But who is he? And why would he tell a child her father is a monster? Several families had a meeting. Is Dimitri from another organization? Could we dig up information on him?
She looks at me, her eyes red but dry. “That’s who I am, Max. That’s what I’m made of. Fifteen years of refined hate, focused and aimed at one target. Roman Kozlov. The man who killed my mother and stole what was mine. The man who destroyed my perfect life and left me with nothing except the need to make him suffer.”
The conviction in her voice is absolute.
She believes every word.
I give myself a moment, then suck in a breath. “You’re not wrong. Roman can be an arrogant, ruthless bastard. He’s the boss, and what he says goes, no matter what.”
Her eyes light up, and her mouth opens, but I keep going.
“But he loved your mother. He’s never gotten over losing her. Or you.”
She jerks back like I struck her. “No. No, you can’t know that. You can’t know how he really feels. You weren’t there. You didn’t see?—”
“You weren’t there after that night. I’ve seen him every day for so many years.” I relax my grip, allowing her the chance to pull away. “I’ve watched him stare at the portrait of Lilia like it’s the only thing keeping him alive. I’ve seen him disappear into his office on the anniversary of her death…your death…and not come out for days. Not to eat or drink or even use the bathroom. When he does emerge, there’s always more gray in his hair. More pain in his eyes.”
She shakes her head, pushing me away as she tries to physically distance herself from my words.
“He murdered her?—”
“Someonemurdered her.” I sit up, giving her space if she wants it. “A lot of people died that night. Men, women, and children. Shot, stabbed, and burned alive. Some choked on smoke. Pick a fatality. It was chaotic. That’s why we call it Chaos Island now. Nothing that happened that night has ever made any sense, but it’s affected our lives. And Roman has grieved every day since I’ve known him.”
“Because of his guilt! Why else would he snatch the locket?” Her voice is desperate as she straightens up, clinging to the one piece of evidence that’s held her certainty together for fifteen years. She clutches the locket against her breast. “Why rip it from her neck if he wasn’t…if he didn’t?—”
“No idea. But I can guess. His wife had just died, and he needed something to latch onto. It was valuable to him, but only because it belonged to your mother. He hung it on her portrait when he got back from the island, and it stayed there until he watched your video. Coated in dust because he doesn’t permit even the maids to touch it.”
Her certainty cracks, her eyelids flutter in rapid blinks, and she pulls farther away. She’s trying to keep it together, but doubt creeps in, poisoning the hate that’s kept her alive. “You can’t know what he?—”
“I do.” Pushing up higher in the bed, I recline against the headboard, the slats still littered with dozens of cut zip ties that rattle and fall as I stir against them. “We’re alike, Roman and me. We’re both men who lost everything and never figured out how to be human again after. Who carry guilt that eats us alive. Move through a world we wish would have killed us years ago. Except no one we came up against was strong enough, because our self-hatred fuels us.”
She freezes at that, and I nearly choke. I didn’t know I felt like that until I said it.
But it’s true. For me and for Roman.
It’s not a concept she can understand without explanation, though.
“I was eight.” Fuck. I’m really doing this? “My parents were… They weren’t good people. My father beat me just for the fun of it. My mother drank, but she also worked, so she was usually too tired to hit me. My siblings…”
Their faces surface in my head for the first time in years. I’ve buried this memory under time and too many bodies. Behind pain, alcohol, and the red rage that earned me my nickname. The words lodge in my throat and stick there like broken glass, but I force them out.
“I had a sister and brother. Mira and Luka, five and four. I did the best I could to distract my old man from them. It was easy. I just had to open my mouth for him to lash out. Then one day he walked out the door and never came back. After that, I foolishly assumed we were safe.”
I’ve never spoken about this, not even to the cops who showed up later. Talking never did me much good before then and didn’t help much after either.
Ironic since I’m trying it now.
“Mom worked nights, so I slept next to the front door to make sure my old man didn’t come back. It was so cold that night. Luka and Mira were sleeping in their room with the space heater. We only had the one, and there was no way it would keep the whole house warm so…” As soon as I say this next part, Nika will hate me just as much as I hate myself. “I gave it to them and told them to shut the door to keep the heat in.”
Nika gasps, slapping her hand over her mouth. Her eyes tell me she knows the mistake eight-year-old me made.
Guilt nearly devours me. That pounding in my chest comes back, the one that returns occasionally and only stops when I fight or drink.
“When I went to wake them up for school, they were cold. I tried to shake them but…” I can still see the way Mira’s body shifted, her curled hand stuck in place as I rolled her over, her knee still bent. Luka’s stuffed dog tucked under his chin… “I didn’t know what to do, so I waited for my mother. She showed up hours later. Drunk. Pissed. She told me?—”
Nika grabs my hand, scrambling up the bed to rest her head on my shoulder. “No. She didn’t…”
I nod. “Told me it was my fault. That I’d killed the only good things in her life. The beating she gave me would have made the old man proud if he’d been there. When I woke up from that, she was gone and the cops were waiting. They asked a lot ofquestions I didn’t answer. Then hauled us all off to the hospital. Luka and Mira to the morgue, me to ICU. That’s when they explained that my mom had been driving drunk, wrecked her car, and died in the crash.”
