Chapter 33 Rachel
RACHEL
The pain in my head is overwhelming. The nausea has returned with my outburst. Rosco has me plastered to his chest with his strong arms holding me together.
He’s murmuring softly in my ear, but I’m struggling to focus through the pain and nausea.
As it begins to wane, I’m able to focus on the conversation going on around me.
“Michael?” Nicolai…uh, Uncle Nicolai calls out.
“I’m afraid we have distressed her. Is she okay?
” I force myself to lift my head and look up.
Dr. Michael is peering at the machines he’d insisted I be hooked up to once he’d gotten the CT scan completed.
Who knew Nicolai had a complete medical floor in his penthouse getaway in D.C. when he lives in Chicago?
Not going to lie, I’d been floored by his declaration of being my uncle. At first, I’d been appalled due to the whole wanting to marry me thing, so I’d refused to believe him. However, he and Aunt Andorra had been very convincing…
Earlier…
“Why would you say that?” I ask, staring at my captor and the woman, who I’d assumed was his housekeeper but is apparently his sister. “I think I would’ve known if my father was part of the Russian mafia.” A sad smile appears on Nicolai’s face.
“Your father chose to leave our organization when he met and fell in love with your mother,” Nicolai says.
The sad smile is accompanied by a wistful sound to his voice.
“She never knew he’d been raised in the mafia.
He kept that from her. It’s the only thing he wasn’t completely truthful about with her.
“He agonized over it, felt like he was lying to her. A lie by omission, he’d say whenever he spoke to me about it. I tried to assure him he was doing the right thing by keeping it from her. It was safer for her. If she’d known anything about our life, it could have put her life and yours at risk.”
“I don’t understand,” I interrupt. “I didn’t think you could just up and decide you no longer wanted to be in the mafia.” Nicolai gives a bitter laugh.
“You’re are correct, dear niece, in most circumstances.
” Nicolai pauses as if he’s considering his next words.
I sit up a little straighter despite my pain.
“Your father and I were groomed from the time we were born to take over the family business.
Our father was eager to expand out of mother Russia and into the United States.
He was ruthless and expected us to be the same.
Your father was many years younger than me.
“I was sent to New York after I turned twenty-one to begin the expansion. A few years later, I brought Andorra over to save her from a loveless marriage. Father planned to marry her off to a man who was even more ruthless than him. Andorra was only seventeen at the time.
I’d gone home to give our father an in-person update on my progress in establishing our foothold in the U.S. While there, Andorra confessed to me her fear of the man father planned to have her marry, and she’d begged me to intervene.
“Naturally father wasn’t happy when I asked him to reconsider the marriage, and we’d fought over it.
Your father had begun his training already, but I could tell he didn’t relish the life.
He was only trying to keep our father happy.
After many hours of arguing, Father agreed that I could bring Andorra to the U.S.
with me but only if I also brought your father.
Father had wanted to use Mikhail to spy on me, and he’d believed that Mikhail would report back to him everything I was or wasn’t doing.”
“Mikhail?” I question.
“Yes, that was your father’s name given at birth,” Nicolai answers.
“However, after arriving in American he embraced the culture and strove to integrate fully. He worked hard to lose his accent, and when he turned eighteen, he applied for citizenship. He changed his name to the one you and your mother knew, Thomas Smith.” Nicolai smiles fondly as he stares off at nothing, lost in his memories.
“I can still see his face when he received all the paperwork declaring him a citizen and displaying his name change. He met your mother that very night at the pub we owned. We’d all gone down to celebrate, even though he wasn’t old enough in the U.S.
to legally drink. We’re mafia we didn’t care about the rules that didn’t apply in our home country.
“I’d closed down a back room for the event.
We’d been drinking for a while and were about out of the good stuff.
Your father went out into the main room to get more liquor when he saw her at the bar with a couple of her friends.
He invited them to join us even though she was obviously older than him. ”
“He was smitten from the moment he laid eyes on her,” Andorra joins the story. “He stayed by her side the entire evening. She tried to rebuff his advances, but Mikhail had a way with people, especially women, and your mother was no exception.”
