Torrid

by Nikki Sloane

  Sergey Petrov stood at the top of the stairs, inspecting us like we were fleas. He had on a black and blue striped robe, one hand on the belt and the other in a pocket, no doubt holding a gun inside. Was he wondering about me? Did he think I’d been forced to bring Vasilije here?

  “Vasilije Markovic,” I said, my vocal cords strung so tight it barely sounded like my voice, “would like to speak to you.”

  We’d caught him off guard, but he had to see this meeting as advantageous. This wasn’t public, so no one would know what happened, and it was in his home, where he was comfortable and could control nearly everything.

  “Merry Christmas,” Vasilije announced. “Sorry we’re showing up late and without calling, but it’s important.” He used the same friendly tone he’d had at dinner last month, and it set me more on edge. I only had a fingertip’s grip on it.

  “Let me get dressed.” Sergey’s distrust was so huge, it flowed down the steps and nearly knocked me backward.

  “You don’t need to do that,” Vasilije said. “This won’t take long.”

  My father was irritated, but controlled. “Fine. I’ll come down and we can discuss in my office. I don’t want to wake my wife.”

  Only I was sure she was wide awake and hiding around the corner, just out of sight from where my father stood. She’d have a gun in her hands, ready if my father needed her.

  He took his time coming down the stairs, cautious as a cat. His gaze landed on Filip.

  “I’ll speak to you, Vasilije, or Goran without my security if that goes for both of us. Your uncle’s man will have to wait outside.” My father knew what Filip was capable of.

  “Your men go, too, then I’m fine with it.”

  Sergey gave a look of disdain. “I’d also feel more comfortable if you’re not armed.”

  Vasilije unholstered. “Same. Also, Filip is my man now. My uncle’s dead.”

  Sergey’s movements slowed as he considered the news. He glanced at Filip, who gave a single nod in confirmation. My father produced the gun from his pocket and set it down on a side table with a quiet thud. The wheels were turning in his head. He believed Vasilije would be easier to control than Goran, but he was dead wrong. My father gave a perfunctory smile. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  “Feels more like my gain,” Vasilije said flatly. “I’m the one who killed him.”

  He plodded to the side table, set his gun beside my father’s, and told Filip to wait outside with the other security guards.

  My father had no response to Vasilije’s statement. Instead, he turned and paced toward the office.

  I’d only followed the men a few steps when his sharp voice made me flinch. “No. This conversation won’t include you.”

  “Except she’s the whole reason I’m here,” Vasilije said.

  He looked so confident and carefree walking into my father’s office, when he should have been studying every inch of space. I’d drawn him diagrams. I’d explained the layout in the best detail I could, but it wouldn’t compare to the real thing. I’d told him the couch was only a few feet from the bookcase, but I’d underestimated.

  I needed to know Vasilije would succeed if I failed. He promised if anything happened to me, he’d finish what I started, and he told me he’d do it with pleasure.

  It still smelled like darkness and death in the office. I’d killed a man in this room, but Ilia was just one of many to die here. It was my father’s preferred spot to end business deals. He moved toward the desk, but Vasilije was smart enough to stop him before the gun taped beneath the center drawer was within reach.

  “You tried to get a spy into my house, and failed.”

  “Did I?” Sergey’s half-smile chilled me to my center. “She got into your bed fairly quickly.”

  “I’m not going to complain about that, but I wanted to make sure you got that you failed. Not just with Aleksandar, either. You played this all wrong.”

  “How’s that?”

  Vasilije smiled. It was all dimples and teeth, and I wanted to possess the same grin. Did it trigger danger alarms in my father’s head?

  As Vasilije wandered further into the room, I followed his lead, and let my gaze linger on the books on the bottom shelf where the 9mm was stored. He did better than I did. His focus didn’t hover over the hiding spots I’d told him about.

