by A. Zavarelli
Sergei begins to convulse on the table and foam at the mouth as the neurotoxins take over his body. When the paralysis sets in and his bulging eyes find mine, I lean over him so that there can be no misunderstandings between us.
“It is only the beginning.”
And then beside him, I take my seat. A spectator to his last and final hours.
There will be no violence or bloodshed from my hands today. By all outward appearances, it could even be considered a gentle death. But the pain that Sergei will feel as the venom attacks his nervous system is anything but gentle.
It is a balm to my soul, watching him suffer. And yet it means nothing at all. I will still be forced to go on. Without Talia. Knowing what I’ve done. Knowing that I failed her. That I am no better than Sergei himself.
And the only satisfaction I will have in the end is that my father is dead too.
“How long will it take?” Viktor asks as he sits down beside me.
I did not expect him to watch. But it should not surprise me. Even after all I have done, Viktor still regards me as a son. As one of his own.
“It could be hours,” I answer.
Beside me, the Reaper and Nikolai also take their seats.
And then we wait. The only sounds to break the intermittent silence are those of Sergei’s tortured groans and the shaking of the table beneath him.
It is a short event. Shorter than I had hoped.
Just as I always suspected, Sergei was weak. But this knowledge does not give me any satisfaction.
Because in this house, and in my life, the sun no longer rises.
51
Talia
“How is he?” I ask Lachlan.
He does not reply for some time. And it annoys me. I keep touching the star on my hand, and he is watching me with curious eyes. But guarded too.
“Talia, you must realize that it would be out of character for me to call him so often. He is not taking calls, anyway.”
I tap at the table again. And Mack’s watching me, but she keeps her lips zipped on the subject.
“But you said he’s a friend. Wouldn’t normal protocol be to go visit him?”
Again, Lachlan remains silent. And I realize he’s hiding something from me.
“What is it?” I ask.
He looks up at me and frowns.
“I have been to visit him,” he answers finally. “He’s as well as you could expect him to be.”
“Oh.”
I need more. I’m desperate for more. But Lachlan simply sighs.
“His father was responsible for the car bombs,” he tells me. “And he is dead now. Arman too.”
“Good,” I reply. “That’s good.”
They both look at me, and I shrug.
“I don’t mourn the loss of them,” I answer. “Alexei deserved better for a father than Sergei.”
“Yes, well,” Lachlan replies, “It wasn’t just them. Katya’s dead too. And a whole host of any other men that ever touched you.”
I blink.
And my heart aches at the thought of Alexei on his murderous rampage. I can only hope that it has given him what he needs. Some peace.
But I doubt it.
His father had always been the root of his issues. And Katya didn’t help.
They were the reason he did not trust me. The reason he told me he could never love me. And he was right.
I blink back tears, and Lachlan meets my watery gaze.
“I know you care about him,” he tells me. “But you need to make a decision, Talia. You need to decide if you can move on from this. Without him. Because I can’t keep going back there.”
The pain on Lachlan’s face guts me. Because he is hurting for Alexei. But still, he is loyal to me. I cup my face in my hands and try to pull myself together. I know he’s right. That none of this is fair to anyone.
But I still don’t know what to do.
I don’t know anything.
So I do what I’ve always done. The thing I do best.
I avoid it altogether.
52
Talia
Mack has had her baby.
A little girl.
They named her Keeva Crow. And she is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. When I get a chance to hold her, it scares and thrills me.
And I think of Alexei. Again.
Lachlan was there for Mack every step of the way. He was in the delivery room, coaching her through the delivery and cutting the cord. Kissing her forehead and holding his daughter for the first time with blinding love.
It makes me ache.
I won’t have that. I will go through it alone, just as I always have been.
Mack says she will be there with me, but it’s not the same. It’s just not the same.
I keep telling myself that I have more time to prepare. That by the time that I go into labor, I will be stronger. That I will be mentally prepared.
Only, that isn’t true.
Because my water breaks two weeks early when I’m alone in my bed. I’m fumbling for my cell phone when Lachlan’s guard comes in to check on me.
He’s young, and his name is Conor. He’s been staying at the safe house with me, watching over me. And right now, I’ve never been so grateful for his presence.
“Everything good?” he asks.
His eyes widen when I flip off the covers and he sees the bed.
“No,” I tell him. “It’s time. Now.”
“Now?” he squeaks.
“Yes, now,” I growl. “Help me, please.”
“Right.” He steps into action, coming at me like he has no frigging idea what to do. Which he probably doesn’t.
“Just take me to the… ugg.”
I double over in pain with a contraction. “Take me to the hospital.”
Conor gets me into the car and asks me what else we need to bring. But I don’t know. Because I haven’t packed anything. I barely have anything.
“Just take me,” I groan.
And he does. He drives like a lunatic which only makes it worse. But I’m sweating, gripping the door handle, and trying to breathe through the pain.
