Nina
I take a step back. This has to be a trap.
Alina turns around, breathing hard. “You shouldn’t stand in the hallway.”
“You think that’s my biggest concern right now?”
“I know,” Alina says. “I know how this looks.”
I let out a sharp laugh. “Do you?”
She flinches.
I’m too shocked to care.
I look around the apartment. It is small, plain, and dim. The curtains are pulled shut. There is a half-empty glass of water on the table, a blanket on the couch, a packet of crackers, and a phone plugged into the wall with the screen turned down. No sign of Roman. No sign of anyone else.
Just Alina.
Alive. Hiding.
Looking at me like I’m the last person she expected to actually come.
“You came,” Alina says.
“You sound surprised,” I say.
“I am.”
“Then maybe don’t invite people through criminals.”
Her face tightens. “Roman is not—”
“Don’t defend Roman Karpov to me,” I say. “Not today.”
Alina goes quiet.
I step closer. “Start talking.”
She swallows. “I’m pregnant.”
“I know that part.”
“No,” Alina says. “You don’t.”
I go still.
Her hand presses more firmly against her stomach. “The baby is Misha’s,” Alina says.
The room drops out from under me.
For a moment, I don’t understand the words. They reach me, but they don’t arrange themselves into anything possible.
My brother.
I stare at her. “No.”
Alina’s eyes shine. “Yes.”
“No,” I say again, because apparently that is the only word my brain can produce.
“I’m sorry,” Alina says.
“Don’t say sorry,” I snap. “You walked into Luka’s office and told him you were pregnant like it was his.”
“I know.”
“So you lied.”
“Yes.”
The answer is simple, and that makes it worse.
I feel heat rush into my face.
For days, I argued with Luka. I doubted him. I doubted the evidence. I accused Pavel of handing him a neat story. I defended Misha so hard because I knew my brother, because I knew he would never betray Luka, never put me in danger, never become part of something this ugly.
Now Alina is standing in front of me, pregnant with his child.
I feel stupid. I feel betrayed.
I feel like the ground under me has changed and nobody bothered to warn me before I stepped forward.
“So Luka was right,” I say.
Alina looks confused. “About what?”
“That you were lying. That this was a setup. That you were being used and it was my brother who did it to move against Luka.”
Her face changes. “No. Not like that.”
“Then how?” I ask. “Because from where I’m standing, you lied about being pregnant with Luka’s baby, vanished from protection, and showed up on camera with my missing brother.”
Alina sits down on the edge of the couch like her legs cannot hold her anymore. “I was hired to get close to Luka.”
I stare at her. “Hired.”
“Yes.”
“To seduce him.”
“Yes.”
My stomach turns.
Alina wipes under one eye quickly. “I was supposed to get close enough to learn things. His routines. Who he met. What routes he used. Where security shifted after meetings. I was given information about his schedule, the places he preferred, the kind of women he was seen with.”
“Who hired you?”
She hesitates.
I take another step forward. “Alina.”
“Oleg Taran,” she says.
The name takes a second.
Then I remember. The gala.
Kirill Antonov, smiling at Luka near the exit, telling him they had better support now.
And beside him, the quieter man. Broad shoulders. Flat expression. Watching more than speaking.
“He’s behind it?”
“Kirill?” I say.
She nods. “Him too. They’re both in on it.”
“Luka dismissed them like they were annoying insects,” I say.
“Oleg hired me. At first, I didn’t know exactly who was behind him. I only knew he had money, contacts, and information he should not have had. I was supposed to lure Luka, make him trust me, and pass along whatever I could.”
“And the assassination attempt?”
She closes her eyes.
My skin goes cold. “You were involved,” I say.
“I gave them information,” Alina says. “I didn’t know they were going to shoot him.”
“Don’t.”
Her eyes open. “It’s true.”
“Men died,” I say. “Luka was shot. I was there.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t know,” I say.
Alina flinches. “I thought they wanted pressure,” Alina says. “Business leverage. Something to scare him. I knew it was wrong, but I didn’t know they were trying to kill him.”
“You helped them get close,” I say.
“Yes,” she whispers.
I look away because I might slap her if I keep looking at her face. “Where does Misha come in?”
“He was never part of the plan.”
I turn back. “Then why is his name everywhere?”
“Because someone put it there.”
“That’s convenient.”
“It’s true,” Alina says, and for the first time, her voice becomes firm. “Misha would never betray Luka.”
I stare at her.
She says it with such certainty that it knocks me off balance. “You’re defending him?”
“Yes.”
“After all this?”
“Misha is the most loyal man I have ever met,” Alina says.
