Page 8

VLAD

PRESENT DAY

" S he's home," Maxim tells me on the phone, and I let out a deep breath.

She's safe.

As safe as she can be. And as far away from me as possible.

"You really did it this time," Vanya quips from a corner, swinging her legs up and down on a chair.

"Go away, Vanya," I tell her, not in the mood for anything.

"She's going to hate you, you know," she continues, and I feel my ire rising.

"GO AWAY!" I yell at her, my eyes widening at my own outburst.

Vanya's expression mirrors my own as tears gather in the corners of her eyes. And just like that, she's gone.

I slump in my chair, wishing I could erase the day from my mind. Hell, wishing I could forget everything.

Sisi.

The moment I'd opened my eyes and seen her… Seen the magnitude of what I'd caused, a bottomless pit had formed inside of my stomach, making me unable to process anything else.

I could only see the prints of my palms around her neck, the gaping wound at her shoulder, bleeding and bleeding…

And then…

I close my eyes, the image too much. Her naked body had been riddled with bruises, fingerprints and red marks I'd caused on her skin. I'd seen them on her thighs, her hips… her breasts.

"Lord," I groan out loud, the ugly bite mark on her breast threatening to make me sick.

But then there had been the worst of all. The blood between her legs. The same blood staining my cock and letting me know exactly what I'd done.

I could have killed her.

Bleakness overtakes me as I realize this is truly the end. I'd allowed myself to believe I could be saved, and in the process I'd damned her too.

Fuck, but the sight of her so battered, so broken had killed something within me. For all my claims of unfeelingness, seeing her like that had shattered me.

I pick up the blood streaked hair I'd salvaged from the floor, my fingers tightening around the strands as I bring them to my nose, inhaling.

"Sisi…" I whisper, wishing for the first time that things were different, that I were normal and deserving of her.

The thought of never seeing her again causes such a deep agony within me that I don't know how I'll manage. It feels constricting to breathe just imagining a day without her, but a future?

Slowly rising from my chair, I go to the bathroom, carefully washing the hair and placing it in a safe space so it can dry.

The last thing I'll ever touch of hers…

But I can't regret my decision. Not when I'd almost killed her. Certainly, I'd defiled her in the worst manner possible, the vision of her bloody thighs, or the gaping wound at her throat threatening to make me ill.

And then there's her expression when I'd lied through my teeth, hurting her where I knew she would hurt. Because I knew that my brave, beautiful Sisi would never leave me unless I left her first. She would staunchly withstand everything until I actually killed her.

And I can't have that.

For the first time in my life I value a human life, and I find that in order to preserve it, I'd do anything.

"Stupid," I whisper to myself, slowly bringing my head against the wall, the impact barely tickling the surface of my skin. "Stupid," I repeat, pushing my head even harder into the wall, wanting the pain–needing the pain.

But it doesn't come. Not even when my skin breaks and blood pools down my forehead.

There's simply no outward pain, not as there is inward, my chest constricting with a foreign feeling.

So I just bang my head against the wall, the knowledge of the pain I'd caused her my main impetus.

"Why?" I rasp, bringing my fists forward. "Why can't I be normal?" I cry out, tired of this existence… tired of everything around me.

"Why can't she be mine?" The words tumble from my mouth as I fall to the floor.

I'd never wanted something for myself, never craved anything like I did her. She was the one person who welcomed me with open arms, the only one to ever see me . The one person who made me feel human.

And I almost killed her.

My eyes feel damp, from blood or tears I have no clue. Not when all I can think about is my barren future without her.

"Why can't she be mine?" I throw the question to the universe, already knowing the answer.

You don't deserve her. You never have.

And yet I had her. For a few brief moments, she was mine and I was hers.

I'm still hers, but she'll never be mine again.

I'd never wanted to hurt her. Hell, I'd treated her with kid gloves, afraid that my brutish nature would scare her away and make her realize just how not normal I was. And I'd been so careful.

Damn, but I'd been so careful. I'd denied myself countless times when all I wanted was to slide inside her slick heat, get lost in that luscious body of hers… finally make her mine.

But I'd refrained, because it would have caused her pain.

And I never wanted to cause her pain.

I can't help as the images of her battered body flood my mind, the fact that I'd taken her like an animal making me want to end my own wretched existence.

Flashbacks dance before my eyes. Small snippets of me thrusting into her like a beast, her cries of pain as she'd tried to stop me, her small hands pushing at my shoulders when I'd been too rough.

"Sisi," I groan, fear, desperation, and desolation brewing inside of me, growing to such a crescendo that I start trembling uncontrollably. My entire body starts shaking, my vision blurry as everything comes crashing down.

I failed her. I failed her. I failed her.

"Fuck," I curse out, feeling myself slip, voices crowding my head, my pulse skyrocketing as more and more foreign thoughts seek to drive me insane.

