29. Via
VIA
The taste of chloroform is the first thing that registers, a greasy coating on the back of my tongue that makes my throat dry and raw.
I try to swallow, but my tongue feels like a dry block of wood, my teeth sticky and tasting of copper. The back of my skull is throbbing with a violent hammer that aligns perfectly with the heavy thud of my heart. I blink, but it doesn't do any good.
Everywhere is pitch black.
I try to lift my right arm to wipe the sweat from my eyes, but a clink echoes through the quiet space.
My wrist jerks back, a cold band of rusted iron biting deep into my skin.
I pull harder, my shoulder tensing as the rattling sound of heavy chains vibrates through the floorboards beneath me.
I’m sitting on cold, damp concrete that smells of rust, mold, and old fuel.
My left hand is free, but my right is handcuffed tightly to the vertical iron pipe of a rusted, freezing radiator.
The Esplanade. The boutique. The flash-bang.
The memories hit my brain in a sudden, dizzying rush that makes my stomach do a violent, nauseating flip.
A cold, paralyzing wave of terror washes over my chest, so thick I can barely draw a breath of the damp, musty air. My hand instinctively drops to my flat stomach, my fingers curling tightly over the smooth green silk of the dress I’d changed into at the boutique before the world blew up.
Please. Just be okay. Don't let me lose this baby. Not here. Not in this dark.
My fingers press into my flesh, searching for any sign of pain, any indication that the blast or the fall had ruined the tiny, fragile heartbeat growing inside my womb.
My body is sore, my ribs aching from where I hit the cash wrap, but there’s no sharp, tearing pain in my belly.
Just a dull, empty ache that matches the dread settling into my gut.
A quiet, trembling sob carries from the darkness to my left.
I freeze, my ears straining to track the sound through the quiet room. "Ekaterina?"
"Via?" Her voice is a tiny, broken thread that barely carries over the low, rhythmic rattle of the pipes. "Via, are you awake? I can't... I can't move my hands. It’s so dark."
"I’m here, Ekaterina." I reach out with my free left hand, my fingers sweeping across the cold concrete until they find the soft wool of her sleeve. I pull her closer, my arm wrapping around her shaking shoulders, pulling her head down onto my lap. She’s shivering, her teeth chattering so hard I can hear them click in the quiet. "Stay quiet. Don't move. I’ve got you."
"They... they put a bag over my head," she whispers, her chest heaving against my thigh. "They dragged us into a van. I heard them talking about Ilya. They said he was dead, Via. They said they burned the estate."
What?! No, no, no, no. That’s a lie.
It’s a lie.
"They're lying," I say, my voice flat, cold, and completely steady, though my heart is trying to kick its way out of my chest. He took a bullet graze and didn't even blink. He’s not dead. He can't be dead. "They're just trying to scare you. Don't listen to them."
A metallic screech echoes through the ceiling above us.
A sharp, thin line of yellow light cuts through the darkness at the far end of the room, growing wider and brighter as a heavy steel door is pushed open. Footsteps thud slowly down a flight of wooden stairs, uneven, dragging footsteps that carry a slow, rhythmic limp.
A single, bare lightbulb swings from the ceiling, turning on with a sharp click that makes my eyes burn and water.
I squint through the yellow light, my hand tightening on Ekaterina’s shoulder as the figure steps onto the concrete floor.
Mikhail is wearing his beige suit, but it’s no longer clean. The trousers are stained with dark grease, the lapels dusty and torn at the seam, but it’s his face that makes the breath completely stall in my throat.
The left side of his jaw is a horrific ruin of pink scar tissue, the flesh twisted and melted in a jagged line that runs from his bottom lip all the way down his neck, disappearing beneath his white collar.
It is the exact path of the bullet Ilya put through his face on the altar.
The scar has pulled the corner of his mouth upward, forcing him into a permanent, grotesque smirk that looks like a caricature of the man I used to think was safe.
He stands five feet away, a silver pocket knife resting loose in his palm, his blue eyes staring down at me with a raw, twisted satisfaction.
"I always loved the way you looked in green, Viallentinka," he says, his voice a low, gravelly rasp that carries none of the boring, soft-spoken warmth I remember from our dinners in my father’s garden.
