THIRTY-SEVEN
Nastasya
“ A re you listening to me?” Lana snaps her fingers before my face, slipping to the edge of her seat. “What the hell did that woman do to you this morning?”
I stare at the wall past her shoulder and utter, “Nothing.”
Nothing other than shine a light on the twisted and ruthless world I’ve deluded myself into thinking I can escape these past years.
I can’t escape who I am any more than I can deny the shape of my body or the hint of the motherland on my tongue. I can’t escape my fate any more than my mother could. Fuck. I’m a goddamn Bratva princess. One who vehemently denied that the life defined my future until now.
It would always catch up to me—it was only a question of when.
“As I was saying,” Lana pointedly states, “the caterers have agreed on the date. They’ve given us a few options, but at the rate you’re paying them, they can cook whatever the fuck you want.” She huffs a dainty laugh before her brow dives into a frown. “Who is paying for this?”
I turn my head and stare at her.
“This is where you answer me,” she teases.
“I actually don’t know.” I assume that Papa would foot the bill for most of it, but then Benito’s family has very much been in charge up to this point. “Shit.” I widen my eyes at the realization. “We’re too poor to pay for all this. It must be them.”
“See.” She leans back in her seat, arms folded high on her chest. “Still controlling everything we do.”
She sounds as jaded as her father. Distrusting and angry toward the family who supposedly oppressed ours, relegating us to nothing better than dirty foremen. Only, I don’t think it’s the De Santis who are wholly to blame for our gradual decline into ruin.
The paranoid control freak at the head of our table is a large part of why our name languishes.
We’re a joke to our own kind; Lana’s father hasn’t visited his late sister’s family in over six years. We don’t matter to them anymore. Why should we matter to our adversaries?
“What were the food options again?” I slip off the sofa and kneel beside the low table, forcing myself to focus on the regimented typeset on the crisp white pages.
“I still can’t believe Uncle Arseni would do this to the family name,” Lana muses, ignoring my feeble attempts to move on. “He may as well sign everything over to them as a fucking dowry. They’ll take it all anyway.”
“They’re not interested in what we have.”
“How do you know?” she presses.
“Because we have nothing!” I sigh at my outburst and lean back on the heels of my hands. “I’m sorry. It’s just… I’ve got a lot on my mind. I must be a little overwhelmed.”
She draws a deep breath, her cropped T-shirt tugging at her manufactured boobs. “Apology accepted.”
“But?” I call the bitch out on her snappy tone.
“But.” Lana straightens, fussing with her hair. “When the hell are they going to let you know the details of this magical fucking union?”
“They did. Our kids forfeit the right to the De Santis dynasty, and Benito has no say in how Papa’s business is run.”
“Then, who does?”
For fuck’s sake. “You know, I’ve done a pretty damn good job of ignoring all the ways my father wants to insult me until you showed up.”
“It’s a legitimate question, Stas. You’re an only child. He has no son to carry on after he’s gone.”
I shove the pointless menus away from me and then rise to my feet. “Maybe your brothers get it.” I shrug. “I don’t know. He doesn’t tell me shit, and I can’t see that changing any time soon.”
“You have a right to know,” she offers softly.
“Damn straight, I do.” I pace to the bay window and stare at the sunset hues that wash over the glistening garden, dewy from the earlier rain. “But what can I do about it? There’s this part of me that fucking knows I’d be good for this family. The things I’ve learned running my own business would aid me with this. But he shuts me out because I wasn’t born with a dick between my legs.” I turn to face her and jolt at the compassion written across her face. “Every time I thought I did something smart, he’s reminded me how naive and stupid I am.”
“Are you though?” She hitches an eyebrow.
“What do you mean?”
“Come on, Stas.” She tilts her head, eyes closing briefly. “You’re smarter than this. What do men do to women they fear?”
“Oppress them.”
“Exactly. Make them believe they’re helpless. Weak. Your father has bullied you your entire life—you know it, I know it. Fucking everyone knows it.”
