Chapter 13
Vivi
Around four in the morning, a slow, steady rain begins to fall upon the city. I see it in the distance, a sort of blurry cloud that catches the light emanating from the windows of the buildings. By the time it reaches the building I’m in, a low, rumbling thunder accompanies the raindrops. A flash of lightning strikes in the distance, and thunder answers it.
I watch the droplets of water slowly roll down the glass window panes, only paying attention to the lightning in my peripheral vision.
Nature’s cat-and-mouse game continues for an endless span of time. Lightning teases with its momentary appearance, disappearing the instant thunder deigns to answer. They never quite sync up.
So much like me and Ivan. Both of us are here…in this city…but we haven’t yet found each other. He’s thunder, chasing my lightning.
Doesn’t lightning get tired of dancing in the sky? I’m so fucking tired.
Stifling a sigh, I stand and move away from the wall of windows toward one of the stiff-looking leather chairs in front of the desk. Nikolai barricaded me in this office after our arrival earlier, one of the more private ones within a larger suite of offices on the fifteenth floor of a high-rise. It looks as though it may belong to a law firm, judging from the books on the low bookcase spanning one wall.
All I know for certain, though, is that this is not Romanov property. Nikolai had to pick the lock to get us inside. Why he chose this particular office over thousands of available others in the city is something I have yet to figure out. If I had to guess, I’d venture a Romanov property may be in this building somewhere. That’s why we were able to get through the night security checks.
If I had to make another guess, I’d say Nikolai is feeling a lot less confident about hiding in known safehouses after Damon Papparado shut him down. He’s spiraling, his every movement twitchy and agitated.
I draw in a deep breath in an effort to curb the anxiety threatening to send me into a curled-up ball on the floor. His nerves make me nervous.
He locked me in this private office so he could get a few hours of sleep in another part of the suite of rooms, but I don’t think he’s getting much rest. The front of the office I’m in is mostly glass, and every time I peek through the long, vertical blinds to look out at Nikolai, he’s sitting or lying in a different position.
It doesn’t appear that he’s able to relax enough to sleep. I laugh a little, careful to keep the sound beneath my breath.
Serves him right.
I thought of attempting to get some sleep myself, but I know it’s useless. My brain won’t shut off, won’t stop spinning in ceaseless circles. Did I make a mistake when I left with Nikolai? A huge, irreversible one?
I worry my lip between my teeth as I consider the question.
Angel made so many bad decisions over the years, decisions that got himself and so many others killed. I was raised to be a dutiful mafia wife, someone who supported her man as he made all of the decisions that affected them both—not someone who would have to make her own choices.
I’ve never put much effort into condemning my parents, but honestly…it was such a shortsighted way of raising a child.
A girl, at any rate. Angel hasn’t seemed to suffer the same agonies of independence that I have.
As I stare out at the spread of city beneath me, I’ve never felt less equipped to handle my own future.
The decision I just had to make could lead to people dying, even while I went with Nikolai to avoid exactly that. The awful truth of that is a hollow sensation in my gut, a kind of lonely sorrow. In the moment, it seemed like the right thing to do. Guns were being pointed, and bullets were about to start flying. There was no one to consult, no time to think. I just had to act.
Maybe I’ve been naive about what it means to hold any power in this world. Is it actually possible to make a decision that leads to an outcome where everyone is safe? It feels like someone will always be at risk.
Can I truly fault Angel for some of the decisions he has made?
Can I fault Ivan?
Our own safety—that of ourselves, personally, and the people we hold dear to us—comes first.
I turn back toward the inside window just as a flash of lightning brings a brief spark of light to the room, my gaze moving without real interest over my temporary prison. Whoever owns this office is a family man. Photos of smiling faces in mahogany frames march along the edge of the coordinating mahogany desk—vacation photos of sunny climes and more laughter line the wooden walls that divide the offices. A child’s hand formed the rustic pencil holder sitting on the desk. I can see the tiny fingerprints frozen forever in the hardened clay.
Famiglia. It’s all that matters, right?