I pull Ekaterina tighter against my side, my chin lifting as I meet his gaze, refusing to let him see the shaking in my legs. "You look terrible, Mikhail. Did you forget how to use a mirror, or did the surgeon just hate you as much as I do?"
He lets out a short, rough laugh, the sound dry and empty in the quiet basement.
He walks closer, his boots scraping against the concrete, and drops to his knees in front of me.
He reaches out, his cold, rough finger tracing the line of my jaw, his touch making a shiver of pure disgust run down my spine.
"Still so sharp," he murmurs, his finger sliding down to my neck, stopping right over the dark purple bruise Ilya left on my skin.
His eyes narrow, the scarred side of his face twitching violently as he stares at the mark.
"You’ve changed since the wedding, Via. You used to be so quiet.
So sweet. I was looking forward to breaking you.
I was going to do it slowly, in our house, after we got married.
But then your father let you get taken by the monster. "
"My father didn't do anything. You singlehandedly did everything." I say, my teeth grinding together. "And Ilya is ten times the man you’ll ever be, you half-melted coward."
Mikhail’s face turns into a terrifying mask of rage. He stands up slowly, his hand going into his pocket to pull out a black, encrypted phone. He taps the screen and holds it in front of my face. "You think your brute is going to save you? You think he is coming for his little prize?"
The screen displays a live security feed.
It is the Kovalevskii estate. The heavy iron gates are gone, reduced to twisted, blackened shards of metal.
The main house is a smoking, ruined furnace of fire and ash, the roof of the east wing completely collapsed, a massive column of black smoke rising into the pale blue sky.
It looks like a war zone, a pile of pulverized concrete and burning wood that has been entirely erased from the map.
My chest contracts, the room suddenly spinning as the cold reality of the image hits my brain.
No. No, no, no.
"Thermite," Mikhail says, his voice dripping with a sick, proud satisfaction as he slides the phone back into his pocket.
"Twelve tons of it, right through his front gate while his captains were sitting in the war room.
I planned to kill them all, Via. I wanted to burn his entire empire to ash while you were locked in your bedroom.
But you just had to escape, didn't you? You just had to run to the mall and survive. "
He bends down, his blue eyes inches from mine, his breath smelling of stale tobacco and mint.
"You're a bad wife, Viallentinka," he whispers, the permanent smirk on his face widening.
"You let yourself be kidnapped. You let my family's business be destroyed, and then...
you started sleeping with my murderer. I was going to save you.
I had my teams waiting at the museum. I wanted to drag you out of his cage until I saw you at that ball.
You were looking at him like he was your entire world.
You were disgustingly in love with the brute who put a bullet in my face. "
"I was never in love with you, Mikhail," I say, my voice a cold, sharp blade that cuts through his words. "You were just the terrible option my father chose to keep the peace. You were boring. You were predictable. And you were too weak to even survive a single wedding."
Mikhail snaps.
He lunges forward, his hand grabbing the collar of my green silk dress. He pulls the silver pocket knife from his pocket, the blade clicking open with a sharp, metallic sound that makes Ekaterina shriek in terror.
"Via! No!" Ekaterina tries to pull him away, her small hands clawing at his beige sleeve, but he pushes her back, her body hitting the concrete wall with a dull thud.
He presses the cold steel of the blade directly against the soft skin of my collarbone, the tip biting just deep enough to draw a single, tiny drop of blood.
The coldness of the metal triggers the panic, my mind instantly throwing me back to the altar. The smell of incense. The sound of the gunfire. The white lace of my dress turning red. The world starts to spin, my breath coming in short, panting hitches as the darkness tries to drag me under.
Don't break. Not now. Protect the baby.
"You're shaking," Mikhail whispers, his eyes tracking the rapid flutter of my pulse under his blade. "Are you finally starting to understand what happens to bad wives?"
He slides the knife down, the sharp edge slowly slicing through the green silk of my dress, the fabric parting with a soft, tearing sound to reveal the pale skin of my chest. The cold metal drags across my breast, tracing the line of my ribs, his eyes dark with a sick, twisted pleasure as he watches me shiver.
"You couldn't even kill him, Mikhail," I say, my voice steadying, my sass turning into a razor-sharp weapon as I force myself to meet his eyes. "You brought a twelve-ton truck, you blew up his gates, and you still didn't get his head. He’s out there. He’s crawling out of that rubble, and he’s going to peel your skin off inch by inch when he finds you. "
He pulls the knife back, his face turning a dark, splotchy red. "He’s dead, Via! He’s buried under ten tons of concrete!"
