35. Thea
THEA
“You two.” I’m already moving for the doors, while the twins Maxim left behind straighten up as if a string pulling them together has been tugged. “Come with me. Now.”
“Thea.” Galina catches my sleeve. “Where are you going?”
“To save him from himself.”
I hear how insane it sounds, but I keep going anyway, because this is my plan, and my plans go according to schedule, and God only knows how much trouble Maxim has gotten himself into by now.
Galina stops in front of me. “You cannot mean this.”
“He went to Sokolov’s alone, Galina. He went tonight, wrecked and not caring whether he returns.
You saw his eyes. You know what he’s thinking, same as I do.
It’s not a plan—it’s a man rushing to his own doom.
I refuse to sit in a shitty chair and wait for the father of my child to die of a broken heart. Not while I can do something.”
Galina’s stitched mouth opens and closes, showing something in her expression that isn’t quite refusal anymore—more like recognition. She doesn’t tell me to sit down again but looks at me a bit longer. Finally, she nods and releases me. “I’ll stay here.”
“Good. Thank you.”
The short-haired twin says, “Miss. Our orders are specific. We keep you here, in the hospital, until the boss comes back. That’s the order.”
“I know it is. He gave it in front of me.” I pick my coat up off the chair. “And that order was designed to keep me safe, yes? That’s the entire point of it. Keeping me safe, right?”
“Well, yes, but—”
I shrug the coat on. “If he dies today because nobody moved, how safe do you think I’m going to be?”
They frown at each other, and he points out, “You’re safest in the hospital.”
“And tomorrow, after Max is dead? Where am I safest? Where won’t his enemies find me? Do you have orders to take me there?” I wait for them to catch up.
“No, but—”
“The order and I want the same thing, boys. We just disagree about the method, and when Max gave it, he didn’t think this through because he was grieving.”
The long-haired twin looks sad to say the words, “We can’t let you walk out. Please don’t make us hold you here.”
“Aw, you’re cute. You think you can hold me here?”
“We’ll do what we must, but we truly don’t want to have to do so.”
“That’s good.” I smile serenely at them. “Let’s talk about what keeping me here looks like. This is a hospital. It is full of cameras and security guards who have no idea who any of you are and wouldn’t care if they did. The second you put a hand on me, I start screaming.”
He sighs. “Please—”
“I shout that two strangers are trying to force a pregnant woman out of a waiting room against her will. I have a loud voice, boys. And good lungs. Security rushes over, possibly police, and you end up spending the most important day of this family’s life in a holding cell.
It’s pointless for everyone, especially for me, whom you’re supposed to be protecting. ”
They share a defeated sigh.
“Or come with me, keep your eyes on me the way Max wants, and make sure I don’t even get a paper cut. You’re still watching me—just from a more interesting place.”
The short-haired one closes his eyes briefly, like a man watching a rockslide he can’t escape. “He’s going to kill us.”
“If he’s alive to react, it’ll be gratitude, not murder on his mind. That’s the entire goal. So, if you’re going to guard me, then you’ll have to keep up. I’m going. Move.”
Reluctantly, they make a hole, and I walk out of the waiting room into the corridor, passing a vending machine, a crash cart, and a nurse who ignores me. I don’t look back, avoiding the question of whether they follow, because turning around would mean asking, and I’ve had enough asking tonight.
I’m not asking anymore. I’m telling.
After three seconds, two sets of footsteps trail behind me, one on each side, matching my pace. A heady sense of calm takes hold of my chest. I’m doing this, and I’m going to win. There’s no other option.
I don’t falter. I don’t try. I just… do.
“Good,” I say, not slowing as we exit the building into the bright daylight. “Now one of you give me a gun.”
There’s a brief pause, a moment of complete disbelief. Then, the short-haired one—God bless him—gently presses a small pistol into my hand as we walk, grip first. It’s a bit smaller than the ones from back home. My hands are steadier around it than I wish they were.
