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Well, I’ll stop going on!
Love,
Emmy
12/1
Dear Ivan,
It has been a long time since I’ve heard from you…I hope you’re okay? Again, I know your job is dangerous, so I worry when I don’t hear from you. I have debated asking Katya if you’re alright because I know she can get a hold of people who can find out.
Everything is fine over here, just getting ready for our Christmas concert again. They are putting it on television this year—just cable access, but it’s kind of exciting.
I have to ask. Is the reason you haven’t responded because I was a little too mushy in my last email? I know I’ve been writing “Love, Emmy” but that wasn’t meant to be taken literally.
Anyway, I hope you are doing well and staying safe.
Sincerely,
Emmy
2/7
Dear Ivan,
I’m going to stop writing, I feel like I’m bothering you. I asked Katya about you, and she said you’re still in Russia and doing fine as far as she knows. I think she gets her information from her roommate, who gets it from Drago. I understand why you wouldn’t want to spend your time corresponding with someone you probably think of as a kid. Thank you so much for listening to me and responding at all. Having a little bit of a sounding board has been helpful, it made me feel like I had this guardian angel listening and sometimes guiding me. I hope you stay safe.
Take care,
Emmy
Prologue II
Drago
Present day - 8 months later
Kicking back in my chair, my eyes drifted around the party. We were all gathered in Nikolai’s girlfriend Hannah’s backyard celebrating Nikolai’s birthday. I was confident Hannah’s mother had no idea how many dangerous men were sitting in her lawn chairs drinking beer. Or maybe she did. We didn’t exactly blend in.
I had half an ear on the conversation, while my attention frequently drifted to whatever Katya was doing. It was hard to keep my attention off her. Her gaze often drifted to me, but almost as often it landed on her brother, Ivan. She worried about him. Her worries quickly became mine. I was considering how to deal with the issue when a particular question ripped my focus away from her.
“Hey, any news on that Russian fuck?” Garrett Callahan asked, walking back from the coolers with another round of drinks for us.
Four Russians snapped their heads in his direction, scowling heavily.
Callahan laughed. “Not you Russian fucks, the guy that was working with Yuri. Jesus, he was a crazy bastard.”
“Orlov?” I asked.
“Yeah, that guy. I come across a lot of psychos in this line of work, but never one like that guy. He was serial killer crazy. And he was fucking obsessed with some girl—couldn’t stop talking about her. Rambled about her all the time. Felt bad for her considering how fucked up he was.”
“Katya?”
Callahan took a sip of his beer and shook his head. “No, some other girl.” He snorted. “He knew better than to fixate on Katya, especially around Yuri.”
While I couldn’t care less about some girl that Orlov had a crush on, something about this tugged at me. “Do you remember the name of the girl?”
Callahan sighed and tipped his head back, trying to recollect what must have seemed like irrelevant chatter from an irritating psychopath at the time. “Annie? Emma? Something like that.”