“He’s tough with me because he wants me to be strong. A pride to the family.”
“Bullshit. He wants you to doubt the strength you already have.”
We freeze momentarily, in a strange state of suspension, while her words sink deep. “Why would he let me start my event company then if that’s the case?” My words are hushed. Humbled.
“A diversion?” She shrugs. “Maybe he thought if you were busy elsewhere, you wouldn’t look too closely at what happens beneath your nose.” She sighs, twisting in the seat to face me better. “You’re not stupid, Nastasya. You want to know something?”
“I get the feeling you’re about to tell me anyway.”
“I envied you when we were kids. You never had to try. You just showed up to events or walked into a room, and people turned their heads. You naturally command attention. Do you know how frustrating that is for someone like me?”
“What do you mean like you?” My brow pinches.
“Somebody who has to fucking surgically alter her body to be enough. To get noticed,” she laments, waving her hands at the pieces of her she’s modified over the years. “I walk into a room, and the music still plays. You walk into a room and the fucking beat drops. I hated you for that for so long.”
“Is that why you took him?” I swallow. “Why you fucked Benito?”
“Partially, sure.” She runs her palms down her loose-fit pants. “But it’s about more than you and me. If I, your meaningless cousin, was that worked up over your natural charisma, then imagine what it did to your father, the pakhan , to have his daughter steal the focus whenever she was around.”
“He’s not jealous of me,” I scoff. “He resents me for reminding him of what he lost: Mama.”
“He resents you for having the same fucking magnetism that got her killed.”
My lungs seize; her statement means so much more after my discussion with Brigida. “What do you know of how she died?”
Lana stiffens at my tone. “Not a lot. Things I heard my father say.”
“Such as?” I step closer.
She leans back in her seat to force distance between us. “He thinks it was jealousy that had her targeted. Somebody resented her and wanted her out of the way.”
“Why would he think that?” I retreat, finding a place on the seat facing her.
“He never elaborated.” Her gaze finds mine. “Look, Stas. It was a long time ago when I heard him say this. I was a bratty teenager, eavesdropping in places I shouldn’t have been.” She shrugs. “Maybe I got it wrong. Maybe I was confused about what happened to cause her death, but what I said about your magnetism, your charm holds true. You attract attention wherever you go, and it’s not always the good kind.”
“What do I do then?” I relax into the seat, throwing an arm casually over the rest. “I can’t stop being myself. I can’t help the way I look or how I move. Expecting me to act small so others feel better about themselves seems unfair. How is their jealousy, their yearning for things they don’t have, any responsibility of mine?”
“It’s not,” she says. “Which is why I don’t think you should dull your light. You should fucking magnify it, Stas. Blind everyone with your worth. Prove to that arrogant asshole father of yours that you have what it takes.” Her mouth softens into a smile. “Be an inspiration for the rest of your kind and take the throne anyway.”
“It’s not that easy.” I lift a hand to my mouth, gently rubbing the side of my finger back and forth along my lips. “Even if Papa named me his successor, we’d have the brotherhood back home to convince. Women don’t head the Bratva, Lana. I’m up against some real old-school patriarchal bullshit.” I toss my hand down and huff. “I don’t even know if I want the role.”
“Why not?” She chuckles. “Being a desperate housewife isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, babe. I’m bored. Undervalued.” She slumps, fidgeting with the edge of a nail. “Dismissed. I’d take your opportunities over mine, any day.”
“Look at the bullshit I’ve been through already,” I say. “Imagine how much worse it would be in my father’s position. Like I said.” I flick my fingertip back and forth over the end of the chair’s arm. “There’s never been a female pakhan . I may as well state my intention to breed unicorns for house pets, for how realistic the dream is.”
She snorts, composing herself in a flash when the double doors to the sitting room sweep open.
“Miss Nastasya.” Dmitry nods toward me and then Lana to acknowledge her presence. “I need you to come with me.”
