7. Sofia
SOFIA
Before I can decide whether to slap him or kiss him again, Damir takes my wrist and pulls me away from the wall.
“Wait,” I snap, stumbling because one of my shoes is gone, my veil is half-torn, and apparently being kissed senseless in a side corridor does not improve balance.
He doesn’t slow down. Men like Damir Volodin probably don’t slow down for weather, bullets, or basic human requests.
“Where are you taking me?” I demand.
“Back inside.”
I almost trip over my own dress. “Back inside? Into the church? The church with guns?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know if anyone has ever told you this, but you have terrible survival instincts.”
His hand tightens around my wrist, not enough to hurt, just enough to remind me that if he wants me moving, I am moving. “I have excellent survival instincts.”
“Then why are you going toward the shooting?”
“Because I’m not finished.”
“That is not reassuring.”
He glances back at me once, and the look is so calm, so cold, so completely untouched by the madness around us that my stomach drops for reasons I refuse to name.
“Stop fighting me,” he says.
“I’m not fighting you.”
“You tried to elbow me in the ribs.”
“You were dragging me.”
“You were running.”
“Yes, that’s what sane people do when men start firing weapons in a church.”
For one second, something that is almost amusement moves over his face.
Then it’s gone.
He pulls me through the side corridor and back toward the nave before I can come up with another argument, and the noise gets louder with every step.
Shouting. Crying. Orders barked in Russian.
The sharp crack of another gunshot somewhere near the rear entrance, followed by a woman’s scream that makes my blood go cold.
When we step back into the church, I stop breathing.
The ceremony is finished. The perfect white flowers are crushed across the stone floor.
Several pews have been shoved out of place, and one of the tall candle stands has toppled near the aisle, wax spilling like pale blood.
Women crouch behind benches, shielding children with their bodies.
Men who arrived in polished suits and expensive watches are now on their knees or pressed against the walls, guns pointed at them by Damir’s men.
There is blood too. Not everywhere, not a massacre. But enough.
One man clutches his shoulder while another presses a cloth against his thigh.
A Sokolov guard leans against a pillar, breathing through his teeth while blood runs down his sleeve.
Near the back, one of Damir’s men is sitting upright with his jaw clenched, another Volodin soldier wrapping something tight around his upper arm.
No one seems dead. Thank God.
Or whatever version of God is still willing to stay in this room.
The church sounds like the end of the world. Gunshots have slowed, but shouting fills the nave. Men bark orders in Russian. I step back into the main church beside Damir, and every head turns.
For one horrible moment, it feels like the entire room sees me at once. My crooked veil. My ruined hair. My swollen mouth. My throat.
The mark is there. I know it before I touch it. A hot, sensitive bloom on my neck where Damir’s mouth had been. His bite aches beneath my fingertips, not exactly painful, not exactly anything I have a decent word for, and my uncle’s face turns from fury into something far colder.
Dmitri sees it. His eyes go black. “You filthy—”
Damir moves before the word can finish. He steps slightly in front of me, his body blocking the direct line between me and half the men in the church.
One arm comes back across my ribs, not tight enough to hold me hostage, but firm enough that if anyone raises a gun, he is between me and the barrel.
His hand lands dangerously high, just beneath my breast.
I freeze. He doesn’t seem to notice.
Or maybe he notices and simply does not care.
His palm is broad and warm through the silk of my dress, his fingers spread over my ribs like he’s measuring my breathing.
If he moved even an inch higher, his hand would be on my breast in front of half the Bratva families in Moscow, my uncle, my almost-husband, and a priest who already looks like he deeply regrets his career choices.
This can’t be my life.
This absolutely can’t be my life.
And yet, here I am, in a wedding dress, barefoot, marked on the neck by my fiancé’s sworn enemy, being half-shielded and half-possessed by a man who has just kissed me like he wanted to swallow my name.
My uncle’s voice cuts through the chaos. “Take your hands off her.”
Damir doesn’t move.
Of course he doesn’t.
“If I intended to hurt her,” he says calmly, “she would already be hurt.”
“That is not the reassurance you think it is,” I mutter.
His thumb shifts once against my ribs. A warning.
Or maybe amusement. I can’t tell.
Sergei Antonov stands near the front pew with three of his men around him, though even I can see the balance in the room has changed.
