13. Aleksandr
ALEKSANDR
Aweek passes before Katerina finally comes to me.
Seven days of silence, of watching her drift through the estate like a ghost in her own skin nearly did me in. I gave her space not because I’m patient—I’m the farthest thing from it—but because I know grief like this doesn’t ease quickly. It has to burn itself out first.
So, I waited, ignoring the knife that twisted deeper each time her lifeless eyes passed over me.
Today, though, something has shifted.
I know immediately when she steps inside the room and shuts the door behind her.
The lock clicks with a quiet finality that has me setting the tablet in my hand slowly down on my desk.
She stands straight when she reaches me, her spine rigid with the same steel I first saw the day she arrived at my gates and refused to lower her eyes.
The dark circles under her eyes haven’t faded, but the haze in her gaze has.
Her voice is steady when she speaks. “I want your help. And I’m not asking for it. You’re going to give it to me.”
The demand lands like a spark on dry tinder.
I fight the urge to smile.
Oh, how I’ve missed that fire. Dearly. The way it crackles under her skin, refusing to be smothered no matter how hard the world tries.
For seven days I watched it suffocate into barely lit embers, hoping it would come back roaring brighter and hotter than ever.
Now that it’s aimed straight at me, I find myself basking in the glow.
I gesture toward the couch by the hearth and stand without hurry. She follows me as I cross over to the wet bar in the corner, taking up the cushion on the left side.
I unstopper the thirty-year-old Macallan I’d been gifted years ago—an obscenely expensive bottle I reserve for moments of significance, tonight of which feels more than appropriate.
I pour two fingers of it into heavy crystal tumblers that are more expensive than most engagement rings.
The amber liquid catches the low lamplight as I carry both glasses back.
She takes hers the moment I offer it. Without hesitation, she downs half in one swallow. This time, I allow myself a smirk as I lower to the cushion beside her, folding back into the couch and hooking one leg over my knee.
“I want to destroy him,” she says, setting her glass down onto the edge of the side table next to her.
“I want every medal stripped from his name, every speech he ever gave to be replayed while news anchors call him a traitor. I want the military to erase him from their history books. I want him to be remembered as the disgrace he is, not the hero he pretended to be.”
I study her for a long moment, taking in the fire sparking in her tear-swollen eyes and the tight set of her jaw. Vengeance fits her like a second skin.
She pulls in a slow, steady breath. “Once he’s nothing but ash in the public eye, we walk away from each other. For good.”
My pulse kicks once. Hard.
While it’s the last thing I expected to hear, it is in its own way unsurprising.
These are the words of a woman who came to me seven weeks ago believing I was the monster and her father the martyr.
She has lived her entire life in survival mode, never once allowing herself the luxury of being delusional about this arrangement.
She believes letting me go will save us both.
I take a slow sip of my drink, let the whiskey roll across my tongue and down my throat while I let the offer sit.
In a way, she is right.
Realistically, walking away would save us both from further complications looming on the horizon. Keeping her here, keeping her mine, will make her a target. Not only with Malyshko and his growing suspicions, but with anyone else dumb enough to try and use her against me.
A clean break would be the smart move. A mutual severing with no debts, no ties, no risk to expose either of us anymore than we’ve already been thus far.
The possessiveness inside me snarls at even the suggestion of letting her go. At the idea of her walking away, of anyone else touching her, looking at her, earning her trust. Losing the only person who has ever stood in my presence and met me without flinching is one I will not let go of.
The thought is fucking unacceptable.
I drain the rest of the glass in one swallow, the burn grounding me back down again. I curl my hand around the empty tumbler, fingers tightening protectively around the crystal. It’s the only thing keeping me from reaching across the space between us and dragging her into my lap where she belongs.
There is no universe in which I let her walk away, despite her believing otherwise.
She has no idea how deeply she’s rooted herself inside me.
She’s taken up permanent residence in places I never knew existed until she forced the doors open to places I kept locked even from myself.
Soft places, vulnerable places my father tried his best to beat out of me before I was old enough to fight back.