  “You sent her to plant a few bugs, when you should have had her kill me. A woman who looks like she does, and doesn’t mind getting her hands dirty? Oksana could have been your greatest asset. And loyalty wouldn’t have been an issue. I mean, she’s your fucking daughter, but then you go and treat her like shit. She probably could have turned me—”

  Sergey’s hand came up, silencing him. His jaw set. “What makes you think she didn’t? You killed Goran, and came straight here, didn’t you?”

  My eyes widened.

  My father’s lie was simplistic but perfect and believable. After coming clean to Vasilije, I’d shattered the trust. I believed we’d built it back up, but what we had was fragile. When a broken bone heals and is hit in the same spot, it’s likely to fracture the same way. Would this lie do the same damage?

  If he fell for it and left me, I was as good as dead. Not just because of what my father would do, either. How would I survive without this man, who’d seen the real me and might love me anyway?

  “Nice try, but I know Oksana a hell of a lot better than you do.”

  “What do you want?” Sergey asked. “An apology for attempting to get surveillance in your home? For turning one of your men?” His condescending tone was like being lectured. “If you think Goran hasn’t tried worse with me, you’re naïve. That’s the price you pay when you’re the head of the family business. Which I’m sure you—”

  Vasilije shrugged. “An apology would be great, but it needs to be to her.”

  It was like he’d been slapped. My father’s incredulous gaze swung to me. “For what?”

  It’d all been building up to this moment, and the blood roared in my body so loud, I couldn’t hear my own thoughts. Every cell in me screamed. I’d been silent the whole time in this office.

  God, other than my music, I’d been silent practically every second I’d been in America.

  And I was fucking done with it.

  I spoke in Russian, the language of my mother. “You can apologize for murdering an innocent family. You can apologize for treating me like I was less than garbage just for being born. And most of all, for how you’re a spineless fucking cunt.”

  There was no tremor in my hands as I went for the gun. I bent, yanking at the books and flinging them away, and—

  The shelf was empty.

  No. No!

  My hands moved on their own, or maybe they were connected directly to a part of my brain functioning on a higher level, existing above the thick fog of my panic. The gun was still here somewhere. My father was too cautious to remove it altogether.

  I tore at the books and the decorative clutter, hurling everything on the shelves I touched toward the floor in a thunderous crash. I knocked over a silver bowl, sending the polished stones inside raining down on my feet, where they bounced and clattered on the wood.

  There!

  The 9mm dumped out the side of the bowl, hidden beneath the stones.

  The metal was cold and sure in my grip, and everything felt so incredibly . . . right. I swung around and took aim, and the air buzzed and swirled. Sergey was racing to get around the desk, but he’d never make it in time.

  I pulled the trigger with no hesitation.

  God knew I’d waited long enough.

  The gunshot was as loud as a cannon firing, and the recoil on the gun caught me by surprise, but I struck him in the back. The black and blue fabric of his robe exploded and Sergey grunted in pain, his knees going weak. He stumbled into the side of the desk, his hands splaying on the desktop, but got back on his unsteady feet.

  I fired again, hitting him in the shoulder this time. The impact spun him halfway to face
me, and as he went down, his expression was comical. He was so surprised, which was stupid. I’d killed Ilia only inches from the spot where he stood. He grabbed blindly at anything to keep him upright, and as he fell, he snagged the corner of the desk calendar and pulled most of the contents of the desktop down with him.

  I pulled the trigger again—

  It wouldn’t budge.

  I squeezed, but there was no give and no sound from the weapon. I stared at my extended hand, confused. The safety couldn’t be off. I’d just fired twice.

  Gunfire erupted outside, and movement dueled for attention. Vasilije closed in on me, and my father was getting up off the ground. There was something in his hand. Something metallic, and sharp.

  Where the fuck had he gotten a knife?

  Vasilije wrenched the gun from my hand. He slammed his palm against the base of the magazine, and racked the slide in a fluid movement, clearing the jam, and although he was fast, by the time he turned and fired, the knife sliced at his neck.

