Page 11 of Mafia King’s Broken Vow (New York Bratva #5)

WHAT WE CARRY

YAKOV

T he footsteps are too soft for a guard. Too hesitant for Mila. Whoever it is, they pause—three seconds of uncertainty—then knock like they’re not entirely sure they’re welcome.

Then the voice.

“Uncle Yakov?”

My spine straightens before I can stop it.

Damien.

It’s a name I’ve said only in silence, a ghost I’ve held at a distance. I cross the room in four strides, pulling my face into something passable before I open the door.

He’s smaller than I imagined. Slight for his age, with pressed navy slacks and a school crest embroidered neatly over his blazer pocket. His shoes are polished. His hair carefully combed. He clutches a chess set under one arm.

Behind him, a tall man stands watch, one of Alex Sokolov’s people, judging by the stance and the subtle bulge under his jacket. He gives me a stiff nod, more obligation than respect.

“You have two hours,” the guard says, not moving from the door.

I don’t respond. My attention is on the boy.

“Damien,” I say. The name tastes strange out loud. “This is unexpected.”

He studies me with cautious curiosity. There’s no fear in him, just quiet evaluation. He doesn’t look like a boy meeting a monster. He looks like someone trying to decide whether the stories were true.

“Father said I could come,” he says. “He said you’re not dangerous anymore.”

I huff out a sound that isn’t quite a laugh. “Did he, now?”

“He also said you might play chess with me. If I brought my own board.” He lifts it slightly. “He said…you’d be a good teacher.”

Of course he did. Igor never does anything without calculation. This is a test. Of me. Of the boy. Of the story they want to write next.

I step back, holding the door wider. “Come in.”

Damien walks past me with that open, self-possessed confidence kids have when they haven’t learned to be afraid of the wrong things yet. His eyes sweep the room. Something his father would do. But the shape of them, that’s Ana. Same shade, same soul.

The guard takes position just inside the door, silent and still.

I motion to the sitting area. “Shall we?”

Damien nods and kneels to unpack the chess set—the one I sent for his seventh birthday. Custom-made, just like I’d requested. He handles the marble pieces carefully, arranging them with exact precision. It’s unsettling how much of her is in him.

“Grandpa says I’m meticulous,” he whispers without looking up. “He said that’s how Mother was.”

My throat tightens. I cross the room and take the seat across from him.

“She was,” I manage. “She used to rearrange the entire bookshelf if one title was out of place. Drove me insane.”

Damien glances up, surprised by the detail. Hungry for it. Of course he is. Igor didn’t know Anastasiya well enough to tell stories like this. They were a quick fling that cost my sister her life.

That left a child without a mother.

“What else do you remember?”

Too much. Everything. What do I tell him first?

“She was smart,” I say. “She loved patterns. Shapes. She could see how things fit together before anyone else did. Always three steps ahead. Like chess…only faster.”

He smiles at that and moves a pawn. “I always start with this one.”

I nod and mirror the move.

“You’re trying to trick me,” he says with a grin, squinting at the board. “Right?”

“Maybe,” I say. “Or maybe I’m just waiting for you to fall into my trap.”

He leans in, focused, all boyish curiosity and budding confidence. For a moment, he doesn’t look like a legacy.

He just looks like a kid who wants to win.

I nod once. “The best way to set a trap. It’s the best opening move for someone who likes to be underestimated.”

I study him as I sit. His hands are steady. His jaw—Igor’s. His eyes—Ana’s. A blend of two heritages that were never meant to coexist.

We fall into silence, the good kind. The kind Ana and I used to share before the world cracked open.

I let him think he’s outmaneuvering me. Deliberately misplace a bishop, allow a weak pawn structure. He needs to win this game.

“She died when I was born?” Damien asks suddenly. “That’s why nobody talks about her?”

I freeze for half a second too long. Then I nod once. “Yes.”

“Father doesn’t say much. I think he’s sad.”

More like guilty. But I won’t say that. Not to him.

“Some people carry loss like a stone,” I say instead. “Others wear it like armor. And some of us…just bleed from it, quietly.”

Damien’s eyes meet mine. Ana’s eyes. “Which one are you, Uncle Yakov?”

I shift a rook. “Still figuring that out.”

It’s the truth. Or the closest thing to it I can give a boy who looks at me like I’m not already lost.

Damien nods, quiet for a moment, his fingers hovering above a piece. Then, without looking up, he says, “Is that why you did bad things? Because you were sad about Mother?”

The question hits like a blade under the ribs—clean, unexpected, and sharper than it should be coming from a boy his age.

“Who told you I did bad things?” I ask, keeping my voice level.

