Sofia
He's giving me space. I know because Sergei Sokolov doesn't do anything by accident. If he's gone from my bed before I wake up, it's because he decided to be. That's just who he is. Every move calculated.
We don't talk. Not really. We exist in the same space, and we understand each other in the way two people do when they've been circling each other for years without knowing it. But the things that matter, the real things, stay just below the surface where neither of us reaches for them.
It's driving me insane.
I need someone to talk to. Really talk to. I've been bottling all of this up since the night of the drive-by shooting. Since the night my best friend walked away from me and never came back. Since I walked into that warehouse and saw what my father built and had no one to tell.
I need Anton.
Nelson is waiting by the door when I come downstairs, like he always is.
“I’m going to visit Anton,” I tell him.
He doesn’t argue. He just nods and follows me to the SUV.
The drive to Anton’s apartment in Brighton Beach takes forty minutes. Nelson tries to make small talk twice. I shut it down both times. I’m not in the mood. He’s nice enough, but he’s Sergei’s guy.
I need my guy, which reminds me I need to hire security. But it’s not like I can call a security service. And I can’t trust anyone in my own bratva.
Anton’s building is a six-story walk-up that’s seen better days. The elevator is broken, so we take the stairs. Nelson stays two steps behind me the entire way.
When we reach Anton’s door on the fourth floor, I turn to Nelson.
“You stay out here,” I say.
“Sofia— “
“I’m not asking.” I soften my tone slightly. “Please. I need to talk to him alone. You can stand right here. Listen if you want. But you’re not coming in. I’m sure he’s heard about my marriage, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to like it.”
“Fine,” he says. “I’ll be right here.”
I knock on the door. It takes a minute, but I hear shuffling inside. The door opens to reveal Anton on crutches.
His eyes light up when he sees me.
“Sofia. Come in, come in.”
He steps aside, and I slip into his small apartment. It’s clean but sparse. A couch, a television, a small kitchen table with two chairs. Everything a man who lives alone needs and nothing more.
Normally, he would stay at the estate.
“You look good,” he says, closing the door behind me.
“Liar.” I turn to face him. “How are you feeling?”
“Better every day.” He gestures to the couch. “Sit. Please.”
I sink into the worn cushions. Anton lowers himself carefully into the chair across from me, favoring his injured side.
We stare at each other for a moment. I don’t know where to start.
“I’m sorry I didn’t come sooner,” I finally say. “Things have been complicated. “
“I know. I heard about the marriage.”
I nod. “I’m sure you understand.”
He studies my face. “Are you happy?”
The question catches me off guard. No one has asked me that. Not once.
“I’m alive,” I say. “That’s what matters.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I look down at my hands. At the platinum band on my finger that marks me as Sergei Sokolov’s wife.
“I don’t know how to be happy,” I admit. “I don’t even know what that would feel like.”
There’s sadness in his eyes.
“Your mother would hate seeing you like this,” he says softly.
The mention of my mother makes my throat tight.
“Apparently, my mother wanted me to stay alive. She asked him to keep me safe.”
He frowns. “How do you know this?”
“He told me. I believe him. He’s been watching me for years.”
“I know. I suspected it was Elena who put him on you.”
“You knew Sergei was watching me?”
He smirks. “I knew. And his other men. Always rotating. But I knew.”
“You never told me.”
He shrugs. “He never crossed a line.”
“Have you heard from Gregor?”
“Cyka!”
I smile. “I take it that means he did set me up to be killed.”
“He’s not a problem for you to worry about anymore.”
Dead.
That’s what he doesn’t say.
I should probably feel sad, but I don’t.
“What do I do, Anton? I can’t trust anyone. You are the only person I can trust. Please tell me you’re still with me.”
“Always.”
“I have no idea what I’m doing.” My voice breaks.
“You made the right move,” he says. “Marrying Sokolov.”
“Really?”
“Don’t ask me to be his friend, but I know he’ll keep you safe. This business with Yuri is not over. Your mother knew he was the right man for the job. He was on the outside and didn’t have to answer to your father.”
“How did my mother know Sergei?”
He waves off the question. Why does no one want to tell me what that relationship was?
“Tell me something about her.” The words come out desperate. “Something I don’t know. Please.”
He leans back in his chair, wincing slightly at the movement.
“She used to sneak down to the kitchen at night,” he says. “Around midnight. She’d make herself tea and sit at the table reading romance novels.”
I can picture it perfectly. My mother in her silk robe, lost in a book. She loved reading, but my father always said it was a waste of time. I think that’s why my reading nook was in my closet. She never said as much, but looking back, I understand so much more.
“She told me once that she needed those hours,” Anton continues. “That they were the only time she felt like herself instead of Mikhail Baranov’s wife.”
Tears prick my eyes. I blink them back.
“Did she know?” I ask. “About what my father really did?”
