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CHAPTER1
Maya
Someone was following her.
Footsteps attempted to mirror hers, the thud of her flats on the pavement being echoed by a second, slightly heavier sound that was almost perfectly matched to her pace.Almost.A fraction of a second was all it took for her ear to pick up on the dissonance, and now that she’d heard it, she couldn’t ignore it.
The orange glow of the streetlights overhead wouldn’t save her—not on such a quiet street, filled with shadows between the flats she walked by. Terrible things could happen in the shadows. Maya knew that well and she shuddered, not wanting to think about her past.
She paused in one of those shadows. Her back to the wall to give her some protection, Maya squinted into the darkness, hoping to catch a glimpse of her pursuer. The street was silent and empty, which was typical in this neighborhood at this time. Had her pursuer given up on the chase, or was he lying in wait somewhere, biding his time, waiting for her to make a mistake?
“Only one way to find out.” Stepping away from the wall, she continued on, trying to soothe herself with the idea that maybe it had simply been someone else working late and eager to return home. A car drove past, making her jump. A quick glance at the driver had her breathing a sigh of relief. Perhaps her paranoia really was all in her head.
That comforting fantasy vanished when she heard the footsteps again. They were moving faster now. “Dammit!”
Maya curled her fingers into nervous fists and found that her palms were sweaty. Her stomach, already uncomfortably full from the Chinese takeaway she’d eaten during her overtime shift at work, clenched tight with dread. She let a stale breath out of her lungs, then squeezed her eyes shut and summoned what little remained of her courage. Moving swiftly, she ducked into the next alley and bolted, hoping to put space between herself and the man pursuing her.
She didn’t get far.
Beyond the rush of her pulse in her ears and the frightening thoughts flitting through her mind as she ran, Maya heard something else that slowed her, then made her stop entirely. There was a pitiful noise coming from a little deeper in the alley. Someone—a man, by the sounds of it—was in pain.
She looked over her shoulder again, half-expecting to see the light from the main street blotted out by a stocky male outline. But there was nothing. And by the sounds of it, the footsteps had stopped again. She turned her attention back toward the sound and approached carefully, still not fully trusting that it wasn’t some kind of trap. But even if it was, what other choice did she have? She could either progress through the alley and pass the noise, in which case she’d risk being captured if it really was a trap, or she could turn around and face whoever had been following her.
Between a possible trap and a certain confrontation, she’d take her chances on the unknown.
A rusted metal dumpster was placed against the side of the flat on Maya’s right. She held her breath and moved on silently, then poked her head around the far side to see if anyone was there. What she saw made her gasp and jump back. Her heart rattled against her rib cage, begging for escape.
Therewasa man there. She’d only seen his outline in the shadows, but she knewthat she wasn’t imagining things. He’d been positioned over a few errant garbage bags, his body draped in such a way that it almost looked like he was sitting, but his head was rolled to the side in an unnatural fashion. Maya could tell that this wasn’t some drunk or junkie who’d nodded out for the night. There was something else going on here—something sinister.
He made another small noise—a groan. Maya’s stomach twisted with pity, and she stepped back around the dumpster to see if he was okay, resolve suddenly overcoming the fear she’d felt moments before. If he was acting, his performance was spot-on and he deserved to capture her. Maya had never heard a man sound so broken before.
“Hello?” she asked in a small voice. “Can you hear me?”
“…pomogi mne, Mama.”
Maya’s lips parted in shock, but she couldn’t find words to speak. The man was speaking Russian, and he was asking for help.
Was this her father’s doing? That was always her first guess…but in this case, what would be the point? If he’d wanted her trapped, there were easier ways. No, this had to be a coincidence. Right?
She looked down the alley behind her, then back to the man in front of her. “Can you hear me?” she asked.
The man murmured something, but he spoke too softly for her to hear. Heart racing, Maya leaned in close, but he’d quieted down. Was he still conscious? Maya couldn’t see clearly enough to tell. She took her cell phone from her purse and activated her flashlight app.
She gasped.
The man was bleeding heavily from a lump on his head that had become so engorged with fluids that the skin had split open. Blood coated one side of his face almost entirely, and it had trickled down his jaw and neck to soak into the top of his shirt. Maya clutched her phone to her chest, blocking out the light as if doing so would reverse what had happened to him. There was no way she could leave him here, but at the same time, she knew that, if there was any chance her father was involved, calling the police or the ambulance wouldn’t be the best idea.
The men Anatoly Popov involved himself with usually wanted to keep themselves and their actions under the official radar. If thiswashis doing, Maya didn’t want to risk calling attention to herself by bringing this matter to the police. The less she had to do with her father, the better…
But she couldn’t leave a man to die in a pile of trash.
“Hey, um, if you can hear me…hi. I’m Maya.” Maya bit down on her bottom lip. She took the phone from her chest and shone the light at him again, avoiding his face. From the looks of his clothes, he definitely wasn’t a vagrant. “I’m going to help you, okay?Ya pomogu tebe.”
“Galina,” the man uttered. He tried to open his eyes, but blood had clotted over his eyelashes and kept one of his eyes glued shut. The opposite eye only opened a sliver. Maya frowned and reached out for him. She set a tender hand on his arm to let him know that he wasn’t alone, and that she meant no harm.
Galina must be his girlfriend, or his wife…
“No, I’m Maya,” she told him. “Maya.I don’t know a Galina. But I’m still going to help you, and I’m still going to make sure that you’re all right. Can you stand?”