“They were married in less than six months and you were born six months later,” Nicolai rejoins the conversation with a smile. “They were over the moon with happiness.”
“How did she not know that my father, her husband, was mafia?” I demand unable to piece it all together. “Did she know? Is that how she ended up with Vena after Father’s death?”
“No, Amelia,” Andorra answers. “She never knew. Nico gave him a legitimate job as manager at one of our restaurants. They lived a normal life, until…” Her eyes mist with sadness, and she turns to Nicolai seeming content to let him finish.
“Our father didn’t trust anyone, even his own children,” Nicolai continues through gritted teeth. “He wasn’t happy with Mikhail’s reports, or lack thereof, so he sent spies, men who were loyal or in most cases owed him a favor and were too afraid to not obey his every command.
“I’d known he would do this, and for many years, I’d been able to run interference, make sure they found evidence to support our loyalty and Mikhail’s reports. However, one slipped by me under the radar.” Nicolai has a pained expression on his face.
“It’s not your fault,” Andorra murmurs, seeming as unsure about disturbing his memories as I am. He glares at her in such a way, I fear for her safety, but she presses on it. “It’s not!” He turns back to me with a look of…guilt?
“I was blinded by my love for her,” Nicolai confesses. “We’d been raised together in Russia. Father had forced me to leave her behind when I came to America. He’d used my love for her to get me to obey him.
“At first, I had obeyed his every request, until I learned about his plans for Andorra and Mikhail. Then I used every bit of underhanded training I’d received from him to oppose him without him knowing.
It had worked beautifully. I had the respect of my men and I’d amassed a fortune here in America that father had no idea about or access to.
“When Natasha called, begging me to press Father to allow her to come to America as my wife, I thought I was ready. I should’ve known something was off. Father refused at first, of course. Little did I know it was all a ruse. He only pretended to be put out with the situation.
“He demanded an increase in percentages of my profits, to which I agreed, but looking back, he gave in too easy.”
“What happened?” I couldn’t help asking when he paused, getting lost in the past again.
“Natasha was a spy,” Nicolai spits out, angrily.
“She wasn’t here to marry me for love like I believed.
She was here to report everything to him.
We’d been very close before I left for America.
We’d stayed in touch, but I’d known father was monitoring everything so our conversations were always limited.
“Once she came here, she pretended to still love me, but I later learned, she was only following orders. My father had been using her as a weapon for years. He’d trained her to gather intel, to kill when it suited him, and he had her complete loyalty.
He was the father of her daughter, a child I knew nothing about until it was too late and your father was dead.” I stare at him in shock. Is he saying my father was murdered? That he didn’t die during an armed robbery at the restaurant?
“Yes,” Nicolai answers as if he’d read my mind. “She killed him late one night after the staff had left, and he was finishing paperwork for the bank deposit. She left me a note.”
“A note?” My voice cracks when I ask.
“She explained to me that my disloyalty and Mikhail’s disloyalty to father is why he had to die. It was supposed to be my wakeup call, to get me to fall in line, but it backfired.
“I’d found the note and headed straight to the restaurant, but I’d been too late.
Mikhail lay dying on the office floor. I tried to staunch the flow of blood, but he’d lost too much.
The ambulance didn’t arrive in time. Before he breathed his last, he made me promise to keep you and your mother away from this life, to never let it touch you.
“I failed him. I’d been so furious and consumed with grief over my failure to protect Mikhail, I failed to protect his greatest treasures. You and your mother.”
“Nicolai went to Russia not long after Mikhail’s passing,” Andorra once again picks up the conversation. “He ended our father’s reign of terror at a heavy cost to himself.” Nicolai glares at Andorra. “It’s true, and you know it. Don’t deny that trip changed you!”
“I never said it didn’t,” Nicolai growls.
“I don’t regret what I did, but I regret that my absence allowed Vena to move in on Naomi.
I hadn’t told her about the money we had set aside to provide for your future and hers should anything happen to Mikhail or myself.
Your mother thought she was alone without a means to support the two of you.
“He moved fast, wooing her and convincing her he’d provide for the both of you. I couldn’t tell her who he was without disclosing who I was, who your father had been at one time. I’d failed again.