he makes. Even if it destroys you."
The door closes. Locks. And I'm alone again.
Hours pass. Mikhail brings food like he promised—soup, bread, water. I eat mechanically, tasting nothing.
Try to sleep. Can't. Just lie on the cot staring at the ceiling, mind replaying everything.
Lev's face when I confessed. The rage. The hurt underneath.
His hands on my throat. The moment I thought he'd actually kill me.
The cold emptiness when he looked at me in his office. Like I was already dead. Already gone. Already nothing.
And Mila.
God, Mila.
She'll wake up tomorrow, and I'll be gone. Elena will tell her some lie about family emergencies. She'll ask when I'm coming back.
Never, baby. I'm never coming back.
The thought breaks something in me that was already cracked.
I curl into a ball on the cot and let myself cry. Not the desperate, terrified crying from earlier. Just quiet tears for everything I'm losing.
For Lev, whom I fell for despite knowing better.
For Mila, who trusted me and deserved so much more.
For the life I built here, that was all based on lies but felt more real than anything I'd ever had.