28. Nadia
28
NADIA
T hey drove me to another building along the lakeshore. I was still gagged, but on the way there, I fiddled the best I could with the zip ties on my wrist.
Being moved didn’t improve my odds. But losing one of the bindings had to help. Erik and his friend hadn’t noticed that one strap was missing. Even though I was sure I could lower my arms and break the last tie, I bided my time and waited.
I had to run wisely. If I took off on foot, they’d catch me. I was dehydrated, starving, tired, and overwhelmed by constant stress and anxiety. Any of these Avilov men around this second storage-like building would catch me. They’d easily overpower me, too.
I needed a weapon. I had to secure a means of fleeing other than on foot. And as I was pushed to walk past a room where it looked like children were beaten and chained up, I knew I had to think of others, not just myself.
I’d always considered myself a loner on the run. Never making attachments—other than Maxim. Seeing those captive here, I was filled with a sense of wanting to do good. To protect. To get away but enable others to run too.
Now was not the time to get a hero complex. I knew I couldn’t save the world. But it almost seemed like Maxim could. With his family’s wealth, with Alek’s leadership and the whole Bratva’s power, they could help free these children who were likely being held before transportation to who knew where.
Deep down, my heart hurt for them. I’d been expected to be given to another against my will, and while it wasn’t slavery—yet—the threat of something so very like it had always loomed over my head.
“No. Don’t take her near the Valkov,” Erik ordered the man who led me.
Dmitri! He was here, in this building, and I felt a triumphant sense of pride in my logic to act like my hands were actually still bound. It might be impossible to really save the day and free all these children here, but I bet I could more realistically plan to free Maxim’s brother. Just one person. Maybe he could help me. Once I located him, he could help me get these kids out of here. I had to assume Dmitri was made of the same character as Maxim. That he’d care. That he’d be a protector like his younger brother.
The man leading me wasn’t one of the crew who’d kept me at the first warehouse, and I got the impression that Erik had a small number of loyalists who knew of his plans for me and his uncle.
They argued. Erik insisted that Lev wanted to see me delivered now , but this other Avilov man wouldn’t budge. He had orders to keep her here for Lev’s arrival, but too many things were shouted and argued about as I was taken further into this storage building. I couldn’t follow all the arguments. They were too loud and often slipped into other languages, mostly Russian.
But I listened to all I could.
“No, Erik,” the one who seemed like a site manager said. “Lev has given Alek Valkov clear orders. Step down, relinquish some power, or he’ll kill Dmitri.”
Erik shook his head. “Andre, no. That’s not what we want.”
Andre shot him a look. “Maybe not what you want, but your uncle is in charge.”
“Engaging with Alek is a waste of time. We don’t need this.”
“It’s not your call to make. Your uncle has determined that he wants the Valkovs shut down. They need to pay for trying to take his bride.” He dragged me by the arm to move faster. I almost stumbled to the floor in a smaller room, and I just barely had the time to correct my posture before I gave away that my hands weren’t bound together all the way.
“But we’ve got his bitch here. Keeping her is punishment enough for Maxim.”
Andre shook his head and crossed his arms as he watched me slink back in the vacant room.
“No. That’s not punishment enough. Sergei Kastava wants his daughter returned. Until Mila is given back, Sergei will want to work with us against the Valkovs.”
“Who gives a shit? Come on, man. Andre, you know as well as I do that we do not need the Valkovs coming after us. Lev’s out of his mind.” Erik rolled his eyes, trying to look amused and counting on Andre to agree.
“I know that you have lost all of your mind if you think you can override your uncle’s decisions.” He pointed at me. “She will stay here until Lev comes. And he will do as he sees fit for the Valkov you’re so fond of beating.”
Erik walked away with him, arguing all the while, but I was cut off from listening anymore. It all sounded like power plays. Secret plans. Takeovers and promises of payback.
Didn’t they ever get sick of it?
