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“Do you see how this works? Do you see what price you have to pay to get in Yuriy’s good graces? Kill your wife, abuse your children, turn into a fucking rug under his feet, and maybe he’ll grant you some—”
“That’s enough!” Father exclaims, looking at me with his eyes full of rage. “Take her to the basement, I’ll deal with her later.”
“And what are you gonna do? Kill me?” I laugh almost hysterically, drowning in the pain and sorrow overflowing in my chest. Everything feels surreal, and only the tears in my eyes remind me that I’m not in the middle of a nightmare.
“Come on, Sasha, let’s go,” Lev says in a low voice as if he feels some sympathy toward me, but I dig my heels into the floor and fight his grip again.
“No, I’m not going anywhere, I—”
But a sudden gunshot cuts off my words, and I hear screams and curses coming from the hallway. Everyone stills and exchanges a quick glance, unsure what to think of it, until Father gestures at Yar. “Check what’s going on out there.”
“Yes, sir.”
Yar nods, rushes out of the open door, and a moment later a gunshot pierces the hallway—and Yar falls on the ground with a bullet hole in his neck. What the hell? I tense up, staring at the doorway and instinctively trying to move away from the source of unknown danger, but Lev holds me tightly.
“What the fuck?” he murmurs, moving closer—and the next moment, the door bursts open and Louis is leaning on the frame and catching his breath. Oh my god.
It feels like my heart explodes when Louis looks up, catches my gaze, and chuckles, someone else’s blood dripping down his cheek. “Here you are.”
“Who are—”
But I catch Louis’s intentions as soon as he looks at Lev behind me. He raises his gun, I lower my head, and the next moment, Lev’s body jerks backward from the impact. It takes a moment for his grip to get loose, so I stumble back along with him before finally tearing myself free.
My mind is blank when I instinctively grab Lev’s gun from his holster and look around.
I hear Father yelling something at the recruit and the guard, gunshots and male voices deafening me, but I don’t care about them. My eyes focus on Father, on the unhealthy pink of his face, the disgusting fat of his neck, and his pig eyes frantically looking around. He rushes to the desk cupboard, probably to take out his gun, but I reach him first.
I grab his wrist, pushing it away from the desk, and when Father looks at me I finally see fear in his eyes. Good. He should be scared.
“Sasha,” he murmurs with begging notes in his voice, and I feel something in my chest tighten.
God, I’ve known him since the first days of my life. He gave me birthday presents when I was little, he was my first teacher in a fistfight, he used to praise me for my progress and tell me I’d grow up to be the pride of the Travin family. Without him, I wouldn’t have been born—and that would have been better than spending every day with this monster.
For every one of Mom’s tears, for every one of Misha’s bruises, for every curse and punch he’s ever given me, I press my gun to his forehead, take a deep breath, and pull the trigger.
Chapter 13 - Louis
At first, I don’t even realize that there's a gunshot sounding from the other side of the room. My mind is fully focused on the last man hiding behind the desk. I only heard him curse once, but I’m pretty sure it’s the same guy who stopped my car earlier today. Who would’ve thought we’d meet again?
But I take it as a chance to get back at him. I use the desk as a cover as well, so we kneel on both sides of it, waiting for a good chance to catch each other, when a gunshot pierces through the tense silence.
Instead of being startled, my instincts force me to use the momentary distraction and catch the man off guard, so I lunge forward and around the desk, firing at the man. He grits his teeth around a scream and tries to shoot me back, but his aim is way off and he shatters a lamp behind me instead.
“Good shot,” I say with a hoarse chuckle, lying on my side in front of him. “But your thirty seconds have passed.”
I raise my gun and, forcing my mind into focus, shoot him in the middle of his chest. Blood bursts out of the wound, splattering all over my arms, and with a frantic gasp, the man falls back on the floor.
Finally, total silence settles over the room, and I can’t help but roll onto my back, close my eyes, and catch my breath. My muscles are sore and my head is throbbing with the echo of gunshots in my ears. Goddamnit. It’s been a while since I had such a tense evening.
Ever since I shot Nikolai’s guards and stepped onto his property, my mind has been completely focused on wounding and killing everyone standing in my way. It’s as if a switch in my mind turned from protection to aggression, and the only thing I could think about was finding Sasha as soon as possible.
Wait. Sasha! I immediately sit up and look around. Where is she? Is she okay?
I can’t see her at first, and invisible alarms go off in my head, nudging me to jump to my feet and go look for her. But as soon as I stand up, I notice Sasha’s small figure leaning against the wall on the other side of the room with her knees bent in front of her and her head hanging low. Her red hair is covering her face, her gun is lying between her feet, and she looks so lifeless that, for a moment, I feel a rush of terror at the thought that she’s been shot.
“Sasha!” I rush to her, ignoring the nagging soreness in my legs, and crouch in front of her. Only then do I notice the body lying next to Sasha. It’s hard to mistake Nikolai’s enormous figure for anyone else.
He’s on his back and facing away from me, lying in a pool of blood gathering around his head and urine soaking through his pants. Not a single muscle in his body is moving, not a single breath escapes his lips, and even though I can’t see his blank stare, I know the grimace of death well enough to imagine.
