Chapter 20
HELENA
The room spins.
My head throbs with a rhythm that leaves me nauseous.
I can still hear the metal screaming. The Sentinel flipping on the bridge. It's a loop I can't turn off.
The blood on my face has dried into a tight, itchy mask.
I try to swallow a breath, but my chest refuses. It’s like the Sentinel itself is sitting on my lungs. I can still feel the seatbelt jerking me back. Now, it's a stinging fire behind my ribs. Breathing shouldn't be this much work. Everything hurts.
I'm tied to a steel chair in a cavernous room.
The air is stale, thick with the taste of iron dust and the briny scent of the harbor’s low tide. Somewhere in the darkness above, water drips.
I try to shift my weight, but the zip ties bite into my wrists.
Blinking rapidly, I struggle to clear the black spots dancing in my vision.
This is the Old Foundry.
A graveyard for ships and steel. And now, for me.
Looking up, my vision swims.
"Dad?" The word scrapes my throat in a desperate plea.
Arthur Blackwood is standing ten feet away. He’s out of place in this graveyard. He glimpses at me, then away. He can't hold my gaze.
"Dad, please," I rasp. "My chest... Something is broken. I need a doctor."
I wait for him to rush forward. To demand they untie me.
He takes a half-step toward me, his hand twitching like he wants to reach out, but then he stops. He looks at the armed men surrounding us.
"Hold on," Arthur says, voice shaking. "It will be over soon. Stay quiet."
He doesn't try to help me. To comfort or care. He simply stands there, wringing his hands.
"Ten minutes to midnight," Moretti says.
He steps into the light with the face of a viper and impossibly cold eyes.
"If he’s not here on the dot," Moretti says, checking his watch, "we put a bullet in her head and leave."
Arthur flinches. "No! Wait. He’s coming, Moretti. I know him. He won't leave her. Give him time."
"Time is money," Moretti sneers, circling my chair.
A sound vibrates through the concrete floor, low. It’s the high-pitched scream of a predator. A V12 engine.
Moretti stops mid-step and tilts his head, listening to the roar.
"He’s early," he notes with a gravelled laugh. "Look at that. The Great Konstantin. Rushing like a delivery boy."
"I told you he would come," Arthur breathes, wiping sweat from his brow.
"It’s pathetic," Moretti spits. "Kings don’t run, Arthur. Desperate men run. He’s terrified."
I close my eyes, disgusted with myself. I betrayed him. My husband.
I told them about the tablet. The shipment. I gave them the keys to the kingdom to stop them from spilling my blood.
Konstantin will come, but not to save me. He’ll come to execute me for treason.
The rusted doors groan open. Headlights blind me, twin beams of white fire cutting through the gloom.
The engine cuts.
A dead quiet settles in.
The driver's door opens. Konstantin steps out. Alone.
He’s wearing a black suit, buttoned to the throat. He’s immaculate, not at all like a man who lost a battle, but like a man who dressed for a funeral, undecided on whose body will be in the casket.
He doesn't look at the men surrounding the perimeter. He doesn't look at the snipers on the catwalks.
His gaze lands on me.
For a split second, his eyes lock onto mine. He sees the blood. The ropes.
Yet, he doesn't flinch.
"Konstantin," Moretti calls out, arms wide. "Welcome to the slaughterhouse."
Konstantin walks forward. His boots echo on the concrete.
He doesn't have a gun drawn, but the way he carries himself makes every sniper shift their weight. They aren't looking at a target; they're looking at a monster.
He stops five yards from Moretti. Stands tall, his shoulders broad, dominating the space. Even surrounded by guns, he looks like the most dangerous thing in the room.
"Where’s the tablet?" Moretti asks.
Konstantin reaches into his jacket and pulls out the thin slate of black glass.
The tablet.
My heart stops. He's giving it away.
Those weapons were his guaranteed victory, the raw firepower he needed to annihilate Moretti and the Italians for the blood they spilled. He's throwing away years of planning and the crown he bled for, all for a woman who betrayed him.
He’s trading his long-awaited blood-debt for me.
"Arthur," Konstantin says. He doesn't look at my father, but his voice cracks like a whip. "I see you finally picked a side. I always knew you were a whore. I didn't know you were a cheap one."
Arthur bristles, face reddening. "You’re finished, boy. Hand it over."
Konstantin holds the tablet out.
"The tablet," he says. "You have what you wanted. Now give me my wife."
Moretti steps forward, snatching the device from Konstantin's hand. He looks at it like it's the Holy Grail, running his thumb over the glass.
"Beautiful," Moretti whispers. "The keys to the city."
Konstantin doesn't move. He doesn't even look at the device he gave away. His eyes are fixed on mine, burning with a quiet promise.
