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Chapter Sixteen

ERIN

“Let me see my baby…” I bang on the door, something that’s become a ritual, just like the silence of the nonresponse. The words are a scratchy whisper of defeat.

I finally sit.

No one else is in my prison suite. No one’s been in here for days. At least, that’s what it feels like.

Olga delivers food twice a day. The guard at the door stands in the room as she sets it down, face averted. Once the older woman, Magda, came. She made the guard wait outside as she gave me a smile that smacked of pity. And towels.

Someone has been through my suitcase and dug out yoga pants and a T-shirt for me to put on.

The food is simple sandwiches, but at most I’ve nibbled at two. Somewhere inside I’m hungry, yet eating is repugnant and I can’t manage more than a bite.

There’s nothing to read. Nothing to do, and I’m teetering on the edge of sanity. Only Sasha and the faint hope of escape keeps me tethered.

It doesn’t help that I occasionally catch the sound of his voice and it just rips me apart .

How the fuck long is Demyan planning on keeping me here? Planning on punishing me? As it stands, it’s beyond cruel. I’d prefer life in prison with no hope of parole if it meant visitations from my boy.

Demyan isn’t the hot man I thought he was. Oh, he’s hot, but he’s capable of deep, dark viciousness. The kind of cruelty I’d never before imagined.

He’s intent on blaming me for this. And he’s right. I never told him. But he was a one-night stand, one I dreamed of, masturbated to, but one I never knew beyond those hours and most of them weren’t spent getting to know each other.

More than that, he was a one-night stand my brother warned me to keep away from, and for the sake of the baby inside me, I did.

He’s acting like I set out to have his child hurt him. To twist the knife and I don’t know what to do with that.

It’s unreasonable, it’s poisoned, and while he doesn’t strike me as volatile, I think he has that in him beneath the layers of ice. Worse, I think he’s capable of all sorts of heinous acts.

Like locking me up and depriving me of my son.

And that’s just me. What about Sasha? I can’t even fathom what he’s going through. I’m all he knows. His little world is me, home, Kara, and my brother when he’s around. He’s used to love and familiar things and…

Not knowing what to do, I get up and pace, then with his stuffed toy in my hand, I go to the window to look out, the futility of the motion not lost as I hope a miracle will happen and I can see the grounds and my son, instead of the drive.

I squeeze his plushy.

He must be missing his toy.

He must be so confused and frightened.

I’ve never been away from him this long.

My legs shake and I sit on the bed, hugging the plush goat with its worn patches from Sasha, loving it so much. I breathe in his scent that still clings to it. He must be asking about me, desperate for his mama.

What’s Demyan told him? Dread trickles down my spine. I can’t help but think he’s never going to let me see Sasha again. Maybe he’ll keep me here forever, a fucked-up version of Miss Haversham, but instead of the decaying wedding feast, it’s just the decaying motherhood stolen from me.

I don’t want to think about Dickens.

I don’t want to go morbid.

But I can’t help it because, oh God, what if he tells Sasha I’m dead?

A laugh breaks free, tinged with hysteria. He’s not going to keep me up here for my life in yoga pants like the modern Haversham. No, Demyan will kill me.

Maybe that’s the plan, kill me and raise our son like I never existed and Sasha, at two, will forget me.

Worse, he’ll grow up cruel and twisted like his father.

I want to throw up.

“You’re letting your imagination take control,” I say, burying my face in the goat’s tummy. “He wouldn’t…”

I’d love to think Demyan wouldn’t do something so cruel. Not to his boy. Not even to me. But there’s a part that believes Demyan’s capable of anything.

Like keeping me around and turning me into someone Sasha hates.

He might?—

The door lock beeps and my head snaps up as the door opens.

Demyan’s there, filling the frame, dark hair curling soft on his forehead, handsome despite the flatness of ice in his light-blue eyes. He’s like a demon who wears the skin of an angel and he takes up way too much space. I can feel him, even from here, like a brush against my skin .

His gaze flickers over me. And I recoil at the burn of contempt.

Demyan steps in, closing the door, and he leans against it, hands in his suit pants pockets.

“Your son is fine,” he says, sounding bored. “In case you’re interested.”

I’m on my feet so fast my head spins. I glare at him, anger coursing through me. I hate him. I despise every single thing about him, and I can’t stand the implication I don’t care about my reason for living.

“You fucking bastard,” I say, forgetting who has the power for a second. And when I remember, I don’t care. “You asshole. Don’t try to act like I’ve been neglecting him. You put me here, you took my son. Sasha’s the only thing I’ve cared about for the last two years, so let me see him. Now.”

My eyes start to burn as my throat closes.

“Please.”

He pulls his hand from his pocket and tosses me his phone. I say his. It’s not locked, so it’s probably a higher end burner. I start to shake. He’s letting me have a phone? Is that how I’m meant to communicate with Sasha? A?—

“Open the photos. Press play.”

My stomach starts to dance queasily. I do as I'm told.

I can’t move. My entire world melts down to the video playing.

