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I storm out of the bedroom and into the living room. I glance at her from the corner of my eye and realize she doesn’t even know I’ve left the room, she’s that drunk on pleasure and bliss. Good.
I sit on the black leather chair that faces the large picture window and stare. The sun has begun to set, fingers of orange and gold tinged with red on the horizon. In front of me lies the city, tall buildings and houses crammed so closely together, from here it looks as if there’s less than a finger’s distance between them.
I came to the city a young man, wild with notions of revenge and power, but I was impulsive and reckless. Dimitri was the one who honed my skills, taught me to master my strength. He taught me everything he knew. Dimitri’s wife never had children, and Dimitri mourned the loss of a dream of having a child. He shared this with me after I’d become like a son to him. I was the son he never had.
And tonight, I honor my allegiance to him.
I stalk to the kitchen and pour myself a shot of ice-cold vodka. I throw it back and let the burn travel from my throat to my stomach, burning its way like a line of red-hot fire. I inhale and pull my shoulders back before I take another shot.
I drink only the finest, purest drinks, and rarely. I despise the idea of needing alcohol for bravery. Bravery comes from within, not from a bottle. Fools think anything but internal conviction and strength is what gives a man courage. I drink instead to dull the ever-present ache in my chest. Memories of my past I stoke to keep me sharp and alert when opportunity arises.
I walk back to the window with a third shot and sip this one slowly. Thinking. Contemplating.
I’m angry that we’re taking the next step before she’s ready. But if I’m honest… when will she be? She likely has misguided notions about old-fashioned concepts like marriage. Sadie probably thinks marriage is a union between two people who love each other. I scoff to myself and shake my head. So naïve. Only fools believe a commitment of fidelity and honor is bound by love.
My fingers clench around the small shot glass in my hand at the thought of what I must do tonight. A few weeks ago, I wouldn’t have thought twice about what needed to happen. Why do I hesitate tonight? What is it about the girl that makes me question what I’ve already decided I needed to do?
I think about my family, to remind myself why I’m here and what I need to do next. I remember being a young boy, rail-thin and dressed in rags, in Dimitri’s sprawling kitchen. His wife fed me thick, crusty rye bread and bowls of soup until I couldn’t hold another bite. I slept in a small room above their kitchen, and reveled in the small luxuries of family life until the day he decided I needed to learn more.
The first time I realized he was part of an illegal crime ring, I was supposed to be asleep in the loft when one of his associates dragged a man into Dimitri’s kitchen in the middle of the night. He was bruised and bloodied and he begged for mercy. I knelt in my loft, peeking down to the kitchen below. Dimitri’s wife Yana came into the kitchen dressed in a fluffy white robe. I held my breath, waiting for her to scream in terror or run from the room. Instead, she put on the kettle to boil and made herself a cup of tea.
“Not in my kitchen,” she said to the men, carrying her tea cup out of the room. “Be sure Kazimir is asleep, and wait until I’ve gone back upstairs before you do what you need to. And for the love of God, Dimitri, be sure to clean up any blood.”
The bloodied man screamed and writhed in the hands of the men who held him, but no one paid any attention to him.
But Dimitri did not wait to see if I was asleep before he “did what he had to.” I watched in horror, the breath frozen in my lungs, when he bared the man’s throat. He ordered the floor be covered in plastic, and the man closed his eyes, openly weeping and begging forgiveness from a nameless god.
I watched every second of it. Dimitri’s cold, calculating determination as he told the man he earned his death with his betrayal before he pulled plastic gloves on his hands and drew his knife. The glimmer of metal in the kitchen light as he drew the sharp blade across the man’s throat. The spurts of blood so dark it was nearly black. The way the man’s body writhed and contorted in the dance of death. The sound of his dead body hitting the floor, smeared in blood. Dimitri’s sharp orders to the men to clean up the kitchen. Then his proclamation he made that I was sure I was meant to hear.