I hate hearing that from her. I hate that she sounds like she knows him in a way I don’t. I hate that a stranger who lied to Luka is sitting there telling me about my own brother’s loyalty while carrying his child.
“So Oleg paid you to do what…”
“He was the one who approached me. At first, it was simple. I was supposed to be in the right places at the right times. A restaurant. A private event. A weekend party outside the city. Places where Luka might appear without it looking like I was chasing him.”
I frown. “A weekend party?”
She nods. “More like a private retreat. Rich people, investors, people who wanted to be near power without admitting they wanted anything. Oleg said Luka was expected there. I was told to go, be seen, make myself useful, and if I got the chance, get close to him.”
“But Luka wasn’t there.”
“No,” Alina says quietly. “Misha was.”
The room goes still.
I sit back slowly.
She looks down at her hands. “I didn’t know who he was. Not then. He wasn’t introduced as Luka’s best friend. He was just Misha. Charming, difficult, too observant for his own good. I thought he was another wealthy man at the retreat.”
“That sounds like him,” I say before I can stop myself.
She gives the faintest broken smile, then loses it. “We talked that night,” Alina says. “Then we drank. Then we argued. Then…”
She stops.
I don’t help her.
She swallows. “Then we slept together.”
My stomach turns. It’s different hearing it this way.
I say, “Did he know you were there for Luka?”
“No,” Alina says quickly. “Not then. He knew I was hiding something, but he didn’t know what.”
“And you didn’t know he was close to Luka.”
“No. I found out later.”
“How?”
She rubs her hands together, shaking a little. “Oleg sent me more information after the retreat. He wanted to know why I hadn’t made contact with Luka. I said Luka hadn’t come. Then he asked who I had spent time with, and I told him only a first name.”
“Misha,” I say.
She nods.
“And then?”
“Oleg went quiet,” Alina says. “That was the first time I knew something was wrong. Later he sent me a photo. Misha standing beside Luka at some event. He asked if that was the man.”
I close my eyes for a second.
Alina whispers, “That was when I knew my jig was up.”
I open my eyes again.
She looks ashamed now. Truly ashamed.
“I had slept with Luka Kazan’s closest friend,” she says. “I knew if Oleg found a way to use that, he would. And I knew if Misha found out why I had been at that retreat, he would hate me.”
“But you kept seeing him,” I say.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Her hand moves over her stomach. “At first, because I was scared,” Alina says.
“Oleg wanted me to use him. He said Misha was better access than Luka because Luka kept women at a distance, but Misha had already let me close. He told me to keep seeing him, get information, find out schedules, find out what Luka was doing.”
My hands curl into fists. “And you did?”
She looks up at me with wet eyes. “At first, yes.”
I breathe out slowly.
I hate her.
In that moment, I hate her so clearly that it almost steadies me.
“My brother trusted you,” I say.
“I know.”
“And you used him.”
“I know,” Alina says, her voice breaking. “I know. I told myself I had no choice, but that was a lie. I had choices. I chose badly.”
“Then what changed?”
She closes her eyes. “He did.”
I don’t want to hear that.
She says it anyway. “He was not like the men I knew. He was suspicious and bossy and impossible, but he was kind when he didn’t think anyone would notice.”
“Stop,” I say.
She stops.
The room is quiet.
I look away because I cannot stand hearing someone describe my brother like that while he is missing.
After a moment, Alina continues more carefully. “When I found out I was pregnant, I panicked. I told Misha.”
My eyes snap back to her. “You told him?”
“Yes,” she says. “I told him about the baby. Then I told him everything else.”
“Everything?”
“Oleg. The plan. The retreat. The reason I was supposed to meet Luka. The information I had passed along.”
My voice comes out low. “And he didn’t tell Luka?”
“He was going to,” she says quickly. “I swear. He was furious. I had never seen him like that.”
I think of Misha’s face at my apartment.
The way he kept asking about my job.
The way he kept warning me away from Luka.
The way he said danger follows him, Nina.
At the time, I thought he was scared because of Luka’s world.
Now another possibility slides into place, ugly and sharp.
Maybe he saw Luka as the danger because he thought Luka had betrayed him too.
Maybe, after seeing Alina with Luka at Maison, some possessive, wounded part of his brain decided Luka had taken the woman carrying his child.
Alina looks at me.
“That night,” I say. “You came as Luka’s date.”
She nods slowly. “Yes.”
“Misha saw you with him.”
Her face crumples. “Yes,” Alina says. “He saw us.”
I remember that evening with horrible clarity.
Luka beside me. Alina arriving polished and beautiful. The jealousy I tried to swallow. The feeling that I had become invisible.
And somewhere in that same night, Misha saw Alina with Luka.
No wonder he lost his mind.