3. Timur #2
"Of course..." I stand and walk over to the island that separates my kitchen from my living room and pick up the bottle Morin left sitting there.
When I come back, I take the water glass and dump the water into my potted plant and pour a few fingers of the alcohol into the glass instead.
She accepts it greedily, gulping it down.
She coughs, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand as she reaches for the pain medication. Her hands fumble with the bottle as she tries to wrestle a few pills out, but she gives up. So I open it and take two out, then place them in her palm as she says, "I want to go home."
I sit back down and press my palms together between my knees. This is the part where everything gets complicated, and I hate it. I hate that Morin put me in this position and I hate that there's no clean way out of it.
"I understand that," I tell her. "And I wish I could make that happen right now."
"But you can't?"
"Not yet." There's no real way for me to explain to her why the man who broke the law kidnapping her deserves better treatment than her.
And I'm not about to grill her for answers this time of night after what she's been through.
Who knows what hell she saw tonight. She probably watched people she loves being murdered.
Her forehead crinkles and she asks, "Why?"
Because she's seen Morin's face. She's seen mine.
She's been inside my house, and if I let her walk out the front door right now, she could have police here within the hour.
And it wouldn't just be me who goes down.
It'd be Morin, Kazimir, Yegor, and eventually, Roman.
Everything my family has built would crumble because I did the decent thing and let a woman go home.
I can't tell her any of that, so I keep it simple.
"There are people involved in tonight who can't be identified. If I let you leave right now, it puts them at risk. And I can't do that."
"So I'm a prisoner."
"Please," I sigh, letting my shoulders droop. "I hope to think of you as a guest I'm asking to be patient with me while I sort this out."
Kira purses her lips and a hint of anger flashes across her face. "I'm just supposed to accept that?"
"I'm asking you to trust me for a moment..."
She finishes the vodka and sets the glass on the table. Her eyes are wet but she doesn't cry, and I respect her for it. "They killed everyone," she mumbles. "Why didn't they kill me?"
I can't imagine what it'd be like to be left behind if all of my family were killed around me and I was the only one left. Maybe it would've been better to let Morin take her and finish it. At least she wouldn’t be mourning them forever. And it might be how this ends up anyway—with her having to die simply for what she knows. I don’t know how this will pan out.
"I can't answer that, but you're alive. And I'll make sure you're safe for now, okay?"
Kira's composure cracks as her lip trembles and a tear slips down her cheek. I have to hand it to her, whoever trained her did it well. She's got to be no more than twenty-one years old and not at all prepared for this sort of life, but she's taking it like a champ.
I stand up, offering my hand to her, but she doesn’t take it. "I'm gonna take you to a room where you can rest. There's a bathroom attached, and I'll have my maid, Sonya, bring you anything you need. Clean clothes, food, whatever."
"And you're gonna lock me in, I assume?" She swipes at her cheeks and stands, drying her hand on her slacks. She picks up the bottle of vodka to take with her.
"Unfortunately, yes."
She follows me down the hall without protest. I think the fight has gone out of her for now, replaced by exhaustion and shock.
I'm glad I don't have to wrestle her into this room or harm her to get her to listen to me.
I know I'm capable of doing it, but my place is usually behind a computer, not wielding weapons and using physical force.
When I open the guest room door and step aside, she walks in and looks around, taking stock of the space. The window catches her attention and holds it for a moment. I bet she's thinking of trying to escape through that window, which means I have to have a plan to make sure she doesn't.
"There'll be a guard outside that window," I tell her. "To make sure you're safe." "Safe" is the only word I think I can use that won't frighten her more, but she gets the point. She's trapped and I'm her captor for now. I'm gonna kill Morin for dragging me into this mess.
She turns and faces me. "You're not what I expected."
"I'll take that as a compliment." My general good-natured humor falls flat on her and she glowers at me.
Fair enough. She's not amused by it, and I can't be mad about that. "Get some rest, Kira. I'm going to make some calls and figure out what to do. I give you my word that no one in this house will touch you tonight."
Nothing about her softens as I step out and lock the door behind me. I send a message to Dima and one to Ruslan to take turns watching the window and then walk straight to my home office where I pull my phone out and call my brother, who is still wide awake like normal.
"Tim, what's going on?" He sounds winded, like he was in the middle of a workout, but I hear his wife behind him mumbling and know I've interrupted something intimate.
"We have a problem," I tell him, pinching the bridge of my nose.
There's a pause and I hear him mutter something to Mila before he says, "What kind of problem?"
"Morin fucked up bad... And I need your advice." He's not gonna like this one bit, but if I've learned anything about his leadership since he took over, its' that we can get through any hard truth. It's the lies he hates.
He's silent for a moment, but I hear a door shut before he speaks again and know he’s going somewhere more private. "Start from the beginning," Ro says, and the only thing I can do is be honest.
This situation got out of hand fast.
And hopefully, he can help me decide how to fix it without it blowing up in my face.