Page 53 of Bratva Sacrifice

“Alyosha,” she corrects herself breathlessly. “This lace is really itchy.”

But it is pretty. She has achieved a perfect tan, having spent so many hours in the pool or laying out in the afternoon sun. The violet lace is a rich contrast against her glowing golden skin. “So wear the polka dots,” I tell her. They’re not pink, like those first panties of hers I saw. But they are the same sort of material. Soft cotton. Not a scrap of itchy lace to be found.

She beats a fist against my back as I carry her toward the bed. “I told you, I couldn’t find them!”

“This is not my problem.” I heave her down, and she bounces on the bed, her blonde hair briefly obscuring her face as she splutters and attempts to scrape it out of her eyes. I splay one hand against the smooth skin of her belly as I climb over her. “I like this lace on you, Katya,” I tell her, and I bury my face in her throat, where I can smell the perfume she has sprayed there; one of the dozens that are scattered across the bathroom countertop. I never know which it is going to be. Like a surprise she wears upon her skin only for me.

“Really?” There is suspicion in her voice, as if she cannot tell whether or not I am being truthful with her.

“Really,” I tell her. “But I like it better off.”

∞∞∞

I do my mobstering, as Katya calls it, mostly when she is occupied with something else. It is like an open secret, I think, but one I am careful to keep separate from her. On those occasions when it is necessary to conduct business I know she will not want to see, I tell her where she must stay and for how long.

After Ivan, she does not disobey again. She knows there are some things she is better off not knowing, happier not seeing. And so long as she does not—she holds on to that peace she has attained.

So even though she knows that, like her papa, I am involved in a number of illicit activities, I do not make her a party to them. I do not tell her these things which would weigh upon her inconvenient conscience. And she does not make the mistake of asking, when she does not want the answers she might receive.

Anatoli cannot understand why I cater to her delicate sensibilities in this manner. Why I wrap up our meetings swiftly and stash away anything that might call to mind the unsavory nature of my profession when I see her coming in from the pool or hear her footsteps on the stairs.

He heaves a sigh as I zip up a duffel bag full of bricks of cocaine and toss it at him to disperse amongst our drug runners who, in turn, will sell to local dealers. And he asks, “Will you take her to Moscow?”

The question surprises me. He is not the sort who usually asks such things. But then, probably before now there has never been an occasion to ask, a reason to ask. I have told him that I will keep Katya—but it is possible he did not believe this.

Until now. Until my schedule, which was once whatever I determined it to be, became governed by Katya’s presence, the routines she has established.

“I don’t know,” I tell him. The truth is something more like I do not want to do this. Maybe Anatoli has a fondness for our home, but I do not. Though in the past, I have split my time between Chicago and Moscow, I like it less each time I return. I find myself reverting to a version of myself I hate, one I once had to be for my own survival. Cold, sharp, and hard—like the city I was born to, and from which I fought to escape. My temper becomes too easily provoked.

I do not want to take Katya to this place, where what I am will be impossible to ignore. I do not want to take her somewhere there is no place for her softness. I do not want her to cut herself on the sharp edges of this place that once shaped me. I do not want to cut her with my own sharpness.

“Will you go without her?” he asks. Anatoli returns more frequently to Moscow than I do. I have put off returning now for several months; I know he will return soon himself. He is asking if I am coming with him this time. Or if he must again go alone.

“No,” I tell him. Other than Anatoli, there is no one I trust enough with her safety to leave her behind. “I don’t go without her.”

Anatoli pinches the bridge of his nose, heaves a longsuffering sigh.

“You don’t have to like her,” I tell him.

“Of course I don’t like her,” he snaps. “You are distracted, always doing stupid shit like swimming and”—he gives an agitated gesture of his hands, as if he cannot believe what he is about to say— “painting her fucking toenails!”

I shrug. “Her fingernails were wet.”

He makes an annoyed sound beneath his breath, scrubbing at his face with one hand. “She is bad for business,” he says, and probably he is right. Katya is bad for business. And maybe I am less attentive to it than I have been to her. “But,” he says, begrudgingly, like this is an admission given despite his better judgement, “she is good for you.”

And this is how I know that regardless of his opinion of her influence upon business, Katya will have his loyalty, too.

Chapter Twenty Six

Catalina

I’ve gotten used to locked doors in Alexei’s house, grown accustomed to a certain curated experience of the rooms available to me. Weeks ago, when I was at my most destructive, it was probably a safety measure. Not just for himself and his staff, but for any valuables that he didn’t want ruined by a pissed off woman determined to cause trouble however she could. It wouldn’t be wise, for example, to provide access to a restaurant-grade kitchen and its impressive selection of knives to a woman who might find herself tempted to stab you.

But after that day at the mall, the doors are open. The rooms are unlocked and available for my exploration.

Most of them, anyway. There’s one I came across that’s down a dark hallway that I suspect leads to the basement. It has a pin pad lock, and no one offers me the code. Based upon the way that the staff tends to avoid that general area, I don’t think I want it.

But what is revealed to me is incredible. Not just rooms where, like the kitchen, a locked door is more convenient than removing dangerous or valuable things found inside, but rooms where the value of the contents is the point.