"Untie her. Now."
Moretti looks up, eyes dancing with malice. He tucks the tablet into his pocket.
He signals his men. They raise their rifles.
The air shifts. Violence is about to erupt.
"I could kill you right here," Moretti says. "I have guns pointed at your heart. I could end the great Konstantin with a snap of my fingers."
Konstantin doesn't blink or reach for a weapon. He stares with bored indifference. "Then do it."
Moretti laughs, shaking his head. "No. That would be too easy. Too quick." He steps closer, invading his space. "I want you to suffer, Russian. Soon, I’ll have your weapons. Your shipment. I’m going to take your missiles. Your explosives."
Moretti grins, his eyes dancing with a sick sort of joy.
"I’m not going to shoot you tonight," he says.
"Death is too easy. I want you to wake up tomorrow with nothing.
Want you to sit in your empty penthouse and watch the horizon.
I want you to feel the exact moment my men use this tablet to unlock those crates.
I want you to hear the ghost of your mother's scream when your own missiles level your territory. "
Moretti leans in, searching for a crack in the mask. He wants a flinch. He wants the satisfaction of seeing the great Russian bear bleed.
Konstantin doesn't give him a single drop.
He stands perfectly still, his arms hanging loose at his sides. His eyes don't even blink at the mention of his mother. They’re fixed on Moretti with a look of clinical observation, as if he’s watching an insect crawl across a tabletop before he decides to crush it.
"Are you finished?" Konstantin asks. His voice is devoid of anger, which makes it a thousand times more terrifying.
Moretti's grin falters. He wanted a broken man. Instead, he's standing in front of an executioner who is simply biding his time.
He looks at me with disgust. Then back at Konstantin. "Take her," Moretti sneers. "She’s broken anyway. A traitor who sold you out for a glass of water. Take your garbage and get out of my sight."
A guard slices the ties.
I fall forward but never hit the floor. Konstantin catches me. His arms are like iron, locking around my waist, pulling my battered body against his chest.
I burst into tears and bury my face in his neck, soaking his collar. "Konstantin," I choke out.
He doesn't say a word.
He cups the back of my head, fingers twisting into my bloody hair. He pulls me back just enough to look at my face. Dried blood and dirt streak my skin, but he doesn't care.
He crushes his mouth to mine.
The kiss is hard, like he’s trying to swallow my soul. He tastes the blood and the dirt on my lips and still drinks me in, claiming every broken part of me.
It’s the only thing that stops the world from falling apart.
"I have her," he says, murmuring to himself as he pulls his mouth free.
Behind us, heavy boots meet concrete. Moretti is already barking at his men, rushing toward the exit. Arthur is right behind him, scurrying like a rat, looking at his shoes so he doesn't have to see me.
They got what they wanted. They're leaving us in the dust like we're yesterday's news.
Konstantin carries me toward the Ferrari.
"Run while you can, Konstantin!" Moretti shouts. "Enjoy the night. Because the sun is never coming up for you again!"
My husband doesn't look back. He opens the car door and sets me gently in the passenger seat. He leans in close, hand brushing the hair from my forehead.
"Did they touch you?" he whispers.
"I told them," I sob, guilt crashing over me. "Konstantin, I told them about the shipment. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
He ignores the confession. His eyes search my face, then travel down to my body, checking for breaks, for blood. He grabs my wrist firmly.
"Did. They. Touch. You?"
I tremble, unable to hide it anymore. I lift my right hand.
The blood is dried on my skin. The shallow slice Moretti made is a bright red line across the base of my thumb. The black marker circle is still visible, the map of the amputation.
"He... he was going to take it," I whisper, trembling. "And the crash... my chest burns. Is Lev...?"
"He’s alive," Konstantin says, his voice impossibly gentle. "He’s already at the clinic. We’re going there now. The doctor will fix you both."
He holds my hand, tracing the line of the cut with his thumb. "He put a knife to you."
His thumb caresses the wound, lingering.
"Good," he says. It sounds like he’s talking to the demon inside him. "Now I don't have to be merciful."
He closes the door, moves around the hood, and settles into the driver's seat. Then, he starts the engine.
"They have it," I whisper, the guilt still thick in my throat. "Konstantin, they have the tablet. Everything you built... I gave it to them."
He doesn't look at the Foundry as we pull away. He doesn't even look back at the men with the rifles. He stares at the dark road ahead.
"They think they took my kingdom," he says, his voice turning the air to ice. "They don't realize I didn't hand over a device. I handed over a death sentence. I know exactly where they're going. And by the time the sun comes up, there won't be enough left of Moretti or your father to bury."
He guns the engine, and the car screams into the night.
He isn’t a man who lost. He is a man already counting bodies.