  40

  After the gunshot, something heavy fell to the floor, but I couldn’t see anything beyond Vasilije, or the way he brought his hand up to his neck. Dark red blood slipped between his fingers.

  “Nyet!” I screamed.

  Or maybe it had been in English. I couldn’t think in a specific language at that point. I threw my hands up around his, squeezing with all the life in my body.

  “Calm down,” he said, his tone pained. “I’m all right.” Only his face said otherwise, and he was bleeding like a sieve. I risked a quick glance away to see my father had a disgusting red hole in the side of his face. His glassy eyes were fixed on the ceiling.

  Vasilije said he was okay, but I didn’t believe him, and when I took one hand off his, my palm was wet with blood. He slung an arm around my shoulders, keeping us together as I urged us out of the office, grabbed his gun off the table, and hurried toward the front door.

  A booming sound came from above, and wood splinted right behind us. I jerked and yanked on Vasilije, pulling him faster than his sluggish legs could keep up. My stepmother was apparently a terrible shot, but we wouldn’t be as lucky with the next one.

  I threw open the front door and ran straight into Filip’s chest. It took him a nanosecond to survey the situation, and Vasilije was pulled from my arms. We moved as a blur through the snow, shuffling to the already-running Lexus. I nearly tripped over the body of one of my father’s men. His blood stained the pristine snow in the front yard.

  All three of us were squished in the back seat when the SUV launched forward.

  It was chaos in the back seat as the vehicle careened through the icy streets, speeding toward the front gate and barreling through it.

  “Keep pressure on it,” Filip ordered, although I wasn’t sure which one of us he was talking to. I clamped both of my hands down on top of Vasilije’s fingers. “Anyone following?”

  “No,” John answered. The back end fishtailed on the entrance ramp to the expressway and made me queasy.

  Filip got out his phone, and when I heard Amit’s name, I knew we weren’t going to a hospital. “I don’t think it’s an artery,” he said to whoever he was talking to, “but he’s losing a lot of blood.”

  Every mile in the car, Vasilije turned a lighter shade of gray. His hand beneath mine began to go slack and his eyes dulled. I could tell he wasn’t all there, and it scared the shit out of me.

  His head lolled toward me and I had to shift my grip on him. “Aren’t you happy?” he said slowly. “You did it. Why don’t you look happy?”

  Because I was worried he was dying, and it was so un—fucking—fair, I wanted to scream. I was a bad person, but I’d only killed other bad people, so wasn’t I allowed to have this evil boy just a little longer?

  He wasn’t coldblooded after all. It poured through my fingers, boiling hot. “I will be a lot happier when you’re not ruining the really expensive clothes you bought me.” I tried to sound strong, but wasn’t successful.

  His blood was all over the back seat. At one point, John took a turn so hard I had to put a hand on the ceiling to brace myself, leaving a smeary mess. I expected Vasilije to groan about the resale value, but his eyes fluttered closed, and it sent my heartrate into overdrive.

  “Vasilije!” I cried. “Don’t you dare leave me!”

  The car pulled in, the top barely clearing the garage door as it rolled up, and as soon as we jerked to a stop and John disengaged the locks, Luka was there, yanking the back door open.

  “How long has he been unconscious?” Addison asked.

  “He’s been in and out the last few minutes,” I rushed out.

  I was pushed out of the way as she took over and the men carried Vasilije inside, moving as a team toward the dining room, and he was set down on the long table.

  I scanned for space for the short Indian man I needed to save his life. “Where’s Amit?”

  “Two minutes out,” Filip answered.

  Addison climbed onto the table, straddled Vasilije, and pressing both hands on his neck. He groaned in agony. “Fuck, Addison.”

  “What’s your blood type?” she demanded. His eyes blinked and rolled, making her turn her gaze toward his brother. “Luka?”

  “I . . . don’t know.”

  My heart lurched. “Doesn’t matter. I’m O negative.”

  Her focus flew to me. “You’re sure?”

