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“Let’s talk.” I guide Eden into my office, closing the door behind us.
“I don’t like treating her that way,” she says, frowning at nothing. “But it might be necessary.” Away from her uncle and Pavel, Eden lowers her guard and lets her true emotions out. And so do I.
“Your uncle is right. You’ve changed, Eden,” I reply. “I hate what the Bratva has done to you— your innocence, it’s disappearing.”
Ignoring me, she changes the subject. “It went well, the meeting, I mean.”
I chuckle. “You mean no one was shot.”
Eden winces slightly, and I’m quickly reminded of Anton’s death. She lost her mother too early to remember what separation feels like. Unfortunately, I experience it on a regular basis and have become locked away from my grief. She walks over to the slightly open drawer in the bookshelf where I keep my laptop and frowns at the straightened paperclip lying on the floor.
“We can still find a way to make a truce with the Lanzzare, can’t we?” she says. “Uncle Vito offered you a property.”
I refrain from laughing, though I smirk. “Truce? For a worthless property that was once my father’s?” I scoff bitterly. “We have to remain on guard always. The hate won’t be forgotten quickly, even if Zakhar absolves them.”
Eden looks at me, her gold hazel eyes searching for a sign of hope. I know she wants to believe that there is some inside me, but hatred will always remain deep beneath the surface. Scratch it hard enough, and the venom will spew out again.
It’s not just her innocence that’s been lost.
She looks away and sits down heavily on the couch. Her faith in the possibility of a new future is slowly dying as the feud lumbers on.
“Love will have to be enough,” she murmurs, pretending she hasn’t changed. “It has to be.”
“Love can be a powerful thing.” I sit beside her and take her hand. “But it can also be dangerous. Your very existence is proof of that, especially when it’s tainted by revenge.” My jaw tightens at the memory of how Zakhar nearly ended our lives at the altar so he could avenge his own loss. “Zakhar has let revenge impair his reason.”
“And you haven’t?” she asks softly.
She’s right, but I cannot bear to admit it to her.
“I have to protect us from his madness,” I tell her instead. “I have to give the kill order, Eden.”
“Will you hunt him until he’s dead?”
“Not if he goes underground again and remains there.” I lean back on the couch, pulling her into my arms. “But I’m afraid he won’t give us what we want.” I place my hand on her belly, determined to reassure my child that nothing bad will ever happen to it.
The city lights gradually blink on at dusk and cast shadows into the room that seem to darken our souls. It’s impossible to ward the shadows away. I know they won’t let me forget them. I can’t help but notice the change in Eden, the way her eyes are alert, as if she also senses the darkness closing in.
“Is there really no hope for a truce, Nikolai?” She lifts her head to look me in the eye. “Can’t we find a way to end this without losing another life?”
I kiss her forehead and avoid giving her a brutal answer. The truth is I’m not certain if I want a truce. Matvei’s death hardened my compassion. It made me the man my father wanted me to become. My thirst for revenge is an all-consuming blaze of hate as devastating as Zakhar’s. The only thing that stops it is Eden—and realizing that Zakhar and I are one and the same is a frightening thought.
A truce is a fragile thing, but death is lasting. And it’s easier to get.
Mercy’s shouts travel through the thick doors and gradually fade as she’s led away. Some brave soul has released the Kraken and is taking her back upstairs.
“Family can change a person,” Eden answers our thoughts out loud. “It can bring out the worst in us.”
“Or the best,” I counter, thinking about our baby growing inside her. “But when it comes to the Lanzzare, I don’t know if a truce can exist. Not after everything that’s happened.”
“Maybe we can find Mercy a Bratva husband.” She smirks at her bad joke. “Maybe two marriages will do what one can’t.”
Pavel’s voice carries through the thick door. A string of Russian that I’m thankful Eden cannot understand, followed by a shriek from Mercy. And a flood of footsteps up the spiral stairs.
Despite the chaos, I need these talks with Eden. But I watch her forehead furrow in distress, and I realize that the greatest threat to our love might not be the Bratva or the Mafia—it might be me.
“Will our love suffer, Nikolai?” The question hangs in the air. “When the danger is gone?”
“Love has a way of surviving,” I reply, and my words sound hollow. “But that doesn’t mean it won’t be tested.”