Something isn’t right.
I know it in my gut.
It’s happening too fast. The pain is too intense. This baby is coming now.
“I don’t know if I’m going to make it there,” I tell Conor.
“You have to,” he shouts. “I can’t deliver a baby.”
“Pull over!” I scream at him. “And call an ambulance.”
He does. And while he’s on the phone, I’m delivering in the backseat of the car.
“I need your help!” I yell. “Fucking Christ.”
Conor comes around to help me and nearly passes out when he sees the baby’s head.
“Just breathe,” he tells me.
“I am fucking breathing.”
I arch back in pain as the contractions come hard and quick. And it’s happening. Three more pushes, and my baby is born. In the backseat of the car, in the middle of Boston.
The ambulance arrives just in time. And the paramedics quickly usher me and the baby onto a stretcher. Everything is in chaos around us, but I can only look at him as they bundle him into my arms.
He looks so much like his father.
I’m crying. I’m in shock. And I’m in love.
They start to close the doors with Conor still outside, looking lost and traumatized.
“You’re coming with me,” I tell him.
“What?” he looks horrified by the idea. “No.”
“Yes.”
He comes.
I grab onto his arm as they start checking our vitals. “You have to call him.”
“Lachlan?”
“Alexei. You have to call Alexei.”
He blinks in confusion.
“Now.”
“Okay, okay. I’m calling him. What do you want me to tell him?”
“Just tell him I need him here. Please.”
And then they are whee
ling me into the hospital.
53
Alexei
I am vaguely aware of someone trying to wake me, but I ignore the hand on my shoulder and keep my eyes closed.
When they are closed, I can dream of her. I can forget for a brief time that it isn’t real.
But the hand on my shoulder becomes more insistent. When I blink up and see Nikolai, I shove him away. He has not left my house for the last three days, and he is grating on my last nerve.
This is what I’m thinking when the ice water hits my face, followed by a stinging slap. I’m already wheeling back my chair, preparing to murder my half-brother once and for all, when I am met by Magda’s angry gaze.
“Pull yourself together,” she demands. “And drink this, you will need it.”
I look down at the coffee in her hands and try to reach for my cognac instead. But she grabs the bottle and throws it against the wall, smashing it to pieces.
“Magda.”
“No.” She forces the cup into my hands, and I have never seen her look so crazed. “I have news for you, Alyoshka. But you must pull yourself together first. You look like death.”
I don’t know what other news she could possibly have, but when Magda is insistent I know there is no arguing about it. So I drink the coffee while they both watch me. When I have finished, I set down the cup and Magda hands me my jacket.
“I will tell you in the car. We must go, now.”
“I am not going until you tell me.”
“The news is about your wife,” she says.
And then she walks out of the room, leaving me to trail after her and Nikolai in my annoyance.
“What about my wife?”
I try to reach out and grab her arm, but for a woman of sixty, Magda is surprisingly fast. The car is already waiting outside when they open the door, and my body is growing tense. Anxious.
Nikolai slips into the driver’s seat while I reach out and stop Magda.
“Tell me now.”
“She is not gone, Alyoshka,” she says. “There is still hope.”
It occurs to me as I yell at Nikolai to drive faster the reason they waited to tell me the news.
I need to get to her now.
To see it firsthand before I can believe it.
I need to see my sun.
Finally, my phone buzzes and Lachlan’s name flashes on the screen. When I accept the video call, the first words out of his mouth are the ones I need.
“She is resting up now,” he tells me. “She did a grand job of it, Alexei. Baby Nikolaev did not want to wait any longer.”
It relieves me and angers me at the same time. I want to see her now. See her alive and breathing. But there is still so much distance between us.
“I should have been there.”
“I know,” Lachlan agrees. “I’m sorry, Alexei. I thought I was doing what was best.”
Magda looks at me from across the car, and I ignore her. She does not need to tell me, I am already aware of my shortcomings.
“You were,” I tell Lachlan. “But if you ever hide my wife from me again…”
“I know,” he cuts me off. “I know, Alexei.”
“We are still twenty miles out,” I say.
“Mack and I are here,” he assures me. “We’ll hold it down until you get here.”
“Don’t leave her side,” I order. “Don’t let her out of your sight.”
“She’s not going anywhere, mate,” he assures me. “She was the one who asked us to call you.”
“Tell her that we are on our way,” Magda says, grabbing the phone from my hand. “And I’m going to take good care of her.”
She is tearing up, and so is Nikolai when I meet his gaze in the mirror.
We all look away from each other, allowing silence to settle over the car when Magda hangs up the phone.
My wife is alive. My baby boy has just been born.
And I am never going to fail them again.
54
Talia
My son is curled against my chest, both of our eyes closed when I feel his presence.
I am so tired. So, so tired.