I sit a little straighter. “Why?”
He moves his attention to my cousin. “Mimi will escort you home.” Lana frowns. “It’s important you go with her and listen to what she tells you to do.”
“Okay.” Lana drags out the second syllable, reaching to gather the bridal catalogs.
“There’s no time for that,” Dmitry scolds, jerking his head. “Go.”
I rise to my feet at the same time as my cousin, eyes as wide as hers.
“Call me,” she instructs before bolting to where Mimi waits in the foyer.
I shift my attention to the soldier before me. “What’s happening?”
His nostrils flare, and he gestures with another jerk of his head for me to follow. “Ignazio is here. He’s stalled at the gate, but it won’t be long before they’re forced to let him in.” He grumbles something incoherent before adding, “Or before he forces his own way in.”
Holy shit. “My father?”
“At the De Santis residence.”
I stash that question away for later and allow Dmitry to usher me into the library. “You remember safety protocol?”
“Of course.” I’d enact it as a child, thinking it was a great game to play. “I left my phone in the sitting room.” Damn it. How am I supposed to reach Benito?
“I called Aleksy,” Dmitry offers as though reading my mind. “They know.”
My heart accelerates as my father’s trusted spy paces around the room, pulling the blinds. I move to the center of the room—where I’m not visible from any vantage points—and wait.
It feels so wrong to wait around to die.
I can’t hear anything save for the pounding of my blood rushing past my ears. “Give me a gun.”
Wide eyes glance toward me before Dmitry faces the door and growls a low “No.”
“I can help.”
Dmitry opens his mouth to protest, yet neither of us hear a single word. A gunshot echoes through the foyer, followed by two more in quick succession from a different weapon.
Dmitry spins on his heel and rises in one fluid, graceful movement, shielding me from the doors that lead out to the front of the house. “Stay quiet.” He whispers the order, hand to his side, slowly unholstering his weapon.
A scuffle ensues in the foyer, the grunt of men preceding the heavy thud of what must be bodies against the wall.
“Hide yourself.” Dmitry points toward the bookcase. “As we practiced.”
I haven’t done this for years. Drills would be commonplace at the height of my father’s reign over his half of the city. But as his power waned, so did the threats. I back away from the sofa, facing Dmitry as he moves toward the door, and slide around the back of the furniture. He glances toward me, checking my position as he reaches for the handle. I lower myself to my knees, praying like fuck that after a decade, I still fit through the hidden panic door. They were never made large enough for adults; the smaller they are, the easier they’re hidden. The grown-ups are expected to stay and fight—these were only for the kids.
The thing is, I’m a goddamn adult now, so why won’t he let me fight?
Setting my hand against the spines of two thick hardbacks, I push toward the rear of the bookcase to trigger the pressure panel. The catch clicks, a gentle tick in an otherwise eerily quiet room. Sparing one last look toward the man who’s kept my family safe for as long as I can remember, I edge the small hatch open, the section of the case turning on its axis to reveal a slim corridor.
Darkness envelops me, a shiver of a memory from the night I lost Caroline chilling my bones as I twist and contort myself into the narrow space between the walls. My hand shakes, my fingers limp when I reach behind me for the metal ring on the rear of the panel and shut myself inside.
It’s darker than Hades and probably twice as dusty.
I stifle a cough.
My grip leaves the cool metal ring, arm falling to my stomach where I’m wedged awkwardly on my side. A resounding crash vibrates the floor beneath me. Dust-filled breath tight in my lungs, I still my chest and listen.
For anything.
Painfully quiet seconds pass before the vicious tones of Dmitry’s war cry seep through the plasterboard that divides us.
Gunshots, grunts, and war.
I roll to my hands and knees and close my eyes, operating on pure memory alone. I don’t know how far I can go or how far these spaces still run. All I know is that if I want to escape death a second time, I can’t leave it up to somebody else to save me.
In this story, the princess saves herself.