Chapter 8 - Izabel
“Really?” I scoff, looking at him with an expression that says, clear as day, do you really think I’m that stupid?
His reaction is immediate and unmistakable as he squares his shoulders and stands taller, ready to defend himself against whatever accusations I’m throwing his way.
“What do you mean, really?” he snaps.
I shake my head, not impressed at all by his story.
“It’s so easy, isn’t it?” I laugh bitterly.
“What is!?” he blurts out, getting more agitated. The calm man I’ve been playing tricks on all week is nowhere to be seen.
“To make yourself look like the victim.”
I watch as his gray eyes turn stormier. Darker.
He clenches his jaw, and muscles ripple across his face.
“A victim? No. I never want to be viewed as a victim. And I’m not trying to present myself as anything in particular. I’m just telling you the truth of what happened,” he snaps.
“Truth is versatile, though, Anton. You’re twisting it to suit your narrative. Maybe even to make excuses for the things you’ve done,” I challenge him.
“Things I did because I had to do them,” he blurts out, his eyes clouding even more.
“Really? You had to kidnap my best friend? You had to do that? And you had to kidnap me!? I’m not even involved in this thing between you and Josiah.
You were just using me like a tool to get to him.
And then you forced me to marry you…” I shake my head, laughing bitterly.
“Don’t come looking for pity from me when you’ve literally taken my freedom from me,” I snap.
“Pity! No, not at all. I was possibly looking for understanding, or maybe a little human honesty. But apparently, you’re not capable of that!
” He’s angry. I’ve struck some kind of nerve, and I won’t lie; I rather like it.
“You keep making it sound like they are such good guys, Josiah, your brother…”
“I never said they were good. And you made it pretty damn clear last night that my brother was pretty much a monster, but I am making it clear that you are just as bad as they are, if not worse!”
He sneers, shaking his head and narrowing those piercing eyes as he glares at me. “Well, little pixie, I never once said I was a good guy,” he mutters dangerously.
“Oh, you didn’t need to tell me what kind of guy you are. I can work that out for myself, thank you very much.”
“You are so—”
His words cut off mid-sentence.
“I’m so what? Go on! Say it! Don’t hold back now, Anton!”
“Be quiet!” he snaps, grabbing my arm, his eyes darting around the room searching for something I can’t see.
“Don’t tell me to be—”
“I said quiet!” he snarls in a dark whisper.
The intensity of his tone sets my heart racing as he pulls me right up against his body.
Without a word, he drags me, moving quickly through the gallery until we are in a quiet alcove set apart from the rest of the main rooms. It’s clear that something is wrong.
“What is it?” I whisper as I try to hide the edge of fear in my voice.
“We’re being watched,” he replies, words hushed.
My heart leaps. Watched by whom? My brother? Josiah? Their security teams? Has someone come to find me and take me home?
I try to move away from Anton to peek around the corner of the alcove so I can take a look around, and he spins me quickly and pushes my back up against the wall, pinning me there.
“Did you not just hear what I said?” he hisses.
“You have the survival instincts of a blind rabbit! Are you trying to get yourself killed?”
“Maybe I’m trying to get myself rescued!” I snap, talking louder now.
He hurriedly claps his hand over my mouth. “Not everyone who would be watching us is here to rescue you, Izabel. You’re smarter than that,” he whispers right against my ear.
Okay, fine, fair enough. But right now, I’m willing to go against the odds and take a chance.
Anton pulls me from the alcove, deciding the coast is clear enough for us to attempt an escape from the gallery. His hand is gripped tightly around my wrist, and whether I like it or not, he is dragging me along with him.
“Fuck,” he snarls, backing up and quickly changing direction. “They’re everywhere,” he says.
“Let me go, I can’t run with you making me trip up like this,” I complain, crashing into him when he comes to a sudden stop and pushes us both against another wall.
“No. Keep up,” he demands.
“I’m trying, but you’re going to make me fall flat on my face!”
“Fine!” he snarls, pushing me forward. “Run, I’m right behind you, and I have my eyes on you!”
Relieved, I bolt forward, darting through the open space until I reach the next doorway. I’m breathing heavily. My lungs are burning from the chase. Or the escape. It’s all pure adrenaline right now.
He pushes me again. “Move, quickly, before they come this way,” he says, encouraging me.
“There!” He points to an exit.
Out in the open I have more chance of getting away from him. It’s so cramped in these rooms. I run harder, moving faster until I burst through the doors.
