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“Maxim,” he says. “Your father. He wants you.” He looks past me to Feliks.
Feliks nods to Oleg. “Go on, brother. I’ll take care of things here.”
“Thank you, Feliks.” I step out. Oleg frowns, but says nothing as I close the door behind me. At least Feliks will make sure Siena knows what’s going on, because I was too weak to do it myself. He’ll make sure they don’t hurt her, as much as he can anyway.
Oleg leads the way, down the spiral staircase to the first floor. I think of all the things I can say that might buy her some time. That might save her life. We move through a side door and into the sitting room. Guards are stationed at all four corners.
Don Bastone is sitting on a chair with his son Enzo at his elbow. Enzo looks pale and drawn and doesn’t raise his head up when I enter. He only stares at the floor.
Don Bastone’s face twists into a sneer.
I don’t pay him any mind.
Father’s standing near the fireplace. He’s looking at the painting. It’s a piece done in oils from the seventeenth century depicting an old Russian farmstead in Siberia. Father insists that’s the farm our family is descended from, but that can’t possibly be true. He bought the damn thing at an auction at Christie’s for six million dollars.
But the story’s what matters. The Novalov family was born in ice and snow. We suffered for our food and nearly starved a thousand times, but we survived. Those harsh Siberian winters forged our family into iron, and now we dominate through the strength of our will and our arms. That’s the story Father wants to believe, even if we all know it’s a lie.
Like so much of my world.
“Father,” I say, nodding as he turns. “Don Bastone. Enzo.”
The men nod back. Don Bastone’s sneer turns wicked.
“Hello, Maxim,” he says. “It seems I’ve caught your father unaware.”
I resist the urge to strangle him and turn away.
“Father,” I say, stepping forward.
But he interrupts me. His tone is icy cold like a frozen knife jabbed into my throat. His face is a mask of cold fury. He controls himself well but I know his looks. I know he wants to break my neck and leave me for dead.
“Don’t call me that. I am your Pakhan. I am not your father.”
I am not your father.
Those words reverberate through my skull and rip me to pieces with their razor-sharp implications.
I am not your father.
I’ve built my entire world on that fact. My self-esteem, my work ethic, my outlook on life is all based on the fact that my family takes the idea of bloodlines extremely seriously, and I am not a blood descendent of my father. I know this, we all know this, and yet hearing him say it like that breaks my heart into a million pieces.
I feel like a child again, like that stupid, desperate teenager I used to be, fighting harder, working harder, being more vicious and ruthless than anyone else, all for his approval.
I am not your father.
I harden myself. I push it all down and away. I summon the image of Siena again—bending over, shy smile—and a surge of anger swells up to buoy me against my father’s scorn.
“Very well. Pakhan.”
He nods once. “Don Bastone told me an interesting thing about your relationship with his daughter. It seems that you made a deal with him.”
“Yes, Pakhan. I did.” There’s no lying now. There’s no dancing around the truth. It’s time to own my mistake for what it is.
A betrayal of my family.
“Who gave you that authority?”
“Nobody, Pakhan. I acted on my own initiative.”
