Chapter 4
Chapter
Four
Sage
“Don't interfere!"
These are the muffled words I choose to shout when Alexei Rushkoff has my face pushed into the grass and my uncle is most certainly attempting to come to my rescue. It's barely legible and I'm sure Anton won't listen to me anyway, but I can't take the chance of him getting in my way.
"You're not in a position to be calling the shots, princess," Alexei says as he digs his boot further into my back.
I groan through a mouthful of grass but am still able to catch him before he can fist my hair and pull me up.
Instead, I take hold of his wrist and pull, dragging him to the ground beside me.
"Sage..." Anton's cautious voice reaches me.
Alexei makes a satisfying noise as he hits the dirt, panting now that we're both down.
"Don't!" I say, sitting up to point my finger at my uncle and narrow my eyes in warning.
"Yeah," Alexei echoes, licking his lip as he draws my eyes back to his. "You heard the girl. Don't come any closer, DeMarco."
Alexei's lip curls as he slowly rises from the ground at the same time as I do. We watch each other carefully as we cautiously find our footing and rub away the grass sticking to our clothes.
With Alexei, it's always hard to tell if he's come to play or is coming for the final kill. Though it seems unlikely he would choose to end my life in the middle of the day in front of my family, I don't underestimate him. These fights never feel like life and death to me until they are.
I get not even a second to recover before Alexei is running at me.
He makes the first move, pulling a knife from his belt that he swipes towards me.
I'm lucky, dodging it even though I lose my footing to my still healing leg wound, just barely missing the blade driven by his tense muscled, tattoo-covered arm.
Knowing this cemetery like the back of my hand, and probably better than anyone else ever has, becomes my advantage. I shift my eyes to the tree root that sticks slightly out the ground, and when Alexei rushes at me again for his next hit, I step into the path of the tree.
Just as I intended, he trips over the root, landing down on one knee with his balled fist catching the ground and his slick hair hanging over his eyes.
Before he can react, I jump onto his back. He rears upwards as I lock my arms around his neck and pull back to choke him.
I'd love to think we look evenly matched, but I know that isn't true. We never needed to be. I wasn't an even match for Victor Rushkoff. But still it's me, not him, that stands here alive today.
Behind me, there's gasping and mumbling, which I try not to focus on but I know it's likely my uncle calling in reinforcements. Which pisses me off. There's no need for reinforcements. I win or he kills me. That's it. That's all the outcomes.
Alexei trips all about the ground as he tries to dislodge me from his back. I tighten my arms around his neck in a headlock and hold on, tensing as I try harder to stay put.
I feel Alexei's chest rise on a deep gasp before he tumbles forward. My eyes widen as I go flying over his back and onto the ground with an oof.
The air punches out of me and I groan as I stare up into the sun, soon blocked by Alexei stepping into its path and leaning over me. His smile is wicked and his arms tense where he braces them on his knees.
"So easy to get you to submit," he smirks.
I narrow my eyes at him, pushing the hair out of my face. I've gotten a few good hits on him in our time. I sliced his arm up once. The tattoos on his bicep healed wonky because of it. I take comfort in the fact that there's some part of him that will always have a reminder of me.
Even if he does best me one day, he'll have to look in the mirror and remember how I hurt him. Even if he does kill me, I will still haunt him. Perhaps that's enough to make everything worth it.
I go to sit up but he's right there, with his boot on my chest he pushes me back down. He watches me with anger as his foot slides up my neck and begins to press down, crushing my windpipe as he does.
It starts off slow, not quite enough to steal my breath, but gets gradually harder and harder until it hurts. I grab at his boot and gasp for air, struggling while his eyes get even more vicious.
"Can't breathe?" Alexei taunts.
He pushes a little harder and I start to panic. My hands claw at him and my legs flail while I look for control.
"Scared to die, princess?" Alexei smiles. He pulls back to give me an evil look and allow me to answer but I feel nothing.
I always feel nothing. So I tell the truth.
"No," I say. "I'm scared to live."
Confusion floods his stormy eyes. A tiny frown appears between his brows and his hold on my neck falters as he wrestles with my words.
I think I've said something that's managed to surprise him.