I drift over to the internal window and pull one of the vertical slats back so I can peer out. The office is in the commanding position of the suite of rooms. Nikolai rolls over restlessly on the narrow couch in the lobby/reception area reserved for guests.
If I move a little to the right, I can see past him through the lobby area and the large plate glass window of the exterior door. The entrance of another office suite is situated just across the hallway.
Sighing, I glance around me. The photos on the desk catch my attention, creating a bitter lump at the back of my throat. My own father didn’t display such photos. Aside from the sentimental aspect that he never would have fallen in with, every sharp-cornered, glass-encased frame is a potential weapon to be used against its owner.
The lock turns in the door. My gaze flickers over to it as it begins to open, but I don’t move or speak as Nikolai enters the room and quietly closes the door behind him.
Outside the building, thunder rumbles.
Nikolai stares at me for a moment, growing visibly irritated when I keep my attention focused on my view from the window. Finally, he speaks. “We can’t sleep here.”
Now I look at him, my eyes narrowing. “You are mistaken. You can’t sleep here.”
I pull my gaze away from the office across the hallway and meet his eye just as lightning lights up half of his face. He was clearly not expecting a response, and my reply appears to have left him nonplussed.
I continue, my voice soft. “We could crawl into a sewer or check into the Ritz, but it would make no difference. You will never sleep as long as Ivan Romanov is after you.”
Nikolai laughs.
I’ve heard many different laughs in this world. There’s the light, careless laugh in response to a joke or something humorous. There is the laugh a person uses to play off an embarrassing or vulnerable moment. There’s the answering laugh, the one that takes the place of a verbal reply when a person doesn’t really know the answer.
There are sarcastic laughs. Intimidating laughs. Flirtatious laughs.
Nikolai’s laugh is one that I’ve never heard because I have never been in a position to hear it. It’s the manic laugh of a cornered man, of a creature who knows they are defeated, but they are going to sink their teeth into everything and everyone until they breathe their last breath.
They’ll drag everyone around to hell alongside them.
Nikolai’s face twists in an ugly sneer. “Do you really think you are the first bitch Ivan Romanov has dipped his wick in? You aren’t special. You are one of many. A temporary bit of pleasure before he throws you away. The only reason why Ivan is coming after us is because he is angry with me. He doesn’t give a fuck about you, you stupid cunt.”
It isn’t true. It can’t be true.
Memory of the softness in Ivan’s gaze as he looked at me and drowsily murmured ‘wife’ hits me. It seems a lifetime ago. We may not have the most romantic love story in the world, but Ivan feels something . I know he does. It’s the only reason I stay.
I was an obsession in the beginning. I know that. He fixated on me, had to have me. I was the end goal, some weird representation of everything he thought he had to have.
I think he’s slowly beginning to see me for who I actually am, slowly beginning to value my voice, who I am as an individual.
And yet…that isn’t love.
I know that.
I can tell myself over and over again when he touches me, when he makes my body sing, that this is love, that he does love me—but that doesn’t make it true.
The only people coming after me are my family, and I just walked away from them.
Nikolai laughs again, the cruelty of its caustic sound sending arrows deep into the flesh of my being. I dip my head and turn back toward the office across the hallway. The darkened reception area separates the private office from the main door of the suite, light from the hallway beyond casting a feeble glow over the shapes of furniture. I try to tune Nikolai out, to concentrate instead on the emblem of the other company’s door. It looks familiar, but I can’t quite place it.
Nikolai moves quickly. Too quickly.
In a matter of seconds, he has me pressed against the glass, crushing and rattling the blinds between my body and the window. His body presses against me, and I can feel him…every bit of him…his erection hardening and lengthening against the small of my back.
I want to vomit.
Choking back the bile, I shove against him, the movement futile. “What are you doing? Stop—”
“Remember that favor you owe me?” He grunts, pushing me back against the glass. It rattles beneath the impact.
The glass is cold against my face, and his touch burns. The blinds slice into my cheek as I jerk against him, his long fingers fumbling across my stomach and toward the band of my jeans. I can smell the tobacco from the cigarette he smoked earlier as his hot breath fans across my neck.