I don't know how I stumble out of the bathroom, heading straight for my secret cabinet and taking out a sedative, injecting it in my veins.

Her face is the last thing I see. Her beautiful, beautiful face. The most beautiful I've ever seen, really. Her outline starts to take shape in front of me. My eyes droopy, I can only watch her in rapture.

"Hell girl," I reach out, clear air greeting me. "I'm sorry." I finally say the words she deserves to hear.

"I wish I were normal," I mumble, my body slowly shutting down. "Then I'd be able to love you too."

And then there's only blackness.

"How much time are you going to spend moping around?" Vanya asks as I drag one of the bodies to the back for Maxim to deal with.

"I'm not moping," I mutter under my breath.

"You are. This week alone you killed what ten people? Twenty?"

"More like fifty," I mumble, and she raises an eyebrow at me.

"They all deserved it," I tell her, "they've been coming after me for revenge one after another. What am I supposed to do? Welcome them with open arms?"

"Maybe." She shrugs, coming to my side to study the results of my latest episode. "Since you clearly have a death wish. You know very well that now you're everyone's target. Yet you stopped carrying a weapon around. If that's not suicidal, then I don't know what is."

"What can I say? My skills defy any weapons," I say smugly, but she jabs her elbow in my side, pointing to my new wound.

"Sure, then what is that ?"

"I don't remember. Someone must have stabbed me during the last fight." I shrug, tugging my shirt up to reveal a nasty looking cut under my ribs. Almost like a ticklish sensation, I can barely feel it.

"One of these days you're just going to bleed out." She shakes her head at me, dragging me to the first aid kit.

"Wouldn't that be a mercy?" I whisper softly.

It's been three weeks since the warehouse incident, and all I've done has been courting death, but with no real result. After all, my self-preservation instinct flares up every time, and even if I want to, I can't go down.

"You need to take care of yourself, brother," Vanya says, worry shining in her eyes. "Remember your promise," she reminds me, and I close my eyes, sighing.

All I've been doing in the last weeks has been forgetting my promise. I'd been so bent on doing everything possible to escape the confinement of my own body that I'd completely disregarded my promise of revenge.

"You're right, Vanya," I concede. "I need to get my head back in the game."

"One might say you need to get your head out of the game. Stop killing people for a second and interrogate them. Remember what Oleg said?"

Her question gives me pause, and I replay the events of the day, wincing as I do because those memories contain her… But Vanya's right. Oleg had intimated that I'd upset some important people.

"You think they have something to do with Project Humanitas?"

"Maybe." Vanya shrugs, urging me to pick up a bandage. "But it's worth looking into it."

"You're right," I agree.

Taking some of the gauze, I start wiping the blood from the wound, noting it's not as shallow as I'd previously thought. I clean and disinfect it, but I'll likely need stitches.

"Call Sasha," Vanya tells me, but I just shake my head.

"I got this," I answer, taking a surgical needle and thread.

I pull the needle through my skin, stitching the two sides together.

My stitches may not be as clean as Sasha's, but they work.

After all, who cares if my body becomes even more disfigured than it already is?

I'd only cared what one person thought of it and…

I close my eyes, taking a deep breath.

I'd tried so hard not to think of her during this time, but the downsides of having a close to perfect memory is that I can recall in detail all our interactions… the way her skin felt on mine, or how her simple presence calmed me.

This isn't working.

I jab the needle harder into my skin, wishing I could hurt the same way I hurt her. But still nothing. The most I feel is a light caress.

"Vlad?" Vanya calls out to me, and it takes me a moment to react. "Vlad!"

"Yes," I mumble, raising my head to look at her.

"What's wrong with you?" she asks, narrowing her eyes at me.

"I don't know what you mean." I say, quickly finishing up sewing myself back together and putting everything back into its place. Turning my back to Vanya, I concentrate my attention on the pile of bodies at the end of the room.

"You're different," she notes, "there's something different about you."

"V, come on," I feign a chuckle, "I'm the same maniac bastard I was before," I joke, but she doesn't reply. She's just watching me closely, the scrutiny in her gaze a little unnerving.

"I should probably burn the bodies," I say out loud, steering the discussion into comfortable territory.

"It's her, isn't it?" Vanya shrewdly points out, coming to my side and forcing me to answer.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"It is her," she affirms. But just then Maxim enters the room with a cart. He starts piling the bodies inside before going to the furnace to burn them.

"You're not getting rid of me." Vanya follows me around to my room.

"Don't I know that?" I mutter, the irony oddly amusing.

"It's her. That's why you're different."

"Let it go, V. I don't want to talk about it." My voice is weary, and as I open my drawer to take out the sedative, all I can think of is forgetting.

Jabbing the needle in my veins, I can hear Vanya saying more things, calling me out for my behavior, yet as I slowly succumb to peace, her face starts appearing in front of me.

And I finally feel light again.