His grip loosens for just long enough that I can free myself.
I throw all my weight and strength behind shoving him off me, and he loses his footing, stumbling back from me.
I stand quickly, but before I can do anything else, he pulls his gun and aims it.
I freeze on the spot.
He could end this right here if he chose to pull the trigger. He's fast and calculated. Imperceptibly so. I know from experience that he's an excellent shot and if he really wanted, it could all be over right here and now.
But we've been here before, so I hold my head high and refuse to surrender.
"Tell me," he starts, gun pointed right at my head.
He looks so broken in this moment. Deranged beyond comprehension.
It presents as anger with his bared teeth, wild eyes and disheveled black hair.
But this may be the first time I've actually seen something in him that looks like grief.
He's different. There's something much more sinister in him now than the boy I knew the year before.
I frown as I watch him, wondering why I feel like I recognize what I'm seeing.
"What is it that goes through your head before you die? "
I could say any number of things to fuck with him, any number of things that would distract him and throw him off his game. In the end, I decide the truth is just as damaging.
"I'm thinking..." I start, pursing my lips, and he shakes the gun to urge me on. "You look exactly like your brother right now."
His eyes flood with an emotion I can't name.
He only closes them for a second, the breath he takes looking more destructive than cleansing.
It's only the briefest distraction, because when he opens them again, the settled storms behind his eyes have returned.
He's back in control when he aims the gun again with purpose.
Just as he's about to finish the job and shoot me, headshot I'd guess, a knife comes flying out of nowhere, hitting Alexei's gun and dislodging it from his hand before he can act.
Alexei follows the path of the knife, eyes tracing a path behind me. "What the fuck, Fallon?!"
I look over my shoulder and find Freddie standing behind me, hands outstretched from throwing the knife that very much intervened and most likely saved my life.
"You can't interfere," Alexei says, gritting his teeth.
"I didn't," Freddie insists.
Uncle Anton appears too now, taking my arm to drag me behind them to safety.
"I just so happened to want to throw a knife right where you were standing in this exact moment. It had nothing to do with what's going on with you," Freddie smirks. "Sorry."
Alexei meets our eyes one by one. "You're pushing it."
Freddie shrugs.
"Time for you to go now," Anton says. "Sage, get to the car."
I reel back and take his knife from his pocket. "Absolutely no-"
"Get in the God damn car!!"
The volume and seriousness in his tone has me pausing, feeling like a scared little girl again. I turn away in shock, trying not to let tears flood my eyes like a scolded toddler. I slink back behind Freddie. Hiding, like I always seem to do when I end up in confrontation with Alexei.
I can't kill him. And he's playing with me.
"Off you go, princess. Run to safety," Alexei says, a smug smile on his face. Looking at me with condescending pity like I'm a pathetic toy.
I'm shoved into the car, and the last thing I see through the crack in the door is Alexei slinking away, satisfied. Freddie and Anton join me, the former going to touch my shoulder.
"You shouldn't have done that," I growl, shrugging him away.
I turn and ignore them, hiding my face before they can see the first tear fall.
By the time the car pulls up at the house I still haven't spoken a word to Anton or Freddie. I asked them not to interfere, and they did, anyway. It's just what I expected of them but still I find myself filled with disappointment. They are very lucky that Alexei let them get away with it.
It doesn't seem to matter how many times I remind them I did this so that they wouldn't get trapped in the middle, they just don't seem to ever hear me. If they bend the rules enough times, eventually Alexei will get sick of letting it slide.
They're only a step behind me as I push through the front doors, immediately annoyed to find that Angie is still here.
I push past her, but she pays me no mind.
"Sage, stop!" Anton demands. Knowing the tone in his voice, I do stop, but I don't turn back to look at him. "We had to-"
"I told you not to interfere. I told you to let it play out," I growl, still facing my back to him.
"This again?" Anton sighs, more easily annoyed with me than he used to be.
"Just let it go," Freddie advises, meant to be said under his breath but I still hear it.
"She doesn't understand wh-"
"Oh I understand," I say, turning on my heel and taking a step down the stairs to yell at them. "I did this so no one else would get hurt but you don't trust me to finish it."
