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Chapter 21
“Don’t get up too fast.”
The warning comes as my eyes flutter open to an unfamiliar room. Tension laces my limbs, making them spring into action before I even fully regain consciousness. To run?
Maybe not.
Instead of a cell, I’m on a leather couch in a dimly lit room. Only a faint orange glow illuminates the weathered face of the man crouched beside me. Vanya. A cut on his forehead bleeds freely, and his left eye is partially shut and swelling fast.
Shock erases my panic. “What happened?” I hear myself rasp. But hazy images are already flickering across my mind. Fire. Shouting. Robert’s men.
“It was an ambush,” Vanya says gruffly. He rises to his feet, wincing, and starts to pace. “All I know is the goddamn house was on fire and we were being shot at like fish in a fucking barrel. I swear to god, if that bastard Medvedev—” He breaks off as if remembering I’m here.
“Where’s Mischa?” A part of me steels myself for the obvious. He’s dead.
“Mischa?” Vanya runs his hand across his face. “He’s—”
The sound of squealing tires cuts him off, and Vanya lurches across the room to a window. I crane my neck to follow his gaze, catching the approach of a white van that skids to a stop near a rickety porch. The vehicle door flies open and Mischa jumps out, shouting.
“Ivan! Come help! Now!” His blond hair casts a shadow over his features that makes him appear years older than he is. Blood streaks his jaw, and he looks more predatory than ever. Inhuman. I barely recognize him as he turns and lifts something from the floor of the van.
Make thatsomeone: a body, small and pale. The little girl.
“Mother of God.” Vanya lumbers through the doorway as Mischa races toward the house. Somewhere beyond this room, a door opens, slamming against a firm surface. The floorboards shake as a stampede of men enters the room, led by a frantic Mischa.
“Move!” He lunges toward the couch, placing a small body down beside me, forcing me to my feet.
The girl. All I see is red. In her hair. On her face. Her chest.
My mouth falls open in horror. “What happened?”
“Don’t just fucking stand there!” Mischa cuts his gaze to me, and the ferocity in it takes my breath away. “Help me!”
Instinct guides my motions. I sink to my knees, gritting my teeth against the pain, and reach for the nearest item I can find—a small throw pillow. Wadding it in both fists, I press it to the largest splotch of blood as my mind tries to process the culprit of such a wound.
A knife?
Gun?
I must have asked the question out loud, because Mischa shoves my hands aside, his voice like thunder.
“She was shot. Move!”
His hands tear at the girl’s chest, ripping her shirt away to reveal the true extent of the wound: a gaping hole on her left shoulder, gushing blood. She’s still alive. My eyes track the fluttering motion of the pulse in her throat to ensure that much. But her eyes are closed, her breathing rapid and labored.
“Help me,” Mischa snaps, raking his bloodied hands through his hair. “Fuck…”
There’s no time to think. Plan. Something inside me takes hold and drives me closer to his side, submitting myself to his silent command: apply pressure with a wad of cloth he fished from seemingly nowhere. The girl moans when I press down, her eyelids fluttering.
Gritting his teeth, Mischa barks an order over his shoulder to Vanya. Only after my brain tries to decipher it do I realize he spoke in another language. Russian? Whatever he said makes the older man move in between Mischa and me, forcing me farther from the chaos.
Eventually, I find myself shoved beyond the room entirely, into a hall that opens onto a narrow room containing a bed and little else.
Here, I listen to the noise seeping through the walls. More shouting. Hushed voices. A lone, plaintive, childish cry.
Then nothing. The silence stretches on for what feels like an eternity, broken only by the eerie creaking of the old wood of the house. The stench of dust and musk irritates my nostrils, betraying the fact that this dwelling hasn’t been inhabited in a long time. Another safe house?
I don’t find any clues giving a definitive purpose. Just darkness and empty spaces. Eventually, the sounds of footsteps retreat down the hall and my heart kicks into overdrive. Hesitant, I linger near the door, unsure if I should exit the room myself in search of answers. In the end, the choice is made for me when the door opens from the outside.
