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“Find a way to buy Kostya seven hours, and we’ll take care of it,” she heard Roman say.
The screen blinked off even as Maya nodded.
Seven hours was too long, but Maya could think of no other way to save the man she loved. She’d find a way. Kostya’s life depended on it.
CHAPTER20
Kostya
Kostya’s skin was clammy, beaded with sweat from exposure to staggering humidity. Each breath he took was labored. It wasn’t the first time he’d felt like this—his encounter in the alley had left him the same degree of battered—but the air was different here than it had been out on the open London streets. Despite the stink of garbage, it had been easier to breathe where he’d been left before.
He recognized the weight in the air and the dank, moldy scent it carried. He’d been brought inside a building, maybe a warehouse, that lacked climate control and had been left to deteriorate.
It didn’t take him long to piece the puzzle together.
He’d intended to force Anatoly Popov out of the car and apprehend him in the very building Maya had been petitioning to have turned into her homeless shelter. But the Svodnik had been prepared and had turned the tables on him instead. He’d apparently brought Kostya inside the very building that Kostya had intended to use to imprisonhimwithin until Maya arrived and decided what to do with him.
How fitting.
Kostya opened his eyes and blinked against the blinding light of day. His head throbbed with a dull, pulsing pain that made it hard to think. A trickle of something wet ran down the back of his scalp and onto his neck. Blood? He wasn’t sure. There was no way to check if his suspicions were correct—his arms had been locked behind the back of the chair he sat on with zip ties that dug into his wrists. His shoulders were nearly overextended. If he struggled, he’d risk dislocation.
The Svodnik knew what he was doing.
As Kostya’s vision cleared, the warehouse came into view. Its unfinished cement floors were desperately in need of attention. Its walls were solid and appeared stable, but badly needed to be treated for mold. If this remained Maya’s pick for her shelter, she had her work cut out for her.
But when had she ever gone for the easiest option? Kostya knew her well enough now to understand that she mercilessly pursued whatever it was she wanted, regardless of the obstacles in her way. If this was her ideal building, for whatever reason, he knew she would make it work.
Not that it would matter much. If her father got his way, cleaning the mold out of here wouldn’t be Maya’s greatest obstacle to setting up a workable shelter. The fact that all of Kostya’s blood was still inside of his body, rather than decorating the space already, was nothing short of a miracle.
Why was Popov keeping him alive?
“Ah, the little doggy has woken up from his nap,” the Svodnik mused from a few feet behind Kostya, speaking in Russian. His footsteps echoed through the empty warehouse. From the singular set of footsteps Kostya heard, he had reason to believe that the older man was alone. “The Mad Dog has been collared. How does it feel to be the one coming up short?”
Kostya closed his eyes and focused on drawing breath. He didn’t deign to answer the man.
“I must admit, it was a courageous—if stupid—plan to catch me while I was most vulnerable. It’s a shame that you couldn’t execute your plan in the way you wanted.” His footsteps came to a stop. Kostya could only imagine the smirk on his face. “That you couldn’t executeme.”
The tactics the Svodnik was using now were similar to ones Kostya had used in the past while torturing captives. Words had a way of getting under the skin and driving men mad in the way that blades and bullets didn’t. What started off as mild irritation would, over time, become more brutal. Kostya wasn’t skilled at lies or manipulation, but he could use the truth as a weapon just as effectively as his fists, describing what he intended to do until the fear of it was as debilitating as any actual blow. This man would attempt to tear into his conscious mind and render it in two before he ever touched him physically, it seemed.
Kostya would not let him. He would rather shut himself down than suffer that.
“And now, here you are…the first of the young Sokolovs to succumb to my might. Isn’t it strange how life works? Out of all your brothers, I wouldn’t have guessed you would be the first to fall victim to me. I’d expected Viktor to fall next, but alas, Elena—” Popov clicked his tongue. His footsteps grew heavier as they echoed through the warehouse then, marking his passage from Kostya’s side to a place right in front of him. “My youngest appears to have fallen under a spell. But no matter. I will return her to my fold soon enough, and she will pay for her transgressions against me. I have several bidders interested in acquiring Elena for their personal use. She will fetch a high price.”
Kostya fought to keep a poker face. While he didn’t like the youngest Popov sister, he abhorred human trafficking and wouldn’t wish that life on any woman. The fact that Popov was so willing to turn one of his own daughters over as punishment filled him with revulsion and he wished he hadn’t made that promise to Maya. This man didn’t deserve to live.
Clicking his tongue again, Popov continued, “Just as there is a woman standing behind every successful man, there is a woman responsible for every man’s downfall, as well. My sweet Maya has made you soft, which I admit, surprised me. I never once thought to bring you two together. Had I known how effective it would be, I would have done it a long time ago. No, she managed to do it all on her own. I’ll have to thank her for all she’s done for me. Do you think she’d enjoy a token of our time together, today? Perhaps, your fingers on a key chain?” The Svodnik chuckled, “I know, your severed head to grace her mantle.”
Kostya couldn’t help it; he wrenched his head up and snarled at Popov. He tried to lunge forward, but the zip ties held firm, and all he succeeded in doing was hurting himself.
No one would hurt Maya like that.No one.
Popov laughed. “Oh, to be young and full of life. What a shame.”
“If you hurt her, I swear I’ll find a way to return that suffering to you a thousand times worse.”
“From beyond the grave?” the older man chuckled. “You don’t actually think you’re going to be leaving here alive, do you, little doggy? I know what’s going to happen as well as you do. I’ll offer you a chance to prove yourself, and you’ll betray my trust. I’ll have no choice but to kill you.”
Kostya didn’t fear his own death. From early childhood, he’d understood the nature of his family’s business. He was disposable. Being a Sokolov didn’t guarantee his safety. But to think that Maya might suffer because of him, or that she might be cursed with a similar fate because she’d opened her heart to him…that scared him more than anything had in the past.