But Alexei is here. So I force my eyes open, just in time to see him leaning down to cradle my face in his hands.
“Solnyshko.”
His voice is rough, his eyes glassy. And the very word is an apology, filled with more emotion than I’ve ever heard in his voice.
“God, my Solnyshko. I have died without you.”
And then he is kissing me all over my face, his other hand resting on our baby boy. When he turns his attention to him, I gesture for him to take him in his arms.
He does.
“Franco,” I tell him. “His name is Franco.”
Alexei seems surprised, but nods his agreement soon after.
“Franco. My son.”
“He saved our lives,” I manage to choke out.
I’m so emotional. Seeing him. Seeing them both together like this. It’s overwhelming in a way that I wasn’t prepared for.
Alexei meets my gaze, and his eyes are red and bloodshot. Filled with grief. And I have so much regret. So much agony and want for this man. The damaged half to my soul. We are both so damaged, but together, we fit perfectly.
I’m crying, I realize. Looking up at him with our baby in his arms.
“I’m sorry I let you think…”
“Shh…” He comes to sit beside me, reaching for my hand. “You did the only thing you could. I was so foolish, my sweet. But it will never happen again. I will never doubt your loyalty again. I will spend the rest of my life proving myself worthy of your…”
His words die off, and he looks like he’s in pain.
“Of my love,” I assure him. “I still love you, Lyoshka.”
“And I, you,” he answers, cupping my face in his palm. “You are my sun.”
He kisses me, and everything else melts away. I don’t doubt his assurances. I know with certainty that he will never allow anything to come between us again. Even the present distance is too much, he tells me, as he comes to sit beside me in bed. Franco nestled in one arm, and me in the other.
He is our foundation.
And despite the intensity of emotion between us in this moment, nothing has ever felt more solid.
The moment is interrupted when Mack and Conor step back inside of the room. Conor looks terrified when he glances at Alexei while Mack looks like she wants to murder him.
Alexei hands me back the baby and kisses me on the cheek before standing up to greet them. When he moves in their direction, Conor takes a step back.
“I didn’t look at anything,” Conor proclaims. “I swear.”
Alexei extends his hand as a sign of respect. “Thank you, Conor. For being there when I could not. I owe you a great deal.”
Conor’s shoulders slump in relief and he smiles. Alexei smiles too. But Mack lays into him a second later.
“I don’t like you.” She pokes him in the chest. “You took advantage of her. You knocked her up. And then you hurt her. That wasn’t the deal we had.”
“I did do all of those things,” Alexei replies. “I was wrong.”
For the first time ever, Mack seems speechless.
“Damn right you were,” she huffs.
“But she is my wife,” Alexei tells her. “She is never leaving me again.”
Mack looks set to argue, but then her eyes find mine. And she sees that I have no protests. This is just Alexei’s way. This is his way of telling her that he is sorry. And that he will take care of me. So in the end, she chooses not to say anything, even though she really wants to.
And I am so grateful for her in this moment. For all that we have been through together, and that even after everything, she is still here for me. And I realize how much we have both grown up over the last two years. How much we have changed. I know that if we can get past all of that, then we can get past anything.
I also know the same is true for Alexei and I. He comes back to me and
holds Franco for the remainder of their visit. He does not let anyone else hold our baby, except for Magda when she bursts into the room at the first available opportunity and doesn’t take no for an answer. She sings him lullabies. And Alexei and I watch, his hand always touching me. Anchoring himself to me.
The rest of the day is spent much the same. Viktor and some of the other Vory come to visit, bringing lavish gifts for Franco and myself.
By the time visiting hours are over, I am exhausted.
“Please don’t go anywhere,” I tell Alexei.
“I did not plan to,” he says.
He climbs into the bed beside me again, which is ridiculous considering his height, but he does not complain that his feet are hanging over the edge. Franco is cradled between us, and he simply strokes his face, his eyes moving between the two of us.
That is when I notice the tattoo on his hand. In the same space that I drew it before. My name, inside the sun.
I reach out to touch it, and Alexei takes my hand in his.
“You got it.”
His eyes are glassy again. Vulnerable with emotion. But he does not try to hide it.
“You are the only woman for me, my sweet,” he tells me. “Even in death, I could never let you go. You are it for me. And I am so sorry that I did not show you before.”
“I don’t want your apologies,” I answer. “I just want your trust.”
He expels a long breath and traces the lines of my face with his finger. “You have it. You have my word, I will not ever doubt you again.”
“We need you,” I tell him. “We need all of you.”
“You have it,” he assures me. “There is nothing without you. Tomorrow, I take you home. And I will make you mine all over again. Every day, for the rest of my life, Solnyshko. That is my promise to you. I will make you fall in love with me every day for a lifetime.”
“A lifetime,” I agree. “Because we are in this together.”
He kisses me on the forehead, and then Franco too.
“Together,” he echoes.
Epilogue
