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I drop my eyes so he can’t see how disgusting I find him. Few people in this world are worse than Martinš, but Nojus, the Lithuanian arms dealer who supplies the criminals on the eastern side of Latvia, might be one of them.
“One hour. Don’t forget to keep this with you.” He sets one of his burner phones in front of me. “I’d hate to have to add the cost of locating you to your already increasing debt. You might never repay it, even between the sheets.”
Not showing him how repulsive I find him is hard, but Nojus is notoriously fickle. The last thing I need is to tick him off before I can even beg Grigoriy to save me. I’ve barely reached the street outside when an unknown number calls my regular cell phone. I’m pretty sure I know who it is. It must be either Mirdza or Kristiana, calling from the arena. After all, when Nojus called me, I basically threw Blanka’s reins at Kris and ran.
Mirdza’s probably furious.
She just made a huge comeback, the likes of which I never imagined she could, and not only did her boyfriend not go to see it, our mother skipped, too. Then her lousy sister ran away and left her instead of celebrating. I’d be super duper ticked.
Maybe she’ll forgive me. My twin sister’s nothing like me.
She’s the one everyone loves. The one people want to be like. The one people want to help. She’s also the reason Kristiana gave me the starter horses, and without them, I’d never even have been able to race. I should be grateful to have a sister like her. I know I should. I’m the worthless sack of crap, and I’m the one always taking, taking, taking, but for some reason that knowledge just makes me angrier.
Every time I think about Mirdza, I’m overcome with the same guilt. The guilt I’ve always carried around. She’s crippled because of me. I should’ve stepped in to help her—I’m the fighter—or help my mother, or call the authorities, or. . .well, anything. I should’ve done something, but instead, I ran.
Her life was forever wrecked because of me.
Until Mr. Handsome Prince showed up, I guess. He seems willing to cut the world in pieces and run it through a blender for her if she just mentions she’d like an earth smoothie. When she moves around a room, his eyes track her every movement. It’s like he’s a magnet, but instead of tracking north, he tracks Mirdza.
I know Aleksandr’s rich. I hear Grigoriy is, too. He’s a prince, for heaven’s sake, or he says he is. He must have money. Is there any chance she might be able to get. . .but half a million euros? How could I even ask her for that?
And there’s no one who can come up with that much in an hour.
Just before the call’s about to go to voicemail, I swipe to answer. “Hello?”
“Kristiana,” she says. “It’s me, Mirdza.” It’s definitely her, but why’s she calling me Kristiana? She didn’t stutter or stammer or correct herself. And she doesn’t sound upset that I left, either.
What’s going on?
“Thank goodness you’re calling.” I open my mouth to force the words out—to ask her for money. Maybe I can drill down to the final amount later, after she’s agreed to talk to Grigoriy. I’m going to have to tell her the reason, and that makes me want to scream. I wonder how much he might be able to come up with before my deadline is here. What do banks let you withdraw, assuming he has it?
“The men you were worried about have taken me after all, just like Aleksandr thought they might,” she says.
What? What men?
Before I can ask, she plows ahead. “But you’re the one they want, Kris. Not me.”
Whoa, she knows I’m not Kris. She wants me to get a message to Kris, clearly. But why didn’t she just call Kris? Or why not just tell me what’s going on?
Someone must be listening.
“Okay.” My mind finally wraps itself around what she said. Those men Aleksandr was worried about. . .took her?
My brain rebels against the thought. I deserve to be taken, beaten, whatever. But not Mirdza. She’s never done anything bad ever. How dare Aleksandr and Kristiana endanger her life?
“They want you to come to the following address in the next half hour.” She pauses, thankfully, and I flip the phone to speaker so I can enter the address she reads into the notes app. My heart was beating fast before, but now I’m probably close to the heart attack range.
I need to get to this place in the next half hour. . .or what?
“But you know me,” Mirdza continues. “I hate the idea of someone trading themselves to save me as much as I hate Polish sausages. I’ve never wanted any, and I don’t want you to show up in the next thirty minutes, either.”
Polish what?
I remember it, then. The stupid code she made up after Martinš nearly killed her. Something about Polish sausages means I’m supposed to call the police.
But she said she hates them, and that she doesn’t want any. Then she told me not to come. Does she mean to tell the cops, but not to go?
It hits me then, why she’s calling me and not Kristiana. I really am a moron. I should’ve known from the start. If she called her best friend, Kris would rush to her side. The men would kill them both. Even if they released Mirdza, they’d definitely kill Kris. She said it herself.
