Chapter 31
Alina
“Iknow it’s going to be hard, but please wait here.” I lean across the car and kiss Seamus on the cheek. “Can you do that for me?”
“The last thing I want is to leave you alone right now.”
“I won’t be alone. My father’s place is protected.”
“I’m not sure anywhere is protected from her.” He touches my leg, and I can see the tension in his face. He wants to make sure I’m safe, but I need this right now.
“Please, Seamus. For me.”
He nods sharply. “Thirty minutes. Then I’m coming in after you.”
That’s not ideal, but I don’t argue. I kiss him again before leaving the car and hurrying up the front steps to my father’s house.
I use my personal code to get through the gate and into the front foyer, slightly surprised that it still works.
Men are lurking, tired-looking guards, and they give me surprised looks as I march back toward my father’s study.
Word of my arrival should be making its way back to him. Which means I don’t have much time.
I start tearing the place to shreds.
This room was sacred when I grew up. The thought of entering my father’s space without his express permission would’ve been impossible. I was always such a good girl back then, and I never would’ve broken his rules, not even if it meant saving my own life.
Now I’m starting to understand the cracks in my family.
The little spaces where I’ve fallen through.
I start at the bookshelf. I’m looking for one specific photograph. It’s a picture I haven’t noticed in a very long time. I rifle through books, riffling the pages at random. I find old money, ticket stubs, and a few torn pieces of paper, but not the picture.
Next, I go through his desk. It’s like desecrating an important crypt.
I can’t believe I’m doing this, but I’m moving in a waking dream.
I can’t stop myself, not even if I really tried.
I flip through papers, over files, across junk, and still there’s nothing.
I sit back, glancing at the door, my heart racing into my throat.
If I don’t find it before my father gets here—
One last idea.
I go to the picture frames. It’s not in any of them, at least not outwardly. Mostly they show my father, my brother, and a few of me, alongside important members of the family and a few powerful politicians.
I pop out the backs and check to see what’s hiding behind them.
There are more old photos. Pictures I haven’t seen in ages. A few show me and Taras when we were little kids. I was such a baby and Taras was a sullen teenager. It’s no wonder we’ve never been close. He basically helped raise me.
I’m about to give up when I try the last frame. It’s all the way at the top, almost out of reach. I hear footsteps in the hallway, and my hands are shaking as I slip out the back and find an old, faded image.
The photo is of two people, a man and a woman.
He’s got dark hair and a wicked smile. I recognize my father instantly.
It’s winter wherever they are. His arm is across the woman’s shoulder.
She’s nearly his height with blonde hair and deep blue eyes, a lot like mine.
I can see so much of myself in her: the same nose, the same jaw, the same cheeks.
“What the hell are you doing, Alina?!” My father stands in the doorway, staring at me with his mouth hanging open. Rage fills his face, and his forehead turns bright red. “You know damn well you aren’t allowed in here without my permission.”
I can’t take my eyes off the photo. “This is her, isn’t it?” I have to lean back against his desk or else I’m going to fall over. I feel sick. My legs go weak and my stomach twists. “You knew, didn’t you? This whole time, you knew?”
His rage stalls. He comes into the office and shuts the door behind him. “I don’t have any clue what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t lie to me.” I keep staring at the woman in the picture.
I’ve only ever seen her in this picture and only once when my father was drunk years back.
He took it from the backing and told me to take a long look at it.
There were tears in his eyes. I’d never seen him that emotional before, which is why the moment stands out.
At the time, I just assumed it was the drink making him act that way.
“Who do you think you’re talking to, girl?”
“I spoke with her tonight. I saw her face.”
His face pales. The anger completely drains away like leaves in the wind. “How did you find her?”
“This is Molchanie.” I hold the picture at him. My hands are shaking. “This is my mother.”
He makes a low, strangled noise in the back of his throat. His eyes shake as he looks at the image in my hand. I’m struggling not to get sick, but he doesn’t deny it. He doesn’t say anything at all.
I remember that night. The first night I saw this picture. The only time he ever showed me. Take a good look, Alina. This is the woman that broke my heart. This is your mother. Beautiful, isn’t she? I see her every time I look at you. Take a good look, because you’ll never see her again.
He was so hurt and angry back then.
Now he just looks small and terrified.
“I wasn’t sure,” he whispers as he walks over to the bar cart in the corner. He pours himself a vodka, hesitates, and pours a second for me. I accept the drink before he collapses into his chair behind the desk.
I throw the drink back, savoring the dull warmth, needing something to wake me from this nightmare.
I take the seat across from him, still holding the picture of my mother.
“But you suspected, didn’t you?”
“I’d heard rumors about her after she left. Things didn’t go the way she expected back in Russia. She decided to turn freelance. A part of me thought she might show up here again one day, but she never did. And she still hasn’t.”
He sips his vodka. He looks so small and old all of a sudden. His shoulders slump, and he stares ahead like he’s looking through old movies in his head.
“Who is she?” I whisper, wanting to know, but afraid of the answer. “No more games. No more pretending. Who is Molchanie?”
