Chapter Twenty-Three
Dmitri
I spent the ride home trying to push the past few hours to the back of my mind. Sarah didn’t need to know that I had blood on my hands, literally and figuratively.
Walking from my car I felt the buzz of restless energy. The kind where I wanted to crack something, twist something, make the world give up answers. The kind of energy that came from hours spent in a room where a man begged and lied and begged again, where the air tasted of fear.
But my door opened with a quiet click, the security system disarmed on the first try, and I stepped inside like a civilized man.
The house should have met me the way it always did. It should have been empty, echoing, the only sound the soft hum of the A/C and the distant city outside my windows.
Instead I smelled garlic.
Not faintly, either. Mixed with onions and something rich simmering in a pot. For half a second, I simply stood there with my hand on the door, blinking like I’d walked into someone else’s home.
A laugh floated down the hall. Small and bright. A child’s laugh.
My body tightened before my mind caught up. Instinct didn’t care that Alexis was safe here. Instinct remembered the panic on Sarah’s face at the safe house. Instinct remembered the man on my table, crying that it wasn’t his idea, that he’d been paid, that he’d been told the child was an easy grab.
It took effort to breathe normally. To move without making sound.
I followed the smell.
The kitchen lights were on, softer than the overhead glare I usually used. Someone had turned on the small lamps that made the room feel lived in. That was the only word for it.
Sarah stood at the stove, her hair tied back, her sleeves rolled to her elbows. She held a wooden spoon and was stirring with the steady rhythm of someone who cooked when she was stressed.
Alexis sat at the island on a tall stool, swinging her legs. She had a coloring book spread in front of her and was distractedly munching on a carrot. Marshmallow wound her way around my legs almost tripping me up.
Sarah glanced over her shoulder and saw me.
The spoon paused mid-stir.
Relief crossed her face first—so quick it almost didn’t register. “You’re home,” she said softly, like she wasn’t sure it was a good idea to say it at all.
Alexis twisted on the stool to look at me. Her eyes widened. “Hi!”
My throat tightened again. “Hello, zayka.”
Home.
My house felt like a home.
I set my keys on the counter without making a sound. “Did Ronnie not leave something in the refrigerator?”
“I just wanted…” Sarah started and then stopped as if she was gathering her thoughts. “After everything that happened today, I wanted to cook. Alexis needed something normal.”
Normal. In my home. In my life.
Alexis held up her coloring book proudly. “Look! I made a picture!”
It was a large fluffy creature and beside it a figure in black.
I leaned in, studying it like it was important. “Very fierce dog.”
She giggled. “It’s Marshmallow and you.”
Sarah’s mouth twitched as she turned back to the stove like she was trying not to laugh. “Dinner will be ready in ten minutes. If you want some.”
I should have said no. I should have told her I had business to deal with. Somehow it seemed wrong to contaminate this simple, happy scene with my darkness. Instead, my stomach, hollow from stress and violence, betrayed me. “Thank you. Let me go shower and I’ll be down.”
After washing off the memories of the afternoon I changed and headed back to my kitchen. Rather than eat in the dining room, Sarah had set our places on the island. She plated food with quiet efficiency, slid a portion onto a smaller plate for Alexis, and set it in front of her.
Alexis took one bite and declared, “Yum,” like she was an expert.
I sat at the other end of the island. Sarah served me last, putting the plate down carefully, not meeting my eyes. After our moment in the back room at Alina’s earlier on, things were charged between us. I think Sarah felt it too, because when our hands brushed briefly, she almost jumped.
I let out a chuckle.
She gave me a heated look.
The food was simple. Noodles, a rich tomato sauce, and a sprinkle of cheese. It shouldn’t have been remarkable. It shouldn’t have mattered.
It did.
It warmed my chest in a way alcohol never managed.
For a few minutes, the only sounds were forks against plates and Alexis’s happy chatter about everything and nothing.
Despite almost being grabbed at the gym, she was remarkably resilient.
In fact she reminded me a little of myself at that age.
Once more I was struck at how homey it all felt.
Like these two were meant to be in my house and my life.
Finally Alexis yawned so widely her whole face scrunched. Sarah’s attention snapped to her instantly.
“Okay,” Sarah said, gentle but firm. “Bedtime.”
“No,” Alexis protested, but it was weak. The kind of protest children offered when they knew they were beaten.
Sarah cleaned her hands and lifted Alexis down, brushing hair off her forehead. “Come on. We’ll pick out a story.”
