19. Octavia
My chest aches softly as I settle back into the comforter and watch Vas leave. Shockingly, it’s not my physical injuries bringing the pain.
You’re stronger than this, Octavia. You’ve been alone your entire life. You can handle a few fucking minutes without your emotional-support man by your side.
“I’d like to see proof,” I whisper into the quiet room. That’s what I should be asking for in the wake of such an absurd claim, right? Come on, Octavia, some voice whispers into my head. What would the scam even be?
I flinch instinctively when the man beside me moves, reaching into his pocket. He doesn’t react, simply pulling out an expensive-looking leather wallet and cracking it open.
“We can do a test, just to be sure, but,” he says, tilting the leather towards me. A small photograph peers back, scratched and worn, as if it’s rested there for years. “I always keep this with me. The family nurse took it the day you were born. April third. Twelve fifty-two PM.”
As I stare down, I’m sure my eyes must double in size.
There he is, a younger version of the man hovering a few inches away.
Less scruff on his chin. Several wrinkles missing between the crook of his eyes, which smile up to the camera with overwhelming joy.
And in his arms lies a tiny, pale face with a birthmark just above the lip.
My hand flies up, fingers brushing the identical brown dot above the corner of my own lips.
The intense gaze burning a hole in my neck makes it difficult to think, let alone process such a wild concept. The guy refuses to look away.
Not just any guy, I remind myself.
My father.
The man who created me. The one who condemned me to this life of pain and hurt and loneliness and…
No, you know what? I am not going to think about that right now, because I’m pretty sure any therapist would agree that surprise daddy issues should wait to be processed after a panic attack passes, not during.
Dirt, Octavia. Think of dirt.
It’s not my first rodeo. At least this time, I’m not panicking in the dark stage wings, seconds from one of the most important performances of my career.
Dirt below my feet.
The soft grains sifting through my fingers, returning to the ground below me.
No, I’m not on stage. I’m just in a room of armed murderers, most of whom are likely related to me, who are watching raptly as my lungs liquefy between weak breaths. My blood congeals in my veins, forcing my heart to squeeze impossibly hard to push it along.
I think someone is speaking in the background, but the words fall short.
Not in the cage.
Not in the darkness.
The reassurances don’t help, because despite the sunlight that filters through the drapes in playful streaks, my skin grows cold. I don’t like the brightness. I want my comforting shadows. I want to be held.
My sight darkens.
“Octavia!” a voice demands, finally cutting through the sound. “What’s wrong?”
Oxygen pounds into my lungs, but not enough flows out.
He needs to come back to me.
I hear my name shouted, but it sounds impossibly far away. Quiet and withdrawn compared to the squelching sound that carves through my memory. Copper twists in my nostrils.
Where is he?
Hands cup my cheeks. My own green eyes stare back at me.
No. Not my eyes.
“What do you need? Please, tell me how to help,” my father begs.
I open my mouth. Nothing comes out. My throat pinches closed, driving my lungs into a burning panic.
“Shit. Alex, what do I do?”
I climb off the bed, pushing away the arms that reach for me. I need the floor. I need stability. And I would really like some goddamn dirt. A pile, or a bucket, or something.
Liquid streams down my cheeks in a helpless drizzle. I hate crying in public, but I’m too lost to care.
Wood cracks against the wall.
“Octavia…” A gasp. “What the fuck did you do to her?”
The voice is familiar. Solid. A life raft in the cold, blue ocean.
“I didn’t do anything,” someone insists. “She just started panicking! Fix it!”
Hands, rough and familiar, weave under my knees and around my waist. Calloused skin scrapes my own. Suddenly, my useless limbs are trapped against a wide chest in a position my body remembers all too well.
My muscles instantly slacken.
“You’re okay. Breathe.”
My hyperventilation slows. The effect is so immediate that embarrassment flushes my skin.
I come back to myself. To the room with the warm rays of sunshine. To the male bodies that crowd around my position on the floor. Murderers. Soldiers. Family.
Self-consciousness replaces the panic, alcohol drizzled over a cut.
“Y…you left me,” I stammer through my next exhale, dipping my chin into his neck to hide my shame.
“It won’t happen again,” Vasiliy whispers, holding me against him on the floor.
I rub the wet streaks from my face with angry swipes. “I’m a terrible feminist.”
Vasiliy chuckles softly, swiping a final tear from the corner of my eye before it can even fall. “We’ll be better feminists tomorrow, moya zlaya.”
There’s something quite bizarre about sitting across from the human being who decided to give you half his genes on a whim nearly twenty-two years ago.
Though I haven’t bothered to utter more than a couple of monosyllabic grunts, I’ve picked up on a few of my sperm donor’s traits.
For one, he’s extremely large. Almost as tall as Vasiliy, and slightly wider, too.
And you know what? After years of praying for a few extra inches to meet the long-legged ballet standard, that kind of pisses me off.
Science isn’t fair, and my short, stubby legs had to pay the price.
