Chapter 14
Damien
"WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO?" I yank the phone away from my ear as Roman's voice explodes through the speaker.
"You're being dramatic, Ro. I'm expecting you all to come home so we can plan the wedding.”
I end the call and glance at my right hand, which is trembling so hard it feels like a vessel might burst.
"Not you too," I mutter.
"Forgive me," Vasili says from the doorway of my office, his voice now laced with disbelief, "but you're about to marry a woman we know nothing about, who comes with a serial killer in tow, and whom you've apparently been stalking for months.
Explain to me, please, when the hell did all this happen? "
I have an hour before I'm due back at the hospital. An hour to arrange a permanent security detail for Roxanne with Vasili.
My vision tunnels at the thought of that bastard getting close to her twice today, but I force the rage down.
I look at the man who has always been by my side and tell him everything. Though Vasili is the only one I trust implicitly, I sometimes omit details to save him the headache. This time, however, I see understanding dawn in his eyes as he looks back at me.
He knows better than anyone what my dear mother turned Berna and me into. He knows about the dozens of times I vomited from everything she made me do until I became immune. He knows the punishments I received if I didn't carry out an order.
Who the hell puts skin peeled from a corpse on their own child?
Even now, I can feel that soft, sticky texture, reeking of copper, on my cheeks, my neck, everywhere she pressed it against me, forcing me to sit with it for hours to "learn my lesson."
"I already know the answer, but I still have to ask. Is she worth risking everything for?" Vasili's voice pulls me back, and a smile appears on my face involuntarily.
He knows what I was like before. He knows I never truly smiled until her. And he was the first to hear me tell a joke, just to make him laugh when my mother had forced him to burn a traitorous soldier alive.
Taking Vasili with me when I escaped her clutches was the best decision I ever made. If only Berna had listened to me…
I tear myself from the memory and answer him.
"Yes. Every single day. If it ever comes down to it, she's the priority, Vasili. Not me."
I see the conflict in his gaze. His life's purpose has been to keep me safe though I've mostly made his job harder by diving in headfirst.
"I want you to put together a small team, our best men, to guard her. And I need to get my hands on that bastard. Now."
"What about the grenade shipment?" he asks, and I close my eyes. I'd almost forgotten.
"I'll handle it."
I look at my hand and notice a slight tremor. Between Roxanne's situation, the Council breathing down my neck, and all my responsibilities to the organization, I feel my fuse burning shorter and shorter. And nobody wants to see what happens when it runs out.
This part of the city smells of ash and wet earth.
It's my favorite place because, here, violence is encouraged.
It's a necessity for survival. When I first came here from Warsaw, with the help of a friend of my father's, I had nothing.
Just eighty dollars in my pocket and a burning desire to destroy the infection that had spread through the place I called home.
Sarin, my father's friend, was the one who supported me in the Council when I took power, but the final vote was written in blood.
Day and night, I did whatever the Council wanted. I stole, I cheated, I beat, I killed. All to prove I deserved this position, to show her that one day I would come for her and not even the walls she'd built around herself could stop me.
Because my mother has many qualities, but perhaps the most dangerous is the ease with which she coaxes secrets out of men between the sheets.
That's how she survived. By wielding secrets that would have destroyed men who were far too influential.
Back then, Sarin made me swear I would spare her, that I would leave her alone as long as she didn't come after me, but this suffocating rage demands to be released.
I let the last drag of smoke from my cigarette fill my lungs when a commotion erupts behind me.
When I turn, Filip, the guy handling the grenade shipment, is getting out of a clunky delivery van with two of his men. Filip is also Polish, one of the few of my countrymen in America involved in arms trafficking, which is why I chose to work with him.
I’ll never understand how anyone can drive these jalopies. Looking at my Ducati, I realize not everyone is born with a sense of aesthetics.
"Damien, I thought Roman would be here too," he says, and the way he relaxes at my friend's absence annoys me.
I know why they all fear Roman. He has the precise charisma of an important businessman you don't want to piss off.
Me? I look like the kind of guy who'd take you out for beers and show you a good time.
They just don't understand that this image is for her.
This relaxed, joking attitude that seems like I don't have a care in the world.
I let out a laugh and look at him.
"I'm in a hurry, Filip. Let's count those grenades so you can get back to eating your Golabki and I can get my beautiful bike out of this shithole."
He gestures toward the back of the van, and that's when I notice one of his men's fingers tapping nervously. The back door opens with an irritating squeal, and Filip pulls the first crate toward us.
We don't even get to twenty grenades before I hear a rustle behind me, and my mind goes perfectly still.
If there's one thing I can thank my mother for, it's that she taught me to listen, to always know what's moving in every direction. And that rustle is the spark that ignites the lava burning in my veins. My elbow smashes into Filip’s jaw, and he collapses backward, caught by surprise.
In the next second, I spin, whip out the blade I always keep tucked in the back of my jeans, and, without hesitation, plunge it straight into the soldier's carotid artery.
The whispers in my head tell me to keep him alive for some fun later, but I know it's a pointless risk. There will be time for games.
I feel a sharp sting on my left side, where a blade nearly found its way into my flesh. My spleen breathes a silent sigh of relief.
The man's eyes widen when he sees he only grazed me. A smile plays on my lips as I rip the blade from his hand and drive it into his stomach.
Not higher, not lower, right in the middle.
His mouth forms an "O," and I can already see the blood vessels popping in his eyes.
"Who sent you? And I suggest you talk fast if you don't want to see your guts spilled on the pavement."
Before he can answer, Filip, who was on the ground, scrambles to his feet and points a gun at me.
I haul our friend up as a human shield and look directly at the man who's been supplying us with weapons for over two years.
"WHO SENT YOU?"
To his left, I see a car approaching and know it's Vasili. He's probably going to strangle me for coming alone when he's always telling me to bring backup.
Filip's eyes dart to the SUV driven by my right-hand man, and as he swallows hard, I see the realization dawn on him: there's no way he's getting out of here alive.
My arm starts to ache from holding up his comrade's body, but I don't let a single tremor show. This is about image, and I know why they tried this now.
"Nie dziel skóry na nied?wiedziu," he spits, and my body tenses.
Raising the gun to his own temple, he pulls the trigger. I watch his body crumple to the ground.
The Polish proverb echoes in my head. It was my mother’s saying: Don't count your chickens before they're hatched. Always warning not to plan for victory until you were sure you'd won.
And if I needed any more proof that we were at war, this was it.
Vasili scrambles out of the car, his gaze fixed on the three bodies at my feet.
"Why didn't you call for backup, Damien?"
"My dear mother sent them."
He knows what that means. For years, I've had to lie in wait, to bide my time.
"It's time for a family reunion," I say, unable to stop the sinister smile spreading across my face.