Page 140 of Scarlet Thorns

Let him wonder. Let him lie awake trying to piece it together, the way I’ve been doing since the day my world imploded. Let him feel what it’s like to have reality shift beneath his feet.

Leave.

Leave now.

The hardest part of the entire exercise is getting out without running the gauntlet of Osip’s security team. But they, too, have learned to give me my space since the miscarriage. The polite fiction that I need time to grieve gives me freedom to move through the house without questions.

Nobody’s openly mentioned it, but I know the lost pregnancy is probably spoken of among them. Whispered conversations in corners, worried glances, the careful way they’ve all started treating me like I might break.

They’re not wrong.

I drag my suitcase to the door, pause with my hand on the brass handle. This house has been my world for weeks. The place where I dreamed of building a family, of creating something beautiful from something that started as business. The place where I fell in love with my father’s killer.

The irony would be funny if it didn’t feel like dying.

The hallway is empty when I peer out. Most of the staff will be downstairs or in the service areas. My heels are loud on the marble, but I can’t help that. Each step echoes too loudly, announcing my departure to anyone listening.

But nobody comes. Nobody bothers me when I step out the door and head toward the main gates, dragging my suitcase behind me.

Thankfully, Melor is nowhere in sight, because I doubt he’d let me go. His questions in the car proved he suspects something. Men like him and Osip don’t survive by ignoring instincts.

Keep walking, Ilona.

Walk away.

Beyond the front gates, Budapest spreads out in all directions— lights twinkling in the distance, traffic moving along distant highways, life continuing as if nothing has changed.

But everything has changed.

The taxi idles outside when I drag my suitcase through the gate. I called ahead, grateful that my voice didn’t shake when I gave the address. The driver— a middle-aged man with kind eyes— doesn’t ask why I’m crying. Just loads my luggage without comment and asks me what airport gate I’m heading to.

“Terminal 2,” I manage. My voice sounds like it belongs to someone else.

As we pull away, I don’t look back. Can’t look back. Because if I do, I might remember the good moments. The laughter. The tenderness. The way his eyes lit up when I told himabout the baby. The way we planned to create a new living soul together.

I might remember that I was falling in love with my father’s killer.

It doesn’t matter. Whatever game we were playing is over now. The rules have changed. The board has been cleared.

I know who he is.

And that changes everything.

Chapter Fifty-Five

Osip

The heavy glass doors of Beacon Hill Orphanage swing shut behind me with a finality that echoes through my bones.

The sound might as well be the closing of a coffin lid— mine, his, ours. The conversation with Simpson plays on repeat in my skull like a broken record.

Slava has been adopted.

He is going to have an amazing life with great parents.

Amazing life. Great parents.