“Goodnight, Mitri” she said breezily.
“Goodnight, zayka.”
Sarah’s eyes flicked up. There was a warmth there that touched something deep in my soul.
I listened to their footsteps fade down the hall. Listened to the low murmur of Sarah’s voice upstairs, the soft rise and fall of a story. Listened to silence settle back into the house.
When Sarah returned, she moved slower. Like someone who’d been running all day and had finally stopped, only to feel the aches.
She walked into the kitchen, saw me still sitting there, and paused.
“You didn’t go to your office this afternoon after you left the restaurant,” she said. It was a statement, not a question.
“I was… busy,” I replied.
Her gaze narrowed, and she didn’t ask what I’d been busy doing.
She didn’t want the answer. Maybe she already guessed.
I had to talk to her. I needed to know what she planned on saying tomorrow on the stand.
This domesticity, the sweet moments between mother and daughter…
If she lied, as the Italians wanted her to, it could jeopardize everything for her.
I wasn’t afraid of jail, for a man like me it was an occupational hazard—though one I had thus far managed to avoid—but for Sarah to perjure herself, I couldn’t allow it.
I gestured to the stool across from me. “Sit.”
She hesitated. Then she sat, folding her hands in her lap like she was bracing for impact.
We stared at each other for a moment. I wanted to take her into my arms. Feel her soft lips, caress those curves, and bury myself between her welcoming thighs.
But now was not the time.
I rubbed my hand over my jaw. I could still feel the day under my skin. The weight of it. The way the man’s voice had cracked when he insisted he didn’t know the Don’s full plan, only that he was to scare Sarah into doing what he wanted.
The idea of Sarah on a witness stand, being forced to lie, made something in me go cold.
“Tomorrow,” I started. Sarah looked up, her eyes meeting mine. “What are you planning on saying?” I asked.
Sarah swallowed nervously. “I don’t know.”
“You do know,” I said quietly. “You’re just afraid to say it.”
Her eyes flashed. “Of course I’m afraid. I’m not like you, Dmitri. I can’t just—” She cut herself off, her breath shaking. “I can’t live like this.”
Neither could I, not today, not with exhaustion in my bones and a man’s cries for mercy still ringing in my ears. I leaned forward, resting my forearms on the counter. “Listen to me. I am not afraid of the consequences, but if you lie on the stand, you give them power.”
Sarah’s mouth twisted. “They already have power. They tried to take my child.”
“And they failed,” I said.
She stared at me, and I could see the unspoken words behind her eyes. Because of you. If Nikolay hadn’t been there, I dread to think what could have happened.
I softened my voice. “If you lie, you become theirs. Not just today. Forever. They will know you are willing to commit perjury. They will use it. Every time they need something, they will remind you of what you did. They will threaten you with it.”
Sarah’s fingers clenched in her lap. “And if I don’t lie, they’ll hurt Alexis.”
I held her gaze. “If you tell the truth, you do what is right for you and your daughter. And I will make sure they cannot touch you.”
She gave a short, humorless laugh. “You can’t promise that.”
I didn’t flinch. “I can.”
The confidence in my voice wasn’t arrogance. It was calculation. It was the truth. The Italians had crossed a line the moment they involved a child. There were rules even in war. And if they wanted to play without them, I would teach them what that cost.
Sarah shook her head, as if she couldn’t accept that kind of certainty.
“Even if you can protect us physically, what about… everything else? If I tell the truth and they come at me another way. If they…” she swallowed.
“If the court thinks I lied before or thinks I’m not credible… If I get in trouble—”
“Exactly,” I said. “If you lie, you risk jail. Not just risk—real jail. And if you go to jail, who takes care of Alexis? Where is her father?”
Her face went still.
That landed. That was the fear under all the other fears. The one that mattered.
Sarah’s voice was barely audible. “Her father is not in the picture.”
There was something in her words. Part of me wanted to press further, but it was clear that whatever happened between her and her daughter’s father was painful.
“My mother would care for her,” she said quietly.
“And if they hurt your mother?” I asked.
Sarah’s eyes filled with tears she refused to let fall. She blinked hard, jaw clenched.
“I can’t,” she whispered. “I can’t let that happen.”
“You need to do what is right,” I said as I reached out and grabbed her hand. The action came before I even realized what I was doing.
Sarah froze, looking at my hand on hers. Her eyes were soft, then the softness vanished, replaced by exhaustion.