“No one had to.” He shrugs, moving his knight forward, a clumsy, vulnerable position. “I heard Father and Uncle Nikolai talking. And the guards go quiet when I come in. They think I don’t notice.” His tone isn’t bitter. Just matter-of-fact.

I watch the knight’s poor placement and make no move to exploit it.

“You’re not stupid,” I say.

“No,” he agrees, meeting my eyes. “I’m not.”

We sit there, the board between us, his knight exposed and ignored. He waits, patient in the way only children can be when they know there’s more to the story.

“You didn’t answer,” he says, quieter now. “Were you sad? Is that why?”

“It’s not that simple.” I lean back slightly, my gaze resting on the black king I just moved. “Sometimes adults make choices they think are right…until they realize they weren’t. Or that the cost was more than they could afford.”

He studies me with unnerving focus. “So…were you wrong?”

The board fades from view. What child could know the weight behind that question? The lives ended. The families fractured. The way I carved grief into vengeance and called it justice.

Before I can answer, the soft knock of the door breaks the spell. It opens a moment later, and Mila steps in. Her eyes sweep the room, surprise flickering across her features when she sees us at the board. Me seated. Him smiling.

“I didn’t realize you had company,” she says, her voice more gentle than usual. “Our session isn’t for another twenty minutes. I thought I’d come get you and we could walk together today. But I’ll wait outside.”

“No need,” I say, my voice steady again. “We’re nearly done. Damien was about to checkmate me.”

The boy’s eyes light up. He looks back at the board, suddenly alert. “I was?”

“You were.” I nod toward his rook.

He studies it for a moment, then moves it with newfound confidence. “Check.”

“And now,” I say, tapping my chin with exaggerated consideration, “I’m completely out of moves.”

He grins, proud. “I win?”

I tip my king gently onto its side. “You win.”

She is still standing by the door, watching us. I can feel her observing, not just the game, but everything under it. The tone. The posture. The way I didn’t let myself win.

She glances at her watch, a gesture I’ve come to recognize. Our session time.

“I’ll walk you to the therapy room,” she says. “Your guard will meet us there.”

The boy looks between us, too perceptive for his age. “You have therapy with Uncle Yakov?”

“I do.” She keeps her voice neutral, but I catch the slight flush creeping up her neck. Does she remember our last session? The way she trembled when I touched her?

“Is he getting better?” Damien asks.

Her eyes find mine across the room. “That remains to be seen.”

“Your car’s waiting,” I interrupt, as he begins to gather the pieces. His hands are careful, precise—Ana’s touch. “We’ll continue next time.”

“Promise?”

The word cuts deeper than it should. But I nod. “Promise.”

He rises and gives me a quick, awkward hug that I don’t expect.

We walk in strange procession—Damien chattering about chess strategies, Mila silent beside him, me and a guard trailing behind, watching the way she holds herself. Stiffer than usual. Armored.

At the therapy room, Damien turns to me once more.

“Next time?”

“Next time,” I confirm.

He hugs me again—quick, fierce—then disappears down the hall.

Mila and I stand in the doorway of our designated cage. The air between us thickens. Without Damien as buffer, the last session crashes back.

“Shall we?” she asks, but her voice catches slightly.

She steps inside first. I follow, noting the changes immediately. Her chair is farther back now, away from where I usually sit. The table between us has been shifted, angled into a barrier.

“Rearranging the furniture, Doctor?” I stay standing. “Afraid I’ll touch you again?”

She doesn’t respond.

“You missed your chance to observe the dangerous captive bonding with an impressionable child,” I add, letting the edge in my voice sharpen the air. “Shame. That would’ve made for compelling notes in your case study.”

She doesn’t flinch, but I see the jump of her pulse at her throat. Her hand tightens on her notebook.

Today she’s in armor again—navy suit, hair scraped back, all edges. But I know what’s underneath. I’ve felt her tremble.

She closes the door with quiet finality, then crosses the room and takes her seat. “You’re good with him.”

“Disappointed?” I ask, stepping closer, close enough to see the shift in her breathing. “You thought you’d find me intimidating a child. Instead, you saw something else. That’s harder to classify, isn’t it?”

Her mouth parts like she wants to argue, but I don’t give her the space.

“You’re wearing less perfume today.” I circle slowly behind her, my usual move by now. She goes still. “What changed? Afraid I’d mention it again? Or afraid of what it does to you ?”

Her pen stills in her hand. “This isn’t about me.”

“No?” I step back into her line of sight, still standing. Her head’s tilted up to hold my gaze. “Then let’s make it about me. What are we dissecting today, Doctor?”

She draws a steadying breath. “Control.”

