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“Mr. Volkov?” the doctor calls my name from the double doors that are marked ‘no admittance’. Even I wasn’t able to wedge myself behind the scenes. The small nurse I had threatened had pushed back with a mighty roar.
I cease pacing and stride toward the doctor. He is still wearing his surgeon’s cap, his mask hanging loosely around his neck. Unease crosses his face when he sees me. It’s quickly covered with an air of professionalism he no doubt uses daily. He isn’t the only one to have this reaction to me. My name is notorious around the city. My reputation precedes me.
“My wife?” I question, trying not to let my nerves show. “How is she?” Anton’s leg stops bouncing against the floor as he listens in.
The doctor clears his throat. “Unfortunately, we were unable to save her.” His expression saddens with a shake of his head. “Or the baby. Your wife was very… thorough. She knew what she was doing.”
Of course, she did. It was her plan all along. Of that, I have no doubt. My poor traitorous wife. If she hadn’t killed herself, I would have gladly done it for her. I don’t suffer disloyalty lightly and once the baby was born she would have been buried six feet under alongside that traitorous friend of hers.
“I need you to run a DNA test,” I tell the doctor.
His brow furrows in confusion.
“On your wife?”
I shake my head. “On the baby.”
One more traitorous secret to uncover and a few million to go.
“Adrian,” Dr. Madsen nods at me respectively as he enters the room, carrying a large suitcase. His assistant follows behind with a wheeled refrigerator. Six years ago, he failed to save my wife’s life. Two months later, I hired him to become my family’s personal physician. He often has to work odd hours, but I pay him more than the hospital ever could and he doesn’t have to worry about a board of directors or coloring inside the medical ethics line. He also has more time to be with his wife and children.
“Eric,” I greet him with a curt nod. He approaches the bed, his gaze rolling over Vanya, assessing her with his eyes before he grabs a pair of scissors from his coat pocket and cuts away at her dressing gown. I help him peel away the fabric from her body. It sticks to her skin. I hiss as he removes the fabric from her side, revealing a bullet wound.
The bullet looks as if it ran along her flank. She is lucky. A little more to the left and it would have taken a decent chunk out of her side, possibly even penetrating an organ. As it stands right now, it is a fairly benign wound. She just lost a lot of blood.
The only other wounds I see are superficial bruises and a few abrasions on the soles of her feet. She must have walked barefoot because the soles hold a few deep gashes that will make walking painful for the next few days. I clench my jaw as my heart tightens into a familiar feeling that resembles something akin to pity.
Fuck that. I won’t feel pity for her. Or sadness. This is the life we live. The risk of being born into the mafia. Death comes for us all, and she is no exception.
Madsen takes a syringe from his assistant. The girl is becoming restless, and the more he examines her, the more restless she becomes. He uncaps the needle and pushes it into the meaty part of her shoulder.
“Midazolam,” he tells me. “This will keep her sedated while I take care of her wounds.” I’m not sure why he feels the need to keep me informed until I realize my fists are tightly clenched at my side, and I’ve taken a step toward them. I don’t answer him. Stepping back, I loosen my fist, letting the blood pump back into the digits as I watch him remove several instruments from his luggage case. His assistant is in the corner prepping a bag of blood.
My gaze slides over Vanya’s naked, bloodied body.
She’s grown in the last six years. The awkward, braces-wearing girl I once knew is gone. Replaced by a woman with full breasts and hips. Her skin is pale, a stark contrast against her raven hair and pouty red lips. She has the face of an angel. Almost fragile looking, but her toned muscles and abdomen say that she’s not as breakable as she looks.
Artemis.The Greek Goddess of the Hunt. That is who she reminds me of. A fiery juxtaposition of fierce and vulnerable. She’d been my wife’s best friend since childhood. They’d grown up together in her house. But Vanya was a mafia princess, bred for royalty. Ada had been her playmate.
I’d been naïve to think that marrying outside of the mafia meant I wouldn’t have to worry about my wife having an ulterior motive. Mafia princesses are snakes in the grass. Greedy reptiles ready to strike out whenever they can. They all have agendas. If not for themselves then for their families. All they care about is the ladder they need to climb. I thought Ada had been different. I’d believed she truly loved me.
She was just another disappointment.
My phone rings, pushing me from my bitter memories.
“Yeah,” I answer gruffly.
“You will not believe this shit,sobrat,” Anton sighs. “They’re all dead.”
The way he saysthey’returns my stomach. “Her entire family?”
Anton snorts mirthlessly. “The entire household,” he says. “Everyone who lives on the premises. The guards, the maids, the cooks… everyone.”
Who the hell kills an entire household of people?
“It’s a trained hit, too,” he continues. “This isn’t some bullshit amateur. The servants’ quarters look as if whoever did this released a cyanide capsule and locked them in the lower levels.”
Khristos.