Damir’s men have pushed deeper into the church with terrifying efficiency.
They are not panicking. They are not shouting uselessly.
They have spread along the aisles and near the side exits, forcing my uncle’s people and the Sokolovs into tighter, more confused clusters.
Children are huddled near the back with their mothers, some of them crying into expensive coats. An older woman is crouched behind a pew, shaking so badly her pearls tremble against her throat. The flower arrangements are crushed. The minister stands frozen behind the altar, white as candle wax.
This is not rebellion anymore. This is not a joke.
This is real.
And I did this.
My stomach turns.
“What do you want?” my uncle demands.
Damir’s voice remains almost bored. “You already know.”
“I know nothing except that you have invaded a wedding like a madman.”
Damir raises a brow. “I showed you the invitation, didn’t I?”
My uncle stares at us. More specifically, he sees me. Then he sees my mouth, which is probably red and swollen.
Then his gaze drops to my neck. The mark. I know the moment he notices it because his face changes in a way I have never seen before.
Sergei Antonov does not lose control often. He has too much pride for it, too much discipline, too many years of practice turning rage into strategy. But now his face goes dark, then red, and the hand at his side curls into a fist.
His eyes lift to Damir. “What,” he says, voice low and shaking, “did you do to her?”
The entire church seems to quiet around the question.
Damir doesn’t even blink. “She is standing,” he says. “That’s more than your men can say for themselves.”
My uncle takes one step forward. Two of Damir’s men immediately shift, blocking the aisle with silent efficiency.
“Move,” my uncle orders.
They don’t.
It’s such a small thing, but it tells me everything.
Damir’s men have control.
Not complete control, maybe. Not enough for everyone to relax.
But enough. Sergei’s men are still armed in places, but most of them are pinned back, outmaneuvered, or staring down the barrels of Volodin guns.
Dmitri’s men look furious and confused, which seems to be their natural state under pressure.
My uncle notices too. That only makes him angrier.
“You bring men into my family’s church, you attack my guests, you put your hands on my niece, and now you stand there as though you have a right to breathe in this room?
” His voice carries through the church with enough force to make the candles tremble.
Or maybe that’s just my imagination.
Maybe everything feels like it’s trembling because Damir Volodin is standing too close to me, one hand still at my side, his body angled in a way that makes it impossible for anyone to get a look at me without looking through him first.
He’s not holding me hostage. That’s the strange part.
A hostage would have a gun to her head or an arm locked around her throat. A hostage would be dragged in front of the room as a warning. A hostage would be used.
Damir does none of that.
My wedding has turned into an armed standoff, my fiancé is bleeding from the mouth, my uncle looks ready to murder everyone breathing, and I am standing here aware of Damir’s hand like some shamefully touch-starved idiot.
I hate this day.
Damir’s face remains calm. “You should be more concerned about why your men fired first.”
“My men?” my uncle roars. “You brought an army into my church.”
“I brought protection.”
“You brought war.”
“No,” Damir says. “You built one and dressed it in white flowers.”
The words land like a slap.
My uncle’s face darkens.
Damir’s men have control now. I see it before my uncle says anything.
The Volodins are fewer, maybe, but they move like one body.
Every man knows his position. Every gun is held steady.
My uncle’s men are angry and humiliated, but they have been pushed back, divided, and disarmed in places.
Dmitri’s men look as if they are waiting for someone else to tell them what courage costs.
Damir’s hand shifts slightly against my side. Not much, but enough to pull my attention back. Enough to remind me that I’m not free simply because Dmitri is no longer holding my hand.
Damir looks around the room, then speaks with such calm that it somehow sounds more dangerous than shouting. “This ends one way.”
My stomach tightens.
No.
I don’t like that sentence.
My uncle’s eyes narrow. “And what way is that?”
“The Antonov-Sokolov marriage can’t continue.”
Dmitri laughs, sharp and ugly. “You don’t decide that.”
Damir doesn’t even glance at him. That’s worse than if he had insulted him.
“The families gathered here have seen Antonov men fire inside a church,” Damir says. “They have seen Sokolov men lose formation. They have seen the bride leave the altar and return with me.”
My face heats so fast I almost feel dizzy.
Several women look away.
Anya, crouched near the third pew with Katya and one of the twins, stares at me like she is already planning to either hug me or strangle me after this.
Possibly both.