9. The Spiral
The Spiral
Nathan
The ledger is a record of things that should not exist.
I've been staring at it for hours—the columns of names, the dates, the dollar amounts that represent lives bought and sold.
Ivan's handwriting is neat, precise, the kind of script that speaks of education and discipline.
He learned his craft in the old country, he told me once.
He learned it from men who learned it from men who had been doing this since before the word "trafficking" existed.
The ledger is proof. Of what we've built. Of what I've become.
I close it. I push it across the desk. I don't need to look at it anymore. The numbers are memorized—three shipments in the past month, twenty-three children in total, the money already flowing into accounts that don't technically exist.
I should feel something. Guilt, maybe. Remorse. The kind of thing a normal person would feel when they've done something monstrous.
I feel nothing.
Or maybe I feel everything, and I've just learned to bury it so deep that it doesn't touch me anymore. It's hard to tell the difference.
The office is dark.
I haven't turned on the lights. I don't need them.
The city outside my window provides enough illumination—the neon signs, the streetlights, the headlights of cars passing through the night.
They paint my walls in shades of red and blue and gold, and I sit in the center of it all, watching the world move without me.
I think about Monika.
She's been avoiding me. I've noticed. She flinches when I touch her now. She doesn't meet my eyes. She's pulling away, piece by piece, and I don't know how to stop her.
She called me a monster.
She was right.
But that's not why I can't stop thinking about her. It's not the guilt that keeps me up at night. It's not the way she looked at me when she found out about the children. It's not even the way her body felt when I pushed her against the wall and took what I wanted.
It's the way she looked at me after.
Like I was something to be pitied. Like I was something broken and sad and desperately in need of saving.
I don't want to be saved. I don't want to be fixed. I want to be understood.
She's the only person who's ever looked at me like I was more than the sum of my sins. She's the only person who's ever seen the boy underneath the monster.
And I'm losing her.
The phone rings at midnight.
I answer without checking the screen. I know who it is.
"Tell me."
"The shipment is ready," Ivan says. His voice is flat, professional, the same voice he uses for every transaction. "The product is secure. The routes are cleared. You can expect delivery in two days."
"Two days."
"Is that a problem?"
I think about Monika. About the way she looked when I told her about the child. About the way she said "don't touch me" like it was a promise and a threat.
"No," I say. "It's not a problem."
I hang up. I stare at the wall. I think about the children in the cages.
I think about Tasha.
I don't know why she stays with me—the girl with the broken arm and the empty eyes. I don't know why I can't forget her. She was just a product. Just another unit in the inventory. I've bought and sold hundreds of children like her. I've never lost a night of sleep over any of them.
But Tasha is different.
Tasha is different because Monika touched her. Because Monika healed her. Because Monika looked at her like she was a person instead of a product, and now I can't stop seeing her that way too.
I pick up the phone again. I dial a number I know by heart.
"Viktor," I say. "I need you to find someone. The child from last month. The one Monika treated."
There's a pause. Viktor is old. Viktor is smart. Viktor knows better than to ask questions.
"Do you want her found?" he asks.
"No. I want her gone. Take her somewhere far. Somewhere safe. Somewhere she won't be found by anyone."
"Understood."
I hang up. I stare at the wall.
I don't know why I did that. I don't know what I'm becoming. I'm breaking my own rules, following the same instincts that make Gabriel think he can save the world.
I'm going soft. I'm going weak. I'm turning into something I hate.
But I can't stop.
The hours pass.
I don't sleep. I never sleep. I just sit in my office, watching the city, thinking about the family I'm destroying and the woman I can't stop loving.
I think about my father.
He came to my room tonight. He stood in my doorway with his grey eyes and his clenched jaw and his quiet fury, and he told me to stop. He told me he wouldn't let me destroy everything he'd built.
I wanted to laugh. I wanted to hit him. I wanted to scream that he was the one who'd destroyed everything—that he'd been destroying it for years, piece by piece, while pretending he was holding it together.
But I didn't do any of those things. I just stood there, watching him, and I felt something inside me shift.
I could kill him.
The thought came out of nowhere—or maybe it's been there all along, buried beneath layers of respect and fear and the desperate need for his approval. But now it's surfaced, and it's not going away.
He's old. He's weak. He's distracted by his grief and his guilt and his love for a woman who doesn't belong to him.
It would be easy.
A pillow over his face while he sleeps. A needle in his arm. An accident—a fall, a fire, something that doesn't look like murder but leaves me with everything.
I could take the empire. I could take Monika. I could finally become the man I was always meant to be.
I stand up. I walk to the window. I press my forehead against the cold glass and I try to breathe.
I'm not going to kill my father.