With the door closed to this room, I hurried to get all the way free. I was running out of time to act. Or to run. This would be the last place they’d bring me. Lev Avilov, the big, bad monster I’d been avoiding for years, would be coming here to collect me and decide the fate of Dmitri.
Please, Maxim. Please find me. Find us.
I was desperate, so clumsy in working on freeing my hands the last little bit that I pulled all the muscles in my upper back.
At last, using the door knob for leverage, I snapped the tie.
Blood rushed into my arms. My hands tingled with pinpricks of pain. Up high, my shoulders tensed and locked in knots. I didn’t delay. As I readjusted to being able to move my arms and hands, I hurried to tear at the gag on my mouth.
Flexing my fingers and rotating my shoulders, I worked as quickly as I could to regain my strength in my arms. After frantic tugs and clawing with my nails, I tore at the gag and then spat it out completely.
I rolled my tongue over my dry mouth and forced swallow after swallow. Working my mouth open and closed, I rubbed my jaw and closed my eyes for a second to let the pain of that binding cease.
Still, I didn’t stop or plan to stay hiding in here. I had to act. I refused to be a victim of the fate planned for me. And I also refused to be idle and not help.
Testing the door, I found that it was locked—as expected—but the hardware was loose. This whole building seemed worn down and aged, perhaps crumbling in appearances with the exposure to the lake.
I fiddled with it and paced around the dark room, trying to figure out how to leave and whether anything was lying around that I could use as a weapon.
Groping in the dark, I found nothing. And the longer I struggled without anything to use, I grew more and more frustrated.
Too many things were on the line.
My survival. This deep need to return to Maxim again, then saving his brother. Figuring out how to free these children.
Even Mila Kastava. No, Mila Valkov. In the darkness as I groped and searched blindly for a tool, for a weapon, anything, I replayed all that Maxim had told me about his family that one night we stayed up so late just talking and sharing.
Mila Kastava was Sergei’s oldest daughter, the one Alek had stolen at the altar. She’d been promised to Maxim and Alek’s cousin. Without her input. Without any chance to make a choice about her life. Her situation seemed all too similar to mine.
I hated the idea of another woman expected to be with someone she didn’t want.
If I could help prevent her from being caught up in this drama, then I would.
If I could help get Dmitri out of here and to safety, then I would.
I’d never had a chance to be someone else’s hero, and I relished the chance to step up to the challenge now.
Without a weapon, I used my busted zip ties to fiddle with the crack between the door knob and the wood. The metal wobbled more and more, and with a racing pulse, I hurried.
Any minute, someone could come. Lev could come for me. Someone could notice that I was messing with the handle. Any number of things could backfire, but I didn’t stop. I couldn’t.
My knob jimmied just so, and several minutes later, I could pull the door inward.
I slowly opened it, holding my breath and tense for anything to jump at me. For someone to notice and rush at me.
No one came.
Once I had the door open a few inches, I peered out and watched down the hall. It was empty, but further out, I heard the sounds of children crying, men shouting, and machinery like trucks being moved.
Here goes. I nearly shook with nerves as I stepped out of the room. They were criminals who’d done this before. They wouldn’t have locked me up so carelessly, I bet, if there weren’t multiple layers of security around this place. But no one waited in this hall. I had no guards posted at this door.
I slipped out, wincing at the throb in my leg from Erik’s kick, but I ignored it. Creeping down the hall, I breathed as quietly as I could and stepped as lightly as possible.
Still, no one came.
I reached the end of the hall and tried to search down another. Getting an idea of the layout was my first step. But as I went, seeking an exit, I looked for a weapon.
A hammer lying on the floor became mine, and I held it firmly as I continued to sneak out.
The longer I went snooping without anyone coming, the more convinced I became that something had to be going on elsewhere in this huge building. Something that was distracting the Avilov men and keeping them away from this end.
I sucked in a hard breath and held it when I peered past a closed door and found three dead bodies in a bloody heap.