“Let’s go.”
In the SUV, as the city rushes by and one of us speeds along while the other is in the back with me, I focus on breathing and clear my thoughts, since feelings are a luxury and I’m on a tight schedule. “Okay. We should call for backup. Right? There have to be more of you.”
“There are,” the driver says.
“Call them. Please and thank you.”
He quickly exchanges a sharp burst of Russian into his phone.
Then he looks at me in the mirror, and I notice the question assembling behind his eyes—the one they’ve both been holding onto since the waiting room.
“Miss, with respect, what is your plan exactly? Because we’re heading toward a pakhan’s heavily guarded estate with two teams and a pregnant woman with a very small gun.
What do you think happens when we get there? ”
Oddly, I actually have a plan—something I would normally laugh at if I had room to do so. It came to me fully formed as I approached the hospital doors. Turns out, I’ve been preparing for this very moment throughout my entire adult life without realizing it.
“We throw a party.”
“Come again?”
“It’s a party. I’ve planned hundreds, including galas, dinners, and a retirement event for a full ballroom with a border-war-worthy seating chart. It’s the same skill, I promise.” I twist to face him, and the plan lays itself out clean and bright in my head.
“I don’t follow you.”
“You invite the right guests. You seat everyone next to the right people. And you prepare a few good topics to keep the conversation moving so there’s never an awkward silence. That’s all tonight is.”
The driver and the back-seat man trade a look in the rearview mirror that says they’re a little afraid of me now, which is good.
“Guests first. That’s our two teams meeting at the estate, everybody arriving at the same time so nobody’s standing around alone looking suspicious.
” I point at the back-seat man. “So, tell me about the second team. Names, numbers, what each of them is good at, what each of them is bad at. I need to know my guests before I can seat them.”
He blinks, shifts his position, and then speaks quickly, rattling off the details. I listen the way I used to when a caterer described which servers were quick and which might drop a tray of champagne on a CEO.
Volkov’s team consists of four men. One is a sniper, patient and more effective at long ranges than in hallway knife fights.
Two are specialists in close-quarters combat—quick, loud, and confident in confined spaces.
The youngest, nervous member drives at reckless speeds and, by his own admission, shouldn’t be near the front lines.
My twins, Sergei and Chaucer, will flank me. One remains calm under fire, and the other excels at reading angles in buildings more than he excels at talking to people.
“Okay. Seating.” I put the man’s phone on speaker and set it on my knee, and I start assigning, playing every strength against every gap the way I’d keep the loud donor away from the shy widow.
I keep going, the chart filling in. As I explain the plan, there’s a startled bark of a laugh from the back seat, quickly swallowed.
“What’s funny?”
“Nothing, miss,” comes the response. “It sounds like a helluva party.”
Not sure if that’s a compliment, but I’m taking it for one. “Now. Topics, to keep the conversation moving.” My voice drops and flattens into something I’ve never heard, and the last of the executive assistant in me folds into whatever I’m becoming.
“Everyone enters armed. I want us to be loud everywhere, taking charge of every room we step into, so that no one on their side gets to finish a sentence. We should dominate the conversation.” I don’t blink.
“When the time arrives, anyone carrying a weapon on Sokolov’s payroll is considered an uninvited guest. Kill orders for all armed individuals on the estate. Proceed accordingly.”
Silence fills the car—not as objection, but as recalibration. It’s the sound of two hardened men reevaluating all their assumptions about the pregnant woman in the back seat.
“I like it,” the short-haired one says. “I’d like to attend your normal parties one day.”
“If you think that’s good, you should see me when a caterer cancels day-of.”
He laughs, and I swear, even that has an accent.
I gaze at the road leading to the estate, where the man I love moves inside an obvious trap. I discreetly check the safety on the small gun again, a comfort that shouldn’t be comforting.
“Oh. And one more thing.” I turn back to them. “Which one of you can connect me to the kumicho Maxim’s been working with?”