“Yes.” His answer is immediate. “She knew. But she loved you more than she hated what he was. She stayed for you.”
The tears come now. I can’t stop them.
“I miss her,” I whisper. “I miss her so much. I need my mother. I need someone in my corner.”
And then it hits me. She is here for me. Even dying, even at the very end with nothing left, my mother found a way to keep me safe. She found him. She made him promise. My mother's last thought was me.
I don't know if that makes the grief better or worse. Maybe both.
Anton gets up, moving slowly, and sits beside me on the couch. He puts his arm around my shoulders and pulls me against his side like he did when I was young and had nightmares.
“I know, malyshka,” he murmurs. “I know.”
I let myself cry. Not the controlled tears I shed in Sergei’s arms or the angry tears when I’m alone. These are the sobs of a girl who lost her mother too young and never got to grieve properly.
Anton doesn’t try to stop me. He just holds me and lets me fall apart.
When the tears finally slow, I pull back and wipe my face with my hands.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
“Don’t apologize for grief.” He reaches over to the end table and hands me a tissue. “Your mother wouldn’t want you to carry this alone.”
I take a shaky breath. “Should I walk away?” I ask. “Let Yuri have it all. What am I fighting for, anyway? I’m married to a very wealthy man. I have my own money.”
“I won’t tell you to stay, but I won’t be the one to convince you to walk away.”
“Not helpful.”
“The bratva is yours,” he says. “If you don’t want it, walk away. But I know you. You don’t know how to quit. And honestly, that weasel does not deserve the chance to sit at the head of the table.”
“He wants me dead, Anton. Dead.”
“Yes, I know." He gestures at the cast on his leg. “And I want him dead. I will not work for him.”
“How many will support my claim?”
Another shrug. “Fewer than I would like.”
Not exactly encouraging.
“But you have Sokolov. You’ll rebuild with people loyal to you.”
“I don’t know how to do that.”
“I’ll be with you until the end. But you know it won’t be easy.”
“I wouldn’t know what to do with easy.”
“What are you doing about the warehouse?”
I frown. “What do you mean?”
“The fire. I heard one of our guys saw Sokolov’s men torching the place last night.”
My stomach drops. “What fire?”
Anton’s eyes narrow. “You don’t know.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” My mind is racing. “What warehouse? When?”
“Warehouse B. The one in Greenpoint. It burned down last night. Complete loss. The word is Sokolov’s crew was seen leaving right before it went up.”
I sit very still, processing this information. Sergei was out last night. He came to my bed smelling like soap, tense and needing me. He wouldn’t tell me where he’d been.
“Tell me what you know about that warehouse,” I say quietly.
Anton shifts uncomfortably. “Sofia— “
“Tell me.”
He won’t meet my eyes. “Medical supply distribution. That’s what your father told everyone.”
“But that’s not what it was.”
“No.”
“Tell me, Anton. Please. I need to know the truth.”
He sighs heavily. “Organ harvesting. Your father set it up about five years ago. Very few people knew the full scope of it. I didn’t know until about two years ago when I accidentally saw something I shouldn’t have.”
“You knew.”
“I suspected you’d figure it out eventually. You’re too smart not to.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because you weren’t ready to hear it. And because I was afraid of what you’d do with the information.” He finally looks at me. “Your father was still in power. If you confronted him—”
“He would have killed me,” I finish.
I feel nothing. I’ve already accepted I’m nothing but another person in my father’s world.
I’m not special.
“How many people?” I ask.
“I don’t know. Hundreds, probably.”
Hundreds of people. Harvested like crops.
“You could have told me.”
“And what would you have done?”
He’s right. I hate that he’s right.
I should be furious that Sergei acted without consulting me. He made decisions about my organization without my input.
I’m not furious.
I’m relieved.
I’m relieved he took that burden from me.
“He protected me,” I say quietly.
“What?”
“Sergei. He protected me from having to deal with it.”
“You care about him,” Anton says.
“I don’t know what I feel. He’s infuriating. Controlling. He makes decisions for me and doesn’t apologize for it.”
“But?”
“But he keeps me safe.”
“That’s what a good husband does.”
“I have to go,” I say abruptly.
He offers a small smile. “What can I do?”
“I need names. I need to know who’s backing me and who isn’t.”
“Give me a week.”
“Thank you, Anton.”
He struggles to get to his feet. “Be safe. Yuri wants you dead. Now that his business has been taken offline, he’s going to be even more volatile.”
“Yuri was running the organ ring?”
“I’ve heard he’s increased the business since his arrival. And now he’s going to be scrambling.”
“I understand. I’ll be careful.”
He gives me a hug.
I step out of the apartment. Nelson sees Anton and nods once in the universal male hello.
I can’t believe Anton knew all this time and never told me. They were all watching out for me. All this time I had no idea I had a whole team of guardian angels sent by my mother.