  “Yes.” My second paternity test in America, when the pathologist had discovered I was O negative, she’d lectured me non-stop about how lucky I was to be a universal donor, and the gift I could give. I’d sat in the chair, feeling anything but lucky that Sergey Petrov was my father.

  Headlights flashed through the front window, and Luka sprinted to the door.

  Time decelerated.

  I stood blood-soaked at the table beside Filip and Luka, watching as Addison and Amit worked to clamp the bleeding and stitch the wound closed. When Amit announced the bleed was stopped, Addison grabbed his medical bag and set her sights on me.

  I sank down on the couch in the living room and pushed up my sleeve. She wasn’t yet a doctor, but she moved like this was the hundredth time she’d taken blood from me and not the first. After the prep, she slid the needle easily into my vein and set the line over the side of the couch so it could drip into a collection bag.

  As she pulled off the rubber gloves, I grabbed her wrist with my free hand. “I need you to tell me he’s going to be okay.” She looked down at my fingers wrapped around her. My grip was ferocious. “He’s my . . .”

  My partner? My muse? My . . . other half?

  I couldn’t explain it, and went with something simple. “He’s mine.”

  There was understanding in her expression as she set her hand on top of mine and squeezed gently. “He’s going to be a lot better with your help.”

  “Thank you.” My voice was barely a whisper. I released her, and she left me, returning to assist Amit.

  Would she ever know that Vasilije’s wound came from the same man who’d taken her family?

  I sat alone in the living room and heard music in my head. A sweet adagio piece that could only be described as a love theme. If I got a chance, I’d write it and replace the Scherzo. It was a better representation of how I felt about him.

  After Amit pulled the line from my arm, Luka appeared with a glass of water, a bag of pretzels he’d pulled from the pantry, and a wet washcloth. I scrubbed Vasilije’s blood from my skin as best I could while I told his brother the highlights of the night. I left the big things for Vasilije. I didn’t feel like it was my story to tell.

  “He’s awake,” Addison said, appearing at the edge of the living room. “He’s asking for her.”

  I was woozy as I got to my feet, but didn’t know if it was the blood loss, or the evening’s effect. Everything had changed.

  My father was dead.

  Goran Markovic was dead.

  And if he survived, Vasilije Markovic would rise to power with me at his side.<
br />
  He was still on the dining room table, but they’d brought in pillows and blankets, propping him up. He was shirtless, but his color was back. A white bandage was wrapped around his neck. Even in this state, he looked intimidating and like himself.

  “You look like hell,” he said.

  I wanted to smile, but couldn’t. “So do you.”

  His voice was commanding. “Come here.”

  I moved one foot, then the other, until I was beside the edge of the table. I was close enough I could touch him if I wanted to. His head swung away from me so he could gaze at the ladder on the other side of the table. An IV bag hung off the top with barely any of my blood left in it.

  Vasilije gave me a fake scowl. “Luka said that’s Russian blood going in me.”

  The tension in my body broke. It shattered into a billion pieces and I laughed, feeling twenty pounds lighter. He was going to be okay. Back to his regular asshole self.

  “I like your laugh,” he said abruptly. “Maybe you’ll do it more often now.”

  I shrugged. “Maybe I will.”

  “And maybe I love you.”

  My breath caught. “If you had a heart.”

  “I do. It’s fucking pumping Russian blood through me right now.”

  I leaned over the table, set a hand on his cheek, and whispered it just before I kissed him. “And now we’re really the same.”

  41

  Vasilije

  Oksana drummed her fingers on the tabletop, and the muscle along my jaw ticked. She knew I hated that shit, but I stayed quiet for once. She was nervous.

  And Konstantine Petrov was fucking late.

  Renting out Il Piacere for the evening wasn’t cheap, and this was the second time I’d done it. I looked at the empty tables around us and tried to keep my anger at simmer, rather than rolling boil. This was going to be his second no-show. We’d killed his father. He was allowed to be pissed about that, but it’d been more than a month since they’d put Sergey in the ground.