Page 101 of Bad Bishop

“When did she die?”

“Before I was born.”

“How is that possible?”

“Tierney and I were carved out of her body while she was still alive when she was thirty-eight weeks pregnant. They kidnapped us and left her to bleed out. They left Fintan behind, too.”

My stomach lurched and rolled, twisting around my lunch, threatening to purge it.

“Who were they? Why did they do that?”

“The Bratva. Igor, more specifically. My father’s business rival back in the day. They competed over large swaths of Europe’s ports. Spain. Greece. Croatia. Da thought he was being ambushed at a port one day. Drew his pistol and aimed straight to the head. He thought it was a Bratva soldier. Turned out to be Igor’s late wife, Luba. She came to speak to him personally, try to reason with him to strike a deal with her husband. She died. So Igor decided to take the most precious thing to him—his unborn children—killing my mam in the process.”

“Why didn’t he take Fintan?”

“Fin hid in the closet and didn’t come out until he was sure the house was empty. Afterward, he sat there, in her blood, waiting for my father to show up. It fucked him up. They flew Tierney and me to Siberia, where we grew up until we managed to escape when we were fourteen.”

Now it all made sense. The twins grew up in a work camp. They learned ASL because their supervisors wouldn’t let them speak freely—and because they didn’t want to be understood.

They’d been tortured. Sexually abused. Shaped into killing machines.

Funny, how I always thought I held the deepest, darkest secret. That my journey was the toughest, longest, most twisted. My childhood, in comparison to Tiernan’s, was a walk in the park.

Tears rimmed my eyes. I didn’t let them loose.

“How did you run away?”

“I formed a close relationship with Igor’s son, Alex. We were about the same age.” He smiled morbidly. “Igor raised his children in the camp to toughen them up, so we did everything together—trained, ate from the same plate, went through the same physical and psychological terror. I’d gained Alex’s trust, and little by little, found out everything I needed to escape. The codes to the gates. Where they kept the keys to the doors. Maps of the area. Escape routes. It took us years to collect all this data and form it into a plan.”

“So how did you end up in North Africa?” I remembered Tierney’s mention of it.

“We had to erase our footprints and travel in a convoluted way. Besides, we weren’t sure where Da and Fintan were. We were told they never bothered looking for us. That wasn’t true. My father fought tooth and nail trying to get us back. Igor told him we never made it past infancy. But we found him, anyway.”

“Does this mean you were raised Russian?” I blinked in confusion. “You speak the language? Know the customs?”

“Yes, and yes. Russian is my first language. English is my second.” He used his index finger to sweep the stout’s foam from the pint, popping it into his mouth. “Once we found our way to Da and Fin, we caught up on everything Irish. There was alanguage barrier at first. We decided to move to New York after a few weeks. Fresh start. By the time I set foot in Hunts Point, everyone mistook me for a born-and-bred Irishman.”

“It took you a few weeks to learn English and sound like an Irishman?”

“I’m a fast learner.”

“More like a genius.”

“Your words, not mine.”

I could hardly breathe I was so choked up on my emotions. Now it all made sense. Why he killed Igor. Why he kept his skull, hollowed out on his office desk, serving as a pen holder. Why Alex was next on his list. The Bratva—theRasputins—robbed him of his mother, his childhood, his future, hishappiness.

“Our names were the only thing Igor allowed us to keep,” Tiernan said. “It was Christmastime when he came for us, and Ma hung ornaments with our names on the tree. Igor kept the ornaments to taunt us with them.”

I reached across the table, clutching his hand. I was so sick to my stomach I was afraid I’d vomit my own heart.

“Don’t feel sorry for me, Lila.” He pulled away, his words an order, not a request. “I’m not that boy anymore. I shed my former self like a snake’s skin, leaving it in the dust of my own tragedy. It’s Tierney I worry about.” He worked his jaw back and forth. “A part of her stayed in Siberia.”

“How do you mean?”

“She self-destructs.”

“And you don’t?”