Page 26 of Her Darkest Possession

"But what if?—"

"No," Svetlana cuts me off firmly. "No 'what ifs.' Have faith in your husband. If anyone can find Amara, it's him."

"It's not that I don't have faith in him," I say, twisting my fingers together in my lap. "It's that I'm afraid."

Svetlana's eyes narrow. "What are you afraid of?"

I hesitate, glancing first at the door, then back at Svetlana's face, and finally out the window, where the weak morning light glimmers off the surface of the sea in the distance.

"I'm afraid it won't be enough for me," I admit quietly.

"What do you mean by that, silly girl?"

I take a deep breath, and slowly, the words that I've buried deep inside of me since that awful day two years ago finally start emerging.

"There's this part of me that's vengeful and angry and bitter," I say. "And that part somehow comes alive when I'm with Anatoly. And as much as I don't want to admit it… When I indulge that part of myself... I feelgood."

I finally gather enough strength to look back at her. There's no judgment in her eyes as she listens, and that's enough for me to keep going.

"I know I won't be satisfied with just bringing Amara back," I confess. "I want to hurt whoever took her. And I'm afraid that the more I ask Anatoly to do things for me, the more I'll be drawn toward a darkness that I'm not sure I can walk back from."

Svetlana considers my words carefully, her fingers absently tracing the edge of her bandage.

"Tolya is happy to do those things for you," she says finally. "And if he's happy to do them, perhaps you can be happy with him doing them."

I shake my head. "My entire life, I've believed I'm a good person. A good person to whom bad things have happened. What if all this proves I'm not really a good person after all? What if Ideservedall these terrible things?"

"Then you should be even more glad that you have someone like Tolya to avenge you of those terrible things," Svetlana replies without hesitation.

"But what if he hurts the wrong person? Because of me?"

"He won't," Svetlana says firmly. "He won't hurt the wrong personbecauseyou are a good person who has been wronged in the most awful way. You know right from wrong, and you know that when you set him loose against the world, you do so with righteousness in your heart. With you by his side, he becomes an extension of your goodness, and not the absence of it."

"But what if I make a mistake?" My voice trembles.

"You won't." Svetlana reaches for my hand and squeezes it tightly. "Because you love him. And when you trust in that love, you will never be wrong."

8

ANATOLY

The doorto my office opens, and I look up to see Indigo standing in the doorway.

She's changed into a loose sweater and leggings since coming home, and her hair—a mix of blue at the tip and red at the roots—hangs loosely around her shoulders.

"Anything?" she asks, her voice quiet but steady.

"Roma is working every contact we have," I reply. "The Volkovs are keeping their lips sealed, but I have an idea for where we might start."

She approaches, one hand unconsciously resting on her stomach, and she hesitates for a moment before she sinks into the chair across from me.

"Tell me." She sinks into the chair across from me.

"Our best lead is Grisha," I tell her. "He's recently been released from police custody, and he's trackable. Taras might want to avoid provoking an escalation he can't afford by hurting Amara,but Lola won't. And if I know Lola, then she'll have her brother do the dirty work her father will forbid her from doing."

Indigo nods. One look, and I know that she agrees with my assessment, but there's no mistaking the fear in her eyes. She's scared of what Grisha might do. And it's not altogether an unfounded fear either.

Grisha has always been a loose fucking cannon. In fact, half of the problems the Volkovs keep running into over the years are directly caused by his recklessness and his propensity to shoot first and ask questions later.