I'm not.
But the thought is still there. Lingering. Whispering. Making promises I don't want to keep.
I think about Gabriel.
My brother. My rival. My enemy.
He's been trying to save Monika for a year. He's been offering her a way out—a life, a future, a chance to be something other than what this family has made her. She hasn't taken it yet, but she might. If I push too hard, if I become too much, she might run to him.
The thought makes me want to break something.
I've never hated Gabriel. I've been jealous, resentful, competitive—but I've never hated him. He's my brother. He's the good one. He's the one who walked away from the family business to study medicine, the one who still believes in something other than power and money and pain.
But now I hate him.
I hate the way he looks at Monika. I hate the way she looks at him. I hate the way he's always there, waiting, patient, like a dog hoping for scraps.
I could kill him too.
The thought is sharper this time. Clearer. It's not just a dark fantasy—it's a plan. I could lure him to the warehouse. I could make it look like an accident. I could tell everyone he left months ago, that he ran away to California and never looked back.
She would grieve him. She would cry. She would hate me.
But she would be mine.
I grip the edge of my desk. My knuckles are white. My breath is coming fast.
I pour myself a drink.
The whiskey burns going down—a sharp, familiar pain that grounds me in reality. I've been spiraling tonight, lost in thoughts I don't want to have, fantasies I can't control. I need to bring myself back.
I think about Monika.
Not the way she looked when she called me a monster. Not the way she flinched when I touched her. But the way she looked the first time I saw her—through the window of that diner, her face illuminated by the neon sign, her hands steady as she poured coffee.
She looked like someone who could save me.
She still looks like that sometimes. When she's not looking at me like I'm a monster. When she forgets to hate me. When she lets herself feel something other than disgust.
I want to be the man she sees. I want to be worthy of her steady hands and her steady eyes.
But I don't know how.
I finish my drink.
I set the glass down. I walk to the door.
I need to see her. I need to touch her. I need to remind myself why I'm doing all of this—why I'm building this empire, why I'm destroying this family, why I'm becoming a monster.
I need to remind myself that I'm doing it for her.
The hallway is dark. The mansion is quiet. The portraits on the walls watch me pass, their painted eyes judging me.
I stop outside her door. I press my palm against the wood. I feel the warmth of her on the other side.
"Monika," I whisper.
She doesn't answer. She's asleep. Or she's pretending to be asleep. I can't tell the difference anymore.
I lean my forehead against the door.
"I'm sorry," I say. "I'm sorry for the child. I'm sorry for everything. I'm sorry for what I'm becoming."
Nothing.
"I'm going to fix this. I'm going to make it right. I'm going to be the man you deserve."
Nothing.
"I love you."
Nothing.
I stand there for a long time. Then I walk away.
I go back to my office.
The city is still dark. The night is still heavy. The world is still moving without me.
I sit at my desk. I open the drawer. I pull out the photograph I keep there—the only photograph I keep there.
It's Monika. From the diner. The staff photo she doesn't know I have. She's standing in the back row, her face half-shadowed, her expression unreadable. She's not smiling. She's not looking at the camera. She's looking at something beyond the frame, something I'll never see.
I touch her face. The paper is smooth under my fingers.
"I'm going to destroy everything," I say. "I'm going to destroy my father. I'm going to destroy my brother. I'm going to destroy myself."
I pause.
"But I'm going to take you with me. I'm going to take you with me, and I'm going to make you mine, and I'm going to prove that I'm worthy of you. Even if I'm not. Even if I never will be."
I set the photograph down. I stare at it for a long time.
Then I stand up. I walk to the window. I look out at the city—my city, the city I'm going to take, the city I'm going to rule.
"I'm not a good man," I say. "I've never been a good man. But I'm going to be the man she needs. I'm going to be the monster she can't live without."
The city doesn't answer.
But I know it's listening.
Dawn breaks.
I watch it rise—the sun painting the sky in shades of gold and pink, the buildings catching the light, the streets filling with people who have no idea what's coming.
I think about the future. About the empire. About everything I'm going to build.
I think about the children in the cages. About the girl who looked at me. About the way she looked away.
I think about Monika. About the way she said my name. About the way she didn't say it back.
I think about my father. About the way he looked at me when I was a child. About the way he stopped looking at me a long time ago.
The day passes in a blur.
I go through the motions—meetings, calls, the endless machinery of the empire. I shake hands with men I despise. I sign contracts I don't read. I pretend to be the man my father raised me to be.
But I'm not that man anymore.
I'm something else. Something darker. Something that's been growing inside me for years, feeding on my ambitions and my resentments and my desperate need for control.
I'm the thing that will destroy this family.
And I don't care.