And soon as I’m in the dank, smelly alleyway behind the gallery, I make my move, running as fast as my legs can possibly carry me.
I skid on the wet ground, grabbing at the corner edge as I turn down a second alley.
I hear Anton shouting behind me, screaming my name in rage.
But there is no time to even glance back over my shoulder.
He sounds far enough away that I have a decent chance to reach my brother’s men. Or Josiah's. Either way.
Skidding around another corner, I slip and fall hard on my knees.
Pain shoots through both legs, so intense that I scream and buckle forward trying to catch my breath.
When I open my eyes, I realize I’m staring at a man’s black leather combat boots. My heart leaps with excitement as I look up.
“Are you—”
“Hello, little Radev bitch. You must be the new wife,” the masked man snarls. Instantly I recognize my mistake, and instantly I know Anton was right. This man is not with my brother or Josiah. He’s someone else entirely. “I’m going to have some fun with you!”
“Izabel!” I hear Anton shouting my name as the man reaches for me, wrapping his long fingers around my throat and lifting me to my feet. His squeezes so tightly that my head begins to spin, and the world around me starts going black at the edges.
“You’re coming with me,” he snaps, and my mind tries to stop the blurry images from stealing me away as I try and try again to take a breath.
He’s turning with me dangling in his grip, half awake, half suffocated, and unconscious.
“Izabel!” My name again, from Anton’s lips, this time much closer.
Right behind us. The man doesn’t move fast enough as he drops me.
I fall to the ground again. My legs buckle beneath me, and I’m gasping for air.
Above me, two men fight. Grunting, snarling, the wind knocked from someone.
The snap of something. The glimmer of a blade.
I’m fighting for consciousness, and slowly it is coming back to me.
“Fuck!” Anton snarls.
I wince as the knife slips into his abdomen right above his hip.
Two gunshots.
The massive man in the black mask falls forward as Anton staggers backward.
I watch him, and he watches the man land face-first on the iced cobblestones.
“Get up!” he says to me, holding out his hand. It’s covered in blood. His blood, which is gushing from the wound on his hip.
“You’re—”
“Get up, more are coming, we need to get out of here!”
Anton staggers forward, and I manage to slip my arm around his waist. I’m barely tall enough for him to rest against, but I do what I can.
We move slower than I imagine he wants to as we make our way around the back of the building, up the side, and finally reach his car.
Thank goodness no one else finds us along the route, but we do hear men shouting when they find their dead colleague in the alleyway.
“You drive,” he huffs, in pain as he practically falls into the passenger seat. “They laced the knife with something. I think they poisoned me,” he groans.
My heart is spinning inside me. “I need to get you to a hospital!” I blurt out.
“No hospital. Take me home. Please tell me you know how to drive stick,” he gasps through rasped and jagged breaths.
“Of course, I know how to drive stick. Did they stab you in the brain or the abdomen,” I snap at him. My adrenaline is so high I don’t know if I’m angry or scared.
“Ha,” is all he can respond as he drifts in and out of consciousness.
“If you die from whatever was on that blade, you can’t blame it on me!” I huff angrily. But he doesn’t respond. He’s barely aware of anything going on around him.
The car revs to life, and I take off at full speed, darting between other cars and earning myself a lot of angry shouts and honked horns of protest.
I could drive away right now. I could drive somewhere and get someone to call my brother. I could escape right this second.
But even as I think it, I know I won’t leave him to die. It’s not in me. It’s not who I am.
“Navigation. Home,” I say loudly to the car's internal system, hoping that it isn’t only programmed to his voice and will also respond to mine.
A map jumps onto the screen. I’m already driving way too fast in random directions, trying to make sure I leave the gallery and whoever that was far, far behind us.
But I don’t know Detroit. Not in the least. So, I’m very, very lost.
A red line plots my course over the street view on the dashboard. Thank goodness.
“Eighteen minutes. We’ll be home in eighteen minutes.”
Glancing at him, I see his face is coated in perspiration. He looks pale, and his breathing is strained.
Dammit, Anton. Why can’t I take you to a hospital?
But I already know the answer. Hospitals ask questions, questions we don’t need or want to answer.
And it’s easy for people to get to us at a hospital. They generally have very shit security. Considering they are there to help people, not protect people.
I get us home in thirteen minutes.
I’m sure he’s got a few speeding fines to deal with, but that really isn’t my concern right now.
