54
Free fall
Y kicked the door shut and dragged me to the window.
"What are you doing?!"
"What do you think?" he asked, opening it without hesitation.
"You just pointed a gun at me!"
"What did you expect? That I would hug your husband in the reunion? I had to give credibility to the scene. The weak Capulet wasn't going to shoot if the pregnancy was true, and judging by his actions, I'd say he got you pregnant. I don't know how you allowed that, although I won't deny it has been very helpful. Don't worry, we'll sort it out; I'm not going to make you give birth to that abomination." Yuri looked around without letting go of me. "Go out, it's clear, climb onto the toilet to make it easier."
"I can't! I'm dizzy, I'd fall..." It was true that I was feeling worse by the minute.
"Suit yourself, but I'm warning you, I won't hesitate. Either you go out, or I kill you," he replied curtly. He pointed the gun at me again. I didn't have mine, and my arms felt like jelly, too weak to try to disarm him. My brother wasn't going to mess around. If I wanted a chance to escape, I had to obey. I climbed onto the toilet and edged myself up to the window.
"I can't, Yuri, it's too high."
"Don't be weak, we're on the third floor, and don't say our father didn't train us for extreme situations. We've done this before. There's a sturdy drainpipe you can grab onto, it's easy."
He wasn't lying; of course, we had done this before. One of our training exercises involved escaping from a building without weapons or any support material, except our bodies. It was one of my father's favorite exercises; he said it sharpened ingenuity, agility, and endurance. We had five minutes to escape while some of his best men pursued us.
During that exercise, I broke an arm and dislocated an ankle. I was thirteen again, having gone out a window just like now, and my only escape route was a rickety drainpipe with rusty screws. I fell from the second floor onto some bushes when some of them came loose under my weight. If it hadn't been for those bushes, it would have been much worse.
I limped back to my father, who congratulated me for doing it in three and a half minutes.
I sat in the window, and there it was, the dreaded drainpipe.
"Come on," Yuri urged insistently.
"The last time I fell off one, remember?"
"You were thirteen, and it was a ruined building."
"Tell that to my fears."
Yuri grabbed my injured arm and twisted it behind my back.
"Either you go down, or I throw you and leave. I won't have a second-in-command who backs down at the first sign of trouble." His hot breath hit my ear. "Prove you deserve to carry our last name, or I'll take you out. You know I won't hesitate, and I hate cowards. Choose." Yuri wasn't lying; he was willing to sacrifice me.
"You want to kill me?!"
"No, but if I have no other choice, I will."
"Police, open the door!" someone shouted from the other side. He looked at me warningly.
"If they open it, I'll kill her!" my brother roared, knowing that protocol would prevent the police from doing anything if the kidnapper had a weapon and a hostage. Yuri locked eyes with mine. "Nikita, do it now!"
I had no choice if I wanted a chance to get out alive. I placed one foot, then the other. I pressed myself against the building wall. With my weak and trembling body, I took two steps to get to the drainpipe.
The wind whipped my hair. I felt dizzy. I couldn't afford to retch; it could destabilize me. I clung to the pipe with what little strength I had left.
The memories, my precarious health, and my bare feet didn't help. I was hurting myself.
"Hurry up!" Yuri urged from the window. "I'm sure they're calling for backup, and for now, the alley is clear."
He was right. There were no patrol cars waiting for me below, just an open dumpster whose smell churned my stomach. I had heard pregnant women were very sensitive to odors. Could that be my case?
"Hold on, Nikita," I told myself.
I slowly descended a section, hooking my toes on the small protrusions I found on the building's facing.
I couldn't fail, I had to make it. Even sick, my determination was firm.
I tried to secure each step. My arm hurt. I was scraping the soles of my feet, enduring the cramps that stiffened my muscles and threatened to stop supporting me at any moment. Yuri couldn't come down until I did. The thick pipe wouldn't hold both our weights.
My brother shouted again for me to hurry up. His face was a constant threat of what would happen if I didn't.
When did he go from being my brother to my enemy?
The pain devoured me inside. I thought about Romeo, about the possibility of having his child in my belly.
Was I really pregnant? Surely, if I hadn't been, my husband would have shot as soon as he opened the door; he held back because I was carrying his baby, not because he wanted to save me or had forgiven me. Thinking about it was a slap in the face. What would I be to him if I survived? A womb with legs? And then what? Would he kill me?
The emotions were unbearable; I wanted to cry, to curl up and beg for the world to stop so I could get off life. I had messed up so badly that it was very difficult for R, his family, and the 'Ndrangheta to forgive me. And if I let myself fall? What if I ended it all?
I abruptly ended my suicidal thoughts. What was happening to me? I fought to the end with tooth and nail, I didn't give up, and I never apologized! Or, at least, I hadn't until three days ago.
Since R entered my life, he had toppled every one of my principles.
My eyes burned. A sharp pain settled in my chest, nothing to do with my poor health. It was the result of the anger and insecurity that had taken root in my heart. And to think that when my parents conceived me, they forgot to give me one.
I tried to keep moving, almost reaching the second floor. I sighed, trying to catch my breath. Each step was getting harder. Both the descent and my own existence.
If I had learned anything, it was that life wasn't meant to be viewed as a work of art on display in a museum, but to feel each one of its edges; some sharp and others surprising.
I realized that I was too focused on the past. I got wrapped up in a vengeance that clouded my present, knocking out my future possibilities.
For the first time, I felt fear that my actions had eliminated any chance of recovering the only person who had shown me absolute loyalty.
To Romeo, I was his priority; he even faced his family for me. My eyes burned. The first tears fell heavily down my cheeks. I had failed the only one who saw and accepted me as I was, who didn't want to change me, who was able to love what others hated, each one of my flaws, the monster that many considered me to be.
I had managed to place myself on the other side of the line from Romeo, just like everyone else. There wasn't a trace of the love he had once professed for me, only hatred towards the woman who had betrayed him. Who could blame him?
I had been a fool, allowing my brother to manipulate me at will. I, who prided myself on being a woman of steel, had become clay in his hands.
Koroleva, the first female vor v zakone in Russian history, had gone from queen to pawn on the board.
"Get down, for fuck's sake!" Yuri roared threateningly. I hadn't moved forward, I was suspended in nothingness, my body stiff with reproach.
I looked up. Our pupils clashed. I may have lost the game, but I wasn't going to withdraw no matter how fucked up the conflict was. This was war, and the last one standing won. I never gave up; that option was excluded from my life.
I clung to the feeling that not everything was lost yet, that as long as my lungs kept inflating me with oxygen and my heart kept pumping blood, I would keep going, fueled by the most powerful force in the universe, the love I felt for Romeo.
I wasn't going to give up, not yet. Yuri was right about that. I wasn't raised to be a loser. I would fight until all my strength left me, and if I finally lost, no one could say I had chickened out like a coward.
I reached for the next section when I realized that my willpower wasn't enough.
My arms refused to hold me. A dizziness overcame me that I couldn't control. My fingers ignored the command my brain was shouting; it was useless to beg my body to hold on a little longer.
I opened my eyes in fright when I felt myself falling into the void.