I’ve also noticed that he’s incredibly analytical, soaking up every word from Vasiliy’s mouth with an intelligent glint, as if he’s filing the information away in some complicated file cabinet in the back of his mind. I won’t lie, it’s a little creepy.
Maybe he’s a psychopath—the clinical version, not the mindless insult.
Oh shit. Does that mean I’m a psychopath too?
I flunked science.
“I still don’t understand how my daughter got all mixed up with the likes of you,” my father says after Vasiliy gets through explaining our kidnapping and captivity.
My eyes grow tired, despite the clock reading half past three in the afternoon. I curl into Vasiliy’s larger form on the bed behind me.
The fact that seeing us so entwined is making my absent father increasingly uncomfortable is just a bonus. Ever since my embarrassing freakout on the floor, he has refrained from commenting on our strange closeness, but that hasn’t stopped the glares from being tossed Vas’s way.
“Solokov ordered me to attend a donor performance at the ballet with his Second, Ivan Petrov,” Vasiliy explains, casually mentioning his employer as if my father knows the guy.
Well, now that I think about it, they might know each other, since they both run those Bratva-things.
“Are you a dancer?” my father asks.
My mouth dries.
I’ve never been ashamed of my career, but how am I supposed to tell this successful leader of an underground empire that all his daughter amounted to was a ballet dancer who makes less than minimum wage and can’t afford groceries most weeks?
“She happens to be the youngest principal ballerina that the Manhattan Ballet has had in years. Hers was the most breathtaking performance I’ve ever seen.”
Shock blooms in my chest at Vasiliy’s words. How would he know that?
Shock, and something warmer. Purer.
“By that, he means it was the only performance he’s ever seen, and I’m pretty sure he slept through it,” I laugh, trying to negate the overwhelming effect of his speech.
“Never. Before seeing you, I never knew dance could be so angry.”
My mouth slackens, hanging open like a goldfish.
“I hope to see you dance one day,” my father murmurs with a confusing tone of honesty.
“That will be up to her,” Vasiliy challenges, causing dear old dad’s earnest expression to board up.
“Obviously, it would be up to her.”
“Not obviously, asshole. Only a week ago, she was working long days on a painful injury and entertaining decrepit old fucks just to keep a crumbling roof over her head, all because you couldn’t locate your daughter wandering around a few states away.
Now that she has me, she’ll be free to do whatever she wishes, including never dancing another day if she doesn’t want to. ”
Vasiliy’s explosion takes me completely by surprise.
I guess I forgot I shared so much with him in the cell.
Or maybe I thought he wasn’t really listening.
I remember a lot of the stuff he told me, but that’s because he’s fascinating.
The dichotomy of a scary mob interrogator and protector of his kid sister, crowded into one large body with pretty blue eyes?
Come on, that’s objectively fascinating.
Then there’s the second part. Now that she has me. The sentiment splashes into my face with a fresh, cold shock.
“Um, what?” I ask, turning.
He shrugs, unrepentant. “I thought we’d agree we’d be feminists tomorrow?”
“Oh God,” I murmur to myself. “My emotional-support man is an idiot.”
“You are not going back to ballet if you don’t want to dance.”
“Vas, we’re practically strangers! You can’t just hand me money.”
Jesus, Octavia, if men want to hand over their money to you, let them. Seven days in a cage and you forget you’re below the poverty line?
My father clears his throat, interrupting.
“I truly hate to agree with this dumbass, but he’s right.
If you don’t want to dance anymore, you do not need to,” he says from the chair beside us.
“You don’t need to depend on him, either.
Technically, you’ve had access to your trust since you turned eighteen.
I haven’t touched it since the day I set it up. ”
“Settle down,” I snap. “I don’t need handouts from you, either.”
“It’s not a handout. Every person who carries the Siderov name wears a target on their back, and unfortunately, you’ve already learned what that entails.
As a Siderov, you have a heavier load to carry than most people do.
The Trust Fund is already legally in your name, to ensure your relative safety and prosperity as best as we can. ”
Top ten words I never thought I’d hear in the same sentence with Octavia: trust fund.
What. The. Fuck.
“In fact, I’m sure I can find you a life coach or a puppy to replace this foul boy, and you wouldn’t have to depend on him for anything, ever again,” my father continues, leaving me to process the fact that I technically had access to a Trust Fund the same year I spent secretly living in the ballet changing rooms and eating out of the trash.
All those nights I prayed that no one would open the door while I slept, before the janitor snuck me his key in a quiet act of kindness. Sure, I’ve done some shitty stuff, but there’s no way my karma’s that bad.
“I did not say she needed to depend on me, old man. I only meant that I’d be happy to provide for her if she wished to pursue other interests. And I will not be replaced by a mutt!”
“You are a mutt.”
“Enough!” My hands extend between the two dumbasses. “Vasiliy, go wait in the bathroom. I need to speak with my father alone.”
“But—” he stammers in a boyish tone.
“I’ll be fine,” I say a little softer. “Just give us a few minutes.”
With a huff, Vas slides out from behind me. He shoots my bio-dad one final glare before shuffling off to the bathroom door.