12. Kirill
Kirill
Violet launches herself from the plush rug in a blur of tiny arms. I catch her. Her ring of laughter anchors me back to something resembling humanity.
My daughter deserves the best part of me. The kind man she made.
“There’s my princess,” I murmur, breathing in the scent of strawberry shampoo against her temple.
“You missed dinner,” she says, cupping my face in both hands and inspecting me with those sharp, knowing eyes that miss very little for a five-year-old. “Nadia said you were working.”
Her nanny is an older woman, married to a long-time guard who works for Drago.
“Not working exactly,” I admit, pressing a kiss to her cheek.
I linger a moment longer, grounding myself in the reality of her.
For five years, I looked in her eyes and saw the first female pakhan. When Sandrine disappeared, I vowed I would never marry again, never give my father that satisfaction. That meant I wouldn’t have more children.
It hits me how much that has changed. In a few hours. My wife is back. As I said to Papa, I can have a son. Or two. Or three.
But my wife hates me. I hate her, too. I hate what she did.
“I’m sorry, solnyshko, my sunshine. I won’t miss tomorrow.”
Violet tilts her head in a way that is far too similar to me. “Okay. You can read two stories tonight.”
A smile tugs at my mouth. “Two?”
“And do the voices,” she adds, already negotiating, already ruling a Bratva man the way I taught her.
“Voices, you shall get,” I agree because there is nothing I wouldn’t give my daughter.
Now I can give her a mother. Her mother.
Violet settles easily into my arms, her head against my chest as I carry her deeper into the room, past the canopy bed draped in pink fabric with white lace trim, past the shelves lined with books, and trunks filled with toys.
In this room, monsters don’t exist unless they’re drawn in crayon or voiced by me at bedtime. My child will know a father’s love. Something I also never had.
I sit on the plush rocker next to the bookshelf, keeping Violet on my lap.
I gently rub her back in an up-and-down, slow, soothing rhythm.
She keeps her head against my chest, completely at ease, completely trusting.
A violent man like me doesn’t deserve her trust. But it’s a side of me I’ll never show her.
Maybe when she’s older and ready to take her place in my Bratva.
“You smell like outside,” she says, pressing her nose into my arm.
“I was outside,” I reply, brushing a curl away from her face. “I had to go get something.”
Her eyes light up with curiosity. “A present for me?”
The image of Sandrine, confused, frightened on the floor of the cell earlier, insisting she doesn’t know me, flashes behind my eyes and leaves a fracture in my heart that may never heal.
Everything in me braces to say the words: Your mother is home.
Once I say those words out loud, everything changes. It changes my daughter. It changes us. I’m no longer a single parent. I’ll have to share Violet.
I’m all she knows in this life. And I’m about to upend her world.
“Not what, solnyshko. Who.” I hear the tremble in my voice. “I brought your mommy home.”
She stills in my arms, then turns around to face me. My world narrows to the pounding of my heart and the weight of what I just said.
“My mommy?” Violet stares at me like she’s seen a ghost.
Her brows knit together in a way so achingly similar to Sandrine’s that it hits like a physical blow.
“Yes.”
Violet searches my face with a seriousness far beyond her years.
“Where is she?” she asks in a rush, her fingers curling into my shirt.
Here it comes.
That continued disappointment I must deliver to this child. Five years and it still lands like a blade slicing out my heart.
“In the house,” I say carefully, choosing not to tell her she’s a few doors down. Guarded.
Violet’s eyes widen into bright and hopeful orbs. “Why didn’t she come see me?”
“She’s not well, solnyshko,” I continue, my jaw tightening around that awful but convenient truth. “She needs to rest.”
“She got hurt in the magical world?” Her voice goes small.
Years ago, I told my daughter that her mother crossed over into a realm to fight evil. Most of the stories I tell Violet include a version of Sandrine with a sword, on a horse, or lightning shooting from the tips of her blonde hair.
I wanted to believe all that, too. Why else didn’t she come home from her father’s house that night?
Seeing her walking around in shorts, a frilly striped top, and fucking flip-flops crushed the image I had of her in my head. The fantasy I built around my heart shattered in seconds.