I smile without warmth. “Fitting.”

“Take a seat,” she says evenly. “And we’ll begin.”

I stay where I am. “That’s the test, isn’t it? Whether I obey.”

“You know why I’m asking.”

“I do. But I want you to say it.”

Her eyes flicker, refusing to take the bait. “You let Damien win.”

I nod once. “I did.”

“And is that what you’re doing with me?” She meets my gaze. “Letting me think I’m winning?”

The question lingers.

“You tell me, Doctor. Do you feel like you’re winning?”

She shifts in her seat—a tell. “We’re not playing a game, Mr. Gagarin.”

“Aren’t we?” I move toward the window, putting distance between us. “We both pretend this is about therapy when we know?—”

“What do we know?” Her voice sharpens, challenging.

I turn back. “That this stopped being about therapy the moment I touched you.”

“Let’s talk about your father.” Her voice wavers.

“Avoidance, Doctor? I thought that was my technique.”

“Your relationship with authority stems from him. The way you need control. The way you manipulate?—”

“The way I manipulate?” I stalk forward. “Like you’re doing now? Trying to make this clinical when your hands are shaking?”

She sets her pen down. “My hands aren’t?—”

I’m beside her before she can finish. “They are. Just like last time. Just like every time I get too close.” I don’t touch her, but I hover. “Tell me, Doctor, is it fear or something else that makes you tremble?”

But she doesn’t bite.

“Damien is the son of a man you’ve spent years trying to destroy.” She straightens her spine. “That’s a complicated dynamic.”

“Children shouldn’t pay for the sins of their fathers.”

“Is that why you included Damien in your plans?” Her tone is steady. “To save him from Igor?”

A trap. Subtle. Either I admit to using the boy or contradict myself on innocence.

I choose a third path.

“My sister asked one thing of me before she died: protect her son.” I finally sit across from her. “Everything I’ve done since has honored that promise.”

“Even kidnapping his stepmother?” she asks. “Threatening the family he lives with?”

Clinical. Detached. And yet it cuts sharper than judgment.

“You understand nothing of this world, Dr. Agapova. Of what it means to owe a debt you didn’t choose. To carry a promise made in blood.”

“Then help me understand.”

She leans forward, and for a breath, I see the woman who let me touch her.

“Help me understand,” she repeats, softer. “Not the Bratva code. Not the vengeance. You. The man who let a child win at chess. The man who keeps promises to the dead.”

The man who touched her face and felt his world tilt.

“That man is a luxury I can’t afford.”

“Can’t?” she asks. “Or won’t?”

We’re too close. I can smell her shampoo, clean, sharp like winter air. I can see the faint circles under her eyes. Did she sleep? Did she dream of drowning? Of me?

For a moment, I almost explain it all—Bratva code, Anastasia, blood for blood. But I don’t.

Vulnerability is a currency I can’t spend.

“You want to understand the Bratva?” My voice drops. “Fine. Let me tell you about loyalty. About what happens when someone breaks it.”

I stand again, pacing. The movement is restless, compulsive.

“My father taught me that trust is a blade—useful, but it cuts both ways. Igor knew that. He knew what Anastasiya meant to me, and he took her anyway. Used her. Discarded her.”

“She fell in love,” Mila says quietly. She rises and walks toward me slowly.

“She was barely twenty,” I snap. “Naive. Desperate for something our world couldn’t give. Tenderness. Igor saw that and exploited it.”

“Like you exploit weakness?”

I stop. “Yes.”

The admission settles between us.

“But not with Damien,” she says. “With him, you were…gentle.”

“He’s innocent.”

“And I’m not? What am I, Yakov?”

We stand facing each other. Her expression flickers—disappointment?—but it’s gone before I can name it. She retreats, returns to her seat, opens her notebook. Composed again. Guarded.

“Very well, Mr. Gagarin. Let’s go back to your father.” She gestures to the chair opposite hers. “Please sit down.”

“Make me.” The words slip out before I can stop them. Her pupils dilate. She remembers.

We freeze.

The air between us crackles with everything unsaid.

Then she sighs, closes her notebook, glances at her watch. “We’ve gone over time,” she says, surprised. “I should—we should stop.”

“Running again?” I catch her wrist as she rises, gently, but she gasps like I burned her. “What are you afraid of, Doctor?”

She looks down at my hand, then up. “The same thing you are.”

She pulls free, and I let her leave, but her words hang in the air like smoke.

I lower into the chair she vacated. Her warmth still lingers.

“Were you wrong?” Damien had asked.

Yes. About so many things.

But the worst thing might be how right Dr. Mila Agapova feels when she’s close enough to touch.