"Get over yourself. You think you can kill him?
" I mock, a dry, bloody laugh escaping my split lip as I spit a mouthful of copper-tasting saliva onto his beige shoe.
"You're a failure, Mikhail. A half-melted, pathetic failure who has to kidnap women because no one would ever look at your face without vomiting. "
Mikhail’s arm swings out in a blur of movement.
The backhand catches me dead center across the jaw, the force of the blow snapping my head back against the rusted iron of the radiator. A sharp, explosive pain whites out my vision, my teeth cracking together as my bottom lip splits, a hot, thick rush of blood instantly filling my mouth.
"Via!" Ekaterina screams, her hands clutching her head as she weeps in the corner.
Mikhail doesn't stop. He grabs my hair, pulling my head back until my neck is arched, and drives his fist into my ribs.
The breath leaves my lungs in a violent, agonizing gasp, my body curling forward as I try to protect my stomach.
I hold my left hand over my belly, my fingers digging into my skin as I try to absorb the blows, keeping him away from my lower abdomen.
He hits me again, his boot catching my hip, the physical pain a dull, heavy roar that vibrates through my bones.
He stands over me, his chest heaving, his beige suit splattered with the fresh blood dripping from my lip. He looks down at me like I’m an insect he’s trying to crush into the concrete.
"You're going to beg before I’m finished with you," he pants, his hand reaching down to grab Ekaterina’s shoulder. "Maybe I’ll start with the little sister. Let’s see how much sunshine you have left when she’s bleeding on the floor."
Ekaterina shrieks, trying to crawl deeper into the corner, her face pale with a raw, wild terror.
"Don't touch her!" My voice is a raw, jagged shriek that tears through my throat. I lunge forward, the chain on my right wrist snapping taut against the radiator pipe with a loud, metallic clang. I grab the silver pocket knife he’d dropped on the floor, my fingers locking around the hilt, and swing it at his leg.
The blade catches the fabric of his trousers, slicing a clean line through the beige wool and cutting into his thigh.
Mikhail lets out a sharp yell of pain, stepping back as a thin line of red blooms on his leg. He looks at the cut, then back up at me, his eyes wild with a primitive, murderous fury.
"You bitch," he growls.
He steps away from Ekaterina, his boots thudding as he walks back to me. He kicks the knife out of my hand, the metal clattering across the concrete, and grabs my throat with both hands, pinning my head back against the radiator.
He squeezes.
My air is cut off instantly, my lungs burning as I try to draw a single, ragged gasp.
The room begins to dim, the yellow light of the bulb turning into a spinning white fog, but I don't stop looking at him.
I glare into his blue eyes, my teeth bloody, my fingers clawing at his wrists with everything I have left.
I kept him away from her. The thought is the only thing keeping the panic from taking over. I kept Ekaterina safe. Ilya... please. Please be alive.
He releases my neck suddenly, letting me fall limp against the concrete, my chest heaving as I choke, a thick, ragged gasp of air finally rushing into my lungs.
He looks down at me, his face twisted in disgust, and turns toward the stairs. "Lock them in. No food. No water. We’re moving them to the docks tomorrow."
The steel door at the top of the stairs slams shut, the heavy deadbolt engaging with a loud, final click that plunges the basement back into the suffocating darkness.
The single lightbulb turns off, leaving us in the quiet, damp cold.
I lie there on the concrete, my body shaking with a violent, uncontrollable tremor.
My jaw is throbbing, my lip split and leaking blood, my ribs aching with every shallow breath I take.
I slowly roll onto my side, my left hand instantly dropping to my flat stomach, my fingers curling over the silk of my dress.
Please be okay, I pray into the dark, the tears finally spilling over my eyelashes and running down my cheeks, mixing with the blood on my chin. Please, baby, just hold on. Your father is coming. He has to be coming.
Ekaterina crawls closer to me, her small, shaking arms wrapping around my waist, her face burying into my back as she sobs silently. I hold her hand, my fingers locking with hers, our grip the only thing keeping us anchored in the dark.
I close my eyes, the image of the burning Kovalevskii estate flashing behind my eyelids.
Ilya...