Anton takes a deep breath and his nostrils flare while he regards me. "Respectfully, Sage. As if I would ever let you take this on by yourself."
That only serves to piss me off and I open my mouth to tell him so but he gets there first.
"Do you think we could bear to lose you?" Anton shakes his head and bites his lip. "You don't want anyone else to get hurt? Me either. You are the someone else I can't bear to see hurt. So think about that next time you go rushing off to fight your fucking promise."
Anton storms away, his expensive shoes clicking on the tile. With just me, Freddie and Angie left, the tension escalates to the point of awkwardness.
Angie seems more amused than anything, flaring her brows at me. "That was interesting. I enjoyed it. Nonetheless your father is home and therefore I have no further reason to stay."
As she goes to exit the house, Freddie gives her a playful look which she doesn't return. She runs her hand down his arm before lightly slapping his shoulder. "Don't call if you need anything."
Freddie disappears too and despite being the first one to temper, I'm the one left alone feeling like discardable trash. I climb the stairs slowly, gripping the rail like it's the only thing holding me up.
I pass the room that used to be my dad's, surprised by the hive of activity even though I knew he'd be here.
I tuck a strand of hair behind my ear as I peer curiously through the door and set sight on my Dad back in his old bed.
It's both a welcome and a horrible sight.
To see him looking so gaunt and pale. A small figure in a place where he used to seem large.
He's placed upright in his canopy bed in front of the maroon curtains. Even from here I can see that his face looks sad. His mouth slightly downturned and vulnerable.
"You're welcome to go in," the nurse says from behind me, startling me into action. I jump but I still can't press my feet forward. "Go on now," she says, giving me a shove in the back that pushes me into the room.
With no space left between me and my fear, I step on careful toes towards Dad's bed.
He doesn't seem any bigger the closer I step. Now he is just small. Nothing like the dark, imposing person that he used to be. Even smaller than he was weeks ago when I last visited him.
It seems impossible that he could wake up now. He's been in a coma for over a year. Every part of the last few years has been a struggle. Bad news after more bad news. I'm not expecting any good. I think I gave up hope on him a long time ago.
Seeing him here is a different kind of grief. I've lost him anyway and yet his body still haunts the earth. Unable to move on.
I can guarantee if Dad knew what would become of him he'd tell me to pull the plug and let him go. Dimitri DeMarco was never small and he never turned away from a fight. Yet his body wastes away in this bed and I know he would hate it.
I take his hand in mine, which feels warm and brings me some sense of comfort.
"I'm sorry, Dad," I say on an exhale. I know I fucked up when I did this to him. My plan was always risky. I only needed him out of the way. I didn't need him to die.
It was supposed to be Angie at the gates that night. She was supposed to fake a siege and keep Dad away for long enough that I could send the marriage document and find out if it really was Victor that was coming for me.
But I messed up. I thought it was all fake when it wasn't. It wasn't Angie at the gates, it was Victor, and I let him in just in time for him to take my father's life.
"I hope you never have to find out what I've done," I say. "You'd be so disappointed."
I can’t picture which part he'd be most disappointed by. It has all piled up. Death. Deception. Endlessly stupid ideas. Even just falling in love with one of his men. I laugh at the thought. Of everything, I imagine that's what would make Dad the angriest if he were alive to see it.
"If you knew what I'd done, oh you'd kill me," I say, a smile on my face.
Dad's hand tightens around mine.
My smile drops and I gasp when I feel it. The action of his hand squeezing me. My eyes snap up to his face, but he hasn't moved. He still looks small and restful. Vulnerable and downtrodden. Eyes closed, exactly as he was when I first walked in here.
I click my fingers in front of his eyes and squeeze his hand again. Did I imagine that? Did I want him to respond so badly that I hallucinated his hand tightening on mine?
That sounds like exactly the kind of thing I would do.
I shake my head at myself and place Dad's hand back on the bed, getting up to leave and feeling more unsettled than I did when I came in here.
I want Dad to be alive, to get the chance to fix this mistake so badly, that I've started imagining things. That's all it is, though. Imagination.
Dad is never coming back.