“Help!” I call to the security guards as I bring the car to a stop. “He’s been stabbed; I need to get him inside.”
Three men immediately come running to the car and pull the passenger door open. Anton topples out, muttering incoherent nonsense.
“Where do you want him?” one of the men asks. The confusion on his face is no surprise. They were told not to let me escape, now they are taking orders from me. Don’t worry, I’m confusing myself by still being here.
“Upstairs in his room,” I demand.
It takes all three of them to carry him because his body is so limp and awkward to lift. While they are getting him up there, I search the bathroom for a first aid kit. I need to stop the bleeding.
One of the guards sticks his head into the bathroom. “Here,” he says, holding up a massive red canvas bag. I breathe a sigh of relief and rush to take it from him.
“Do you know first aid?” he asks.
“A little, but he said something about the knife being laced with something. Poison maybe?” I tell him.
The man nods. “It’s a dirty trick, but not uncommon. Come on. I’ll help.”
“What is it?” I ask, following him to the bed to lean over Anton.
The guard lifts him while I pull his jacket off, then his shirt. I toss them aside.
The man drops him back onto the bed. “Let’s stop the bleeding. The wound doesn’t look bad if we can stop the blood loss. He’s looking pale.”
“What is it?” I ask again. “The poison?”
“It’s more of a drug than a poison. They call it Devil’s Tongue. Because of it he’s going to be fighting demons in his dreams for the next eight or so hours and running a fever. And that wound is twice as likely to get infected, so we need to move fast.”
I nod, silencing myself and waiting for instructions. I might not like Anton very much, but it sounds like he’s about to go through hell, and I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. Not even the man who kidnapped me.
“Pour this over the wound.”
I do as I’m told and the entire area starts to fizz. It makes me yelp in surprise. Anton murmurs. He sounds delirious, and his head is shaking and jittering, but his eyes stay closed.
“Is it supposed to do that? Fizz like that?” I gasp.
“Yes. Take this. You need to push it into the wound to stop the bleeding and disinfect inside.” He hands me a wad of gauze that has been soaked in something.
I gag a little but fight my disgust as I start pushing the gauze into the open hole above his hip.
Anton, suddenly fully awake, tries to grab my hand and screams in pain, but the guard grabs his wrists and pins him down.
His eyes roll, and he loses consciousness again. I let out a sigh of relief. My heart almost leaped out of my throat.
The guard talks me through everything, and after fifteen minutes, Anton is bandaged and no longer bleeding.
We both step back. I take a deep breath and wipe my forehead with the back of my arm. “Is he going to be okay?” I ask.
“We have to wait and see now. I’ll get the team in to lift him so we can change the sheets and clean him up. You should take a shower. You’re covered in blood,” he speaks matter-of-factly.
I look down at myself and, for the first time, notice the dark red, sticky stains all over my clothes.
“Don’t leave him alone. I’ll be quick, um…what’s your name?” I ask.
“Yaroslav,” the man says.
“Thank you, Yaroslav,” I smile tightly. He nods.
When I come back into the room a short while later, the bed has been completely remade. There is a pile of soiled blankets wrapped up in a mattress protector near the door.
I stare at it, in shock about everything that just happened and how fast it did. A man comes in. Not Yaroslav. “Sorry to intrude. I just came to get the last of it,” he says, grabbing the bundle of blankets and quickly leaving the room.
I walk over to Anton’s bedside, and his face is coated with perspiration again.
Yaroslav speaks from the doorway, giving me a fright. “Do you want me to stay with him?”
“No, it’s okay. I’ll watch him,” I say without looking away from Anton. “Do I need to watch out for anything in particular?”
“Just…guide him through whatever darkness he’s in. We don’t know where his mind is lost right now.”
Biting my lip, I nod nervously. “Alright,” I mutter.
“I’m downstairs in the guard’s house if you need me.”
“Thank you, Yaroslav.”
“Thank you for bringing him home,” the man says sincerely, then leaves me alone with Anton.
You’re doing the right thing, Izabel. You can escape another time. But you would never have been able to face yourself in the mirror if you hadn’t helped him.
I hurry into the bathroom to get a washcloth and a bowl of cold water. Then I crawl onto the bed next to him and sit with my back against the headrest and his head on my lap as I gently wipe the sweat from his skin and touch cold water to his lips.
“It’ll be okay,” I whisper. “You’ll get through this. I’m right here with you, okay? Just listen to my voice.”