I hope Dmitri wasn’t in there.
Plowing on, I entered another room.
A man coughed from the dark interior, and I froze.
“Fuck off,” he growled in between rough pants of air.
I narrowed my eyes, wondering who this could be. Multiple hostages had been mentioned. I saw the many children. But this man…
“Dmitri?” I whispered.
“Who the fuck are you?”
I narrowed my eyes. “Are you Dmitri?”
“Depends on who you are.”
“I’m—” I glanced back and forth in the hall, too nervous to let myself be completely vulnerable here. “I’m Maxim’s fiancée.”
He grunted. Maybe it was a laugh. “Fuck. Another sister-in-law? Already?”
It was him! It was Dmitri! I’d found him.
I hurried in, closing the door but keeping it ajar so it wouldn’t lock accidentally. “Dmitri. Are you okay?”
“No. I’m not fucking okay.”
I walked into something dangling on a string, and I flinched, stopping short. As I reached up, thinking it was a pull for a light, I tugged.
Dim illumination flickered in the room, showing me Maxim’s brother.
“Oh, my God.”
He was a broken, suffering man. Blood pooled around him. Cuts littered his skin. His arm seemed bent at a weird angle, and I refused to gag at the amputated digits missing from his hands.
“How…” I swallowed hard. “How are you alive?”
“Good question,” he shot back dryly.
“Can you move?” I crouched closer, forcing myself not to look at the most gruesome evidence of his injuries.
He lifted his hand to show that he was zip-tied to a ring in the wall.
I showed him the hammer. “Watch out.”
“Who the hell are you, really?” he asked as I lowered his arm.
After I positioned his hand low to the floor, I aimed at the longer length of cord on the metal ring. One hard strike of the hammer down severed the binding. I grinned at him. “Nadia Petrov.”
He narrowed his eyes, or at least he did with the one that wasn’t swollen shut and very bloody. “Petrov?”
“It’s a long story.”
He frowned at me. “Wait a minute. Aren’t you supposed to be that old fucker’s wife? Lev’s?”
The only person I wanted to marry was Maxim. And I was confident I would. One day. Well after this whole mess was over with. He and I couldn’t go through so many hardships and suffer so many obstacles to not be together in the end.
I shook my head. “Over my dead body would I marry him.”
He grunted. “Don’t joke. Not like that. People die here, girl.”
“I’m not a girl . I’m a woman who’s going to help get you out of here.”
“How the fuck are you going to do that?” He slid his leg over, showing where his foot dangled at a funny angle.
“Oh.” I grimaced. “Whoa.”
“Don’t count on me walking outta here.” He looked me up and down. “And I doubt you’ll be able to carry me.”
I nodded and assessed him. “Then I’ll drag you.”
He shook his head and exhaled long and hard. “Fuck it, Nadia. Just go. They’ll kill me sooner or later. I’ve lost a lot of blood.”
I winced as I looked over his arm. “And probably infected too.”
He nodded with resignation in his one eye that was open.
“Go. Run back to my brother.”
I shook my head. “No. I’m not leaving without you.”
“You’re insane.”
I was starting to feel like I was, but I refused to consider leaving him here. All that time Maxim had been on his “first” job that Alek gave him, he was chasing me down around the world—only to abort the plans of delivering me to Lev.
Here I was, though, still hiding from the old man and determined to avoid him, but I wasn’t going to abandon Dmitri. I didn’t know him. I wasn’t sure he’d live with these injuries. Yet, nothing would change my mind.
“We’re getting out of this together.” Because I owed Maxim. He was so eager to wrap up this business with Lev so he could find his brother, and I’d done it for him.
“I don’t want to slow you down,” he argued as he strained to sit up more. “He’d never forgive me.”
“And I would never forgive myself. I don’t know much about you brothers and your Bratva, but I can tell that Maxim cares about you. He loves you. And it would destroy him to lose you. I can’t let that happen.”