Sasha. In the sunshine, the backyard, I imagine. The one I snuck out through. I can see the back of the mansion, the flowers and the shade of a tree in the area. And Sasha, laughing, running, and playing.

He squeals with delight and starts chasing something and the camera zooms in. A butterfly. Sasha’s happy little face then fills the screen and I’m bombarded.

Relief and happiness at the fact he’s thriving, he’s fed and healthy .

And a crushing pain that makes the phone slip and the air disappear.

I can’t breathe and someone’s making sucking, wheezing sounds. It’s not until the backs of my legs hit the bed I realize it’s me.

The pain is deep, spreading, and my hearts is squeezed and crushed into nothing.

This video is of a boy who’s adjusted to life without his mother, like he doesn’t care or remember me, like I’m nothing at all.

I’m gone, and he’s… happy.

The phone clatters to the floor as a sob breaks free. I look up and everything goes cold.

Triumph lights up Demyan’s face.

He wanted this reaction from me. He wanted me in pain, to feel like I want to die.

He wanted me to see Sasha thriving and happy without me.

The cruelty is almost beyond comprehension.

For long moments, I can’t move, and I know I’m shaking.

What I want is to lash out and hurt him, claw him, make him bleed. I want to rip his heart from his chest.

And I want him to never, ever teach the child he’s clearly taken from me to be like him. Sasha is good.

“What was that?” he asks.

I realize I spoke. “I said Sasha is good. There’s no bad in him. Don’t… don’t let him ever do this to someone.”

“You did it to me.”

Another sob breaks free. “Are you two? The world isn’t black-and-white, Demyan.

Maybe what I did was wrong, but it was never this.

Never vindictive. It wasn’t like I got knocked up deliberately to keep your child from you.

I did… I didn’t look further after my brother told me to keep away.

I ne ver had your name. And he did that out of love, so leave him alone. ”

“My issue is with you and your vile actions.”

“My…” I stop and take a shaking breath. “There are plenty of guys who’d be happy not to know or be financially responsible for an accident from a one-night stand. I’m not…”

I shove the toy against my mouth as he scoops up the phone and I try not to cry.

“Yeah, well, you fucked up, Erin. He’s where he should be. With me.”

God, I want to rampage, hit, scream, hurt. But I struggle to keep it all under control, and I try to get him to understand, to see Sasha needs me.

“Demyan, I understand you’re angry. I get you’re still processing that you never knew about him until the other day.”

“And I’d never have known except for fate.”

“Maybe. And maybe when, he asked we’d have found you. I don’t… I’d never hurt him. Ever. And if that meant finding a-a dangerous man because he wanted to know his father, I would do that.”

“He’s two.”

“One day. In the future. My goal isn’t to hurt you. It’s to protect him. Always. But if one day he wanted to know about you, then I’d have found you.” I make myself look at him. “And I get it. You’re hurting. But Demyan, you can’t do this to me or our son.”

He gives me a look he might give a piece of dirt on his shoe. “Give me one good reason not to do it, Erin. Just one.”

The tears burn hot and blur. “Because I love that little boy more than anything in the world. And he loves me. Have you even thought what cutting me from his life will do to Sasha? He needs his mom. ”

“Does he?”

I flinch. “Yes. And I’m sorry, more than you can know, that I kept him from you, but I did it to protect him. And I’m glad you know about him and want him. You care, I can see it. The only thing better than one parent is two.”

He doesn’t say a word and I know I have to do it, be the bigger person. For Sasha. He’s all that matters to me, and Demyan’s going to do what he wants. “Can I have the phone?”

“Want to call someone?”

“No. Pull up the notes screen. Please.”

For a moment I don’t think he’ll do it, but he does, and feeling like I’m cutting off my own arm, I start typing.

“You hold my fate, Demyan. I can’t change that. If you want to kill me, you can. If you want to keep Sasha from me, you can do that, too, but… don’t… don’t be cruel to him. He’s just a baby. He doesn’t know. He’s stubborn and he’ll try your patience, but he’s worth every moment.”

I take a shaky breath, forcing the words out.

“If you must hurt someone, make it me, not him, never him. And Demyan, teach him to be good, to be kind. Because he is.”

A tear falls on the screen, and I hand him the phone.

“What the fuck is this?”

“A list of what he likes and doesn’t. His nap times, his toys, his favorite books.

He likes box mac and cheese, but only as a very special treat.

He hates strawberries, but he loves raspberries and watermelon.

He hates seeded bread, unless you call it special bread. I… it’s all there. The essentials.”

Then I hand him the toy and his pillow and I’m dying. I can feel it. Inside I’m shriveling up and dying.

“Please take these. Please. He loves them.”

At first, I think he’s going to let them fall, but his hand comes around them. And that ice in his eyes seems to warm. But then it slams down.

And like I’m nothing at all, he turns and walks out, the door, locking behind him.

Now I have nothing of Sasha’s. I can’t even smell him. I crumple to the ground, lost in a haze of grief.