“Yes, she got hurt in the magical world,” I answer Violet. “I didn’t know. She’s been sick for a long time.”
“Sick like when I got sick?” she asks, her little brain needing these answers to cope.
“Yes, like when you had that fever,” I say, not wanting to alarm her but to help her understand that her mother needs time. “Mommy needs a few more days to get better. Then you can meet her.”
Violet considers this, showing no sign of how her life changed in the past five minutes.
“Okay,” she says and leans into me again.
With the back of her head pressing against my chest, I fight tears, praying she’s convinced. I lied to this child for years about her mother to avoid the tragic wounds she’d suffer knowing she was gone forever.
Like I had to endure.
But she’s accepted this news and moved on the way children sometimes do with things that would shatter an adult.
Like me.
Then she looks back at me, her eyes scrunched again. “But she knows I’m her baby, right?”
Everything in me goes still. The question, simple and innocent, detonates the calm I managed for a whole thirty seconds. My throat tightens as dark and volatile coils twist in my chest.
Here comes another fucking lie.
“Yes,” I say. “She knows.”
It’s the only answer I can give. It’s the only one Violet deserves. It’s not true right now, but it will be by the time I introduce them.
Violet nods again, satisfied. And I know, deep in my bones, that when Sandrine looks at our daughter, she’ll understand why she can never leave me again.
Even if right now, I’m swimming in anger because I don’t know the truth. But my daughter needs her mother.
“Do you still want your story?” I ask her.
As if nothing happened, Violet gives a small shrug, her attention already drifting to the book on the nearby nightstand. “Can we read the dragon one first?”
“Of course.” I take the book from her, but before I open it, I pull her closer, pressing my lips to the crown of her head, holding her there just one more second.
In a day or two, I’ll no longer have her to myself.
Violet doesn’t question me. To her, this is normal. This is just another night with her father, another moment in a life where I have been her constant, unwavering presence.
As I’m about to read, Violet tilts her head back one more time. “Will Mommy read to me when she’s better?”
The question startles me. What if Sandrine rejects the truth? Will I force an unwilling woman on my daughter?
It sickens me, but the answer is no. Then what the hell do I do with Sandrine?
I could lie again. I could give Violet the same story. Wrap it in something whimsical. But for the first time in five years, I have to bring this lie in for a soft landing. Set realistic expectations.
“I don’t know if she’ll read to you,” I say, the words lodging in my throat. “But if she doesn’t, I’ll still read you all the stories you want.”
Violet nods and snuggles closer, already turning the pages for me as I read. My voice deepens into the cadence she loves, giving each character a different tone. The more I read, the more she relaxes fully against me, her breathing evening out as the story unfolds.
But my mind drifts. To a girl standing in the doorway to my office, pale and shaking, her hand pressed protectively to her stomach as she tells me in a voice trembling with fear that she’s pregnant.
I remember the way my world rearranged in that moment.
And my initial reaction wasn’t…pleasant.
But I made up for it shortly after with a fierce and immediate certainty of our future.
I remember cupping Sandrine’s face in my hands and telling her that she had nothing to be afraid of anymore.
I remember the way her eyes filled with tears.
Her relief was palpable. Even if I was telling more lies. I knew my father would be livid.
But that day in the park when I proposed and until the day Sandrine walked out my door, she knew I loved her. And that I wanted her and our child.
“Daddy,” Violet murmurs, her voice sleepy now, pulling me back to the present.
“Yes, solnyshko?”
“You’re mixing up the voices. Go back.”
I clear my throat, correcting it. “I apologize. How is this…” I get growly and tickle her.
Her spit of laughter cracks something open in my chest.
By the time I finish the second story, her eyes are closed, her breathing deep and even.
With her body slacked against mine, I stand and carry my daughter to her bed.
Tucking the blankets around her, I press one last kiss to her forehead.
She stirs slightly and pulls her stuffed dinosaur closer, a faint smile touching her lips even in sleep.
“Goodnight, solnyshko,” I whisper and stride back toward the door.
I stand there and just watch her. With her, I’m something good.
The way Sandrine once thought of me before I became a real monster.