I refuse to cull the growth now forming just because she thinks leaving is an option.
When I don’t say anything, she speaks again.
“Whatever is left of his estate after I liquidate enough of it to keep me comfortable, you can have. Every account, every property, every shell company under his name…” She shrugs.
“Whatever you want, it’s yours. Consider it my bargaining chip to sweeten the deal.
All I ask is that you let me keep the house. ”
I should laugh.
The sound rises in my throat, tempting me.
I don’t need anything financially from Ramil Borchin or his rotting trust. I don’t want it. My accounts are bloated with more money than I know what to do with. Taking his scraps would be like a wolf scavenging a dead carcass on the side of the road for fresh meat.
Aside from that, the idea of stripping her inheritance after everything he already took from her feels like another violation.
She’s earned every brick of that house, every acre of land on that property, and every dollar in those bank accounts.
She’s paid for it tenfold simply by living under her father’s influence for so long.
If I took any of it, I’d be no better than the man who sold her.
I ask the one question that has been burning a hole in my mind. “Why go through the trouble of something this wide-scale? Why not let him rot on his own? Walk away. Wipe your hands clean of the mess. Seems counterintuitive if your goal is to move on.”
Her hands fold together in her lap, fingers lacing one-by-one. She considers the question for a long moment.
“Maybe so,” she says at last. “But I’m tired of him getting away with being a horrible person in the shadows. He needs to be held accountable in a way he can’t bargain his way out of.”
I hum in response.
It comes as no surprise that a private reckoning would not solve the kind of ache she has in her heart.
I’ve seen enough betrayal in my life to know that quiet vengeance rarely satisfies a wound as deep as hers.
Anything less than complete public annihilation would be too easy of a judgement cast upon Borchin.
She wants him dead in every way that has ever mattered to a man like him.
This isn’t a grieving daughter lashing out to get even. This is a strategist who understands power and reputation and how vital it is to dismantle both if you truly want to bury an enemy for good. In that moment, I understand something I haven’t before now.
Whatever her father thought he was creating by breaking her, he failed spectacularly. Instead, he’s honed the weapon that will ultimately be used to destroy him.
I find myself smiling before I consciously realize. It starts as nothing more than a faint curve at one corner of my mouth. But soon it spreads until it’s the full, dark smile that has made more grown men reconsider their life choices than I can count.
Her eyes narrow slightly at me, wary. Underneath it is a flicker of something else there too.
Anticipation.
“Alright. I’ll help you,” I say at last.
For the first since the day she walked into my life, she smiles at me. It is radiant. “Good. Let’s get started.”
Teaching her becomes the easiest decision I’ve made all week.
I expected, at the very least, a flicker of disgust when I finally decide to open the doors to my world and let her see what truly lives beneath the polished veneer that is presented to outsiders from those of us in power.
The illusion of order the Pact so carefully cultivates has always been meant to project stability. To reassure the world that civilized men with impeccable pedigrees and diplomatic influence are the ones in control. In truth, behind that manicured facade is the exact opposite.
To my surprise, Katerina doesn’t recoil once her eyes have been opened. Instead, she leans in closer to absorb it all.
She meets every new revelation with laser-focused attention, her questions pulling her deeper into the underbelly of how proper power is wielded in Russia.
She follows every thread I give her, tugging at it until it unravels into the full picture and shows exactly what corruption, alliances, and machinery of influence it takes to keep everything running smoothly.
Not once does she flinch or shy away from the ugliness that is this country’s true reality. If anything, she seems relieved at being taken seriously and treated as an equal rather than a pawn for those above her to play with at their leisure.
Over the next week, we turn my office into a war room.
The long mahogany desk is dragged into the center of the room and buried under ledgers, timelines, and financial trails that span with decades of unchecked addiction and desperation laid open like an autopsy.
Papers cover every surface of it. Maps and printouts line the walls behind us.
The fireplace burns late into the night as our strategies are drafted until they’re perfect.
I show her everything she will need to completely destroy her father.