“No—nonono, get off—”
Panic spears through me, hot and sharp. Even though I had been nervous the first couple of times with Ivan, a primitive part of me wanted his possession…craved it. I wanted to be touched. I wanted him to touch me.
Everything about this feels like poison. It runs through my veins like wildfire, burning and searing and scarring me from the inside out.
This can’t be happening. This isn’t supposed to happen.
“Ivan—” I don’t realize his name has escaped me until Nikolai pushes my face roughly into the blinds.
“You’ll be calling my name in a minute.”
“Nikolai, please—stop—”
My pleas go unheeded. He tears at my shirt, giving up when he gets it over my shoulders, and moves on to the bra beneath. Pushing it up and over my breasts, he claws at them roughly with his one free hand, squeezing and pinching.
I howl in fury and fear, twisting away from his grip.
He laughs, smacking at my hands when they hit out at him ineffectually.
I fight, punching and kicking back against him, but he is stronger than I am. He jerks my arms above my head, pinning me to the window with one hand shackled around my wrists. His knee in the small of my back holds me prisoner, as his other hand rips at my clothing in a violent motion, forcing my jeans over my hips and to my ankles. He steps on them between my legs with his other foot, holding me securely in place, pinned like a butterfly to a specimen board.
His hand fumbles between our bodies, searching with greedy fingers for my entrance, and I can’t get my legs closed, can’t keep him from touching me with eager brutality. A whimper I barely recognize as my own escapes, and I redouble my efforts, shrieking and bucking when I feel him, bared now, position himself.
Swiftly, casually, he knocks my head into the glass. “Shut up, you stupid bitch.”
Blood smears the glass, a trickle carving a path into the tears on my cheeks. “He’ll kill you…” I murmur, my vision hazy. “He’ll slice you into pieces.”
He laughs. “He’ll have to catch me first.”
His penis probes against me, at that place only Ivan has ever visited, ever touched, and I close my eyes.
I’m not here. This isn’t me.
“What…?” Suddenly, he stops and pulls fractionally away from me— thank you, Blessed Virgin —his attention caught on something beyond the window. I struggle to focus, dimly catching movement in the hallway beyond the lobby door. There are shapes…two of them…I squint until I can make them out.
Ivan.
Angel.
Angel is alive. Elation soars through me. Both of them are here for me…they came!
Opening my mouth, I start to yell out to them, but Nikolai’s hand clasps over my mouth, and he presses me tighter against the glass so I can’t buck against it. The harder I struggle to get their attention, the more painfully Nikolai restrains me.
Don't go. Please don't go. See me…find me…save me—
In agony, I watch their forms vanish down the hallway. Bitter tears slowly trail down my face, and my breath hitches beneath Nikolai's hand. Both of them are so close, yet so far away.
Behind me, Nikolai releases me and jerks his pants into place. He watches tensely until we see them depart altogether, and I go limp against the window, closing my eyes. There’s no one now—nothing to stop this from happening.
Nikolai swears, moving away from me. “Fuck. Just…fuck!”
I look up to see smoke beginning to trail out of the office across the hallway. Simultaneously, an alarm sounds, and the sprinkler system engages, bathing us immediately in a drenching spray of freezing water.
I’ve never been so grateful for an alarm in my life.
“Goddamnit! Get dressed, you fucking slut. We need to go.”
He kicks his foot loose of my jeans, and I tug them up hastily, moments before he takes my upper arm in his punishing grip and drags me behind him out of the suite.
We flee, pressing ourselves against the wall beside the door and hiding in the dark as several uniformed security guards flood the hall to investigate the alarm. When they unlock and enter the office across the hall, we slip past them. Nikolai’s gun is the only incentive I need to remain mute. Avoiding the elevators, he pulls me into an echoing stairwell and down the stairs, a long, stumbling walk to the bottom floor.
I cry the span of the entire fifteen floors. When we reach the bottom and explode outside via a metal door onto the sidewalk, I look for Angel. I search for Ivan in the shadows as Nikolai tows me toward a side street where several cars are parked.
They are long gone.