“You guessed correctly. If Molchanie is the woman in that photograph, then she’s your mother.”
I let out a long, painful breath. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“There was nothing to say. Your mother left a week after your first birthday. She was never a part of your life. She made it clear she didn’t want to be here anymore, and I wasn’t ever to contact her. I respected her wishes. And now she’s back.”
“How is she doing all this? The murders… I don’t understand. Who is my mother?”
He sits back in his chair with a groan. His eyes squeeze shut, and they’re glistening when he opens them again. I feel small and confused. A part of me wishes I’d never come here. It would’ve been better never to find all this out.
“Her name is Darya Sokolova. I met her during one of my trips to Moscow back in those days. I told the truth before. She worked for the SVR in those days, which is the modern foreign spy agency in Russia. I didn’t know it at the time, but she was assigned to report on my movements and my business.”
“She was your spy handler?”
“Something like that. I knew what she was the moment she picked me up in a bar, but I didn’t care.
Your mother was too charming to ignore, even if she was dangerous.
I couldn’t keep away. I fell hard for her, harder than I’ve ever fallen, and I still wonder if the feelings were mutual… ” He trails off, staring at his drink.
“They must’ve been if I was born,” I say, prodding him to keep going.
“Yes, perhaps. I don’t know. She got pregnant during one of my visits and came back with me to the States. We weren’t married long, but they were good days, very good days.”
“That picture is from Moscow, isn’t it?”
“During my third visit. She got pregnant on the fifth. We had a relationship by that time. I’m sure her superiors at the agency loved it right up until she ditched them to move in with me.”
I stare at the picture, trying to make sense of this.
Why would my father sleep with a woman he knew was spying on him?
It’s hard to fathom, knowing him now. He’s so closed off and difficult.
Nothing’s ever good enough, and God forbid he ever shows emotion.
She must’ve been incredible to break through to him.
“Why did she come back?” I ask, my voice shaking slightly.
“I don’t know. Your mother was extremely talented, even back then.
I can’t say for certain but I think she was high up in the SVR and likely would have continued her meteoric rise if she hadn’t gotten pregnant.
” He looks at his hands and slowly curls his fingers open and shut.
“I did what I could for her. I really did. I tried to make her happy. I offered to bring her into the business, but even that wasn’t enough.
Motherhood didn’t sit well with her. Nannies didn’t help.
They only made her feel worse. And in the end, she left without a word.
I tried to find her in the years after, but she was like a ghost.”
“Now she’s Molchanie.” I look up from the picture of my mother’s face. The same face as the assassin in the shop earlier tonight. Only she’s slightly older now. “How did she go from spying for the government to working as a hired killer?”
“I don’t know. I was never sure Molchanie was her, but I had my suspicions over the years. Then when I heard she was back and she was circling around you… I just knew it had to be my Darya.”
“What does she want with me, Papa?”
“I wish I could say.” He leans forward, suddenly fierce as he stares at my face. “How did she look? How did she sound? Did she ask about me?”
I shake my head, startled by his sudden intensity. “We spoke about me. She didn’t mention you at all. I only knew because of this.” I weakly hold up the picture.
He slumps, nodding to himself. “Of course not. I gave her plenty of chances, but she never did reach out. She never wanted to. That’s clear to me now.”
“Papa, I think there’s something wrong with her. She wants me to leave Seamus, and I don’t understand why. She’s killing people. You have to know something… something I can do…”
He shakes his head. “There’s nothing. I’m nothing to her anymore.” He sounds bitter and depressed. “Your mother was always skilled. She was trained by some of the best. She knows a dozen languages. She can fight and kill with ease. I’ve seen her scale walls in seconds. Your mother is formidable.”
Now I understand why I’ve always been a disappointment to him. It sounds like my mother is incredible. She was a highly trained and skilled spy, and she turned into this insanely successful assassin. While I’ve been nothing but a bratva princess following orders and running a clothing boutique.
But something twisted in her. My mother broke somehow over the years. Maybe all that training and all that killing finally snapped something, and she’s lost her mind.
“I’m going to keep this.” I stand, clutching the picture.
He looks slightly panicked. “That’s all I have left of her.”
“I’ll keep it safe, but I need it. I have to know what she looks like. She’s still after me, Papa.”
He slumps, holding up a hand. “I understand.”
“Are you sure there’s nothing you can do? Nothing you can tell me?”
“It’s been a long time, Alina. She hasn’t been in my life since you were a baby. Whatever she is now… she’s not the same woman who left. I’m sorry, but all I can tell you is she’s extremely dangerous. And she’s definitely your mother.”
I leave him alone with his vodka and his memory. My stomach is a twisting, burbling mess. I drop my glass at some point on my way back outside. The picture in my hand feels like it’s burning my skin.
Seamus is standing outside the car as I approach. He hurries over, looking worried. “I was about to come after you.”
“It’s okay. I’m okay.”
His eyes narrow, and he takes me gently by the shoulders. “You don’t look okay. What happened in there?”
“I figured out who Molchanie is.” I show him the picture. “She’s my mother, Seamus. That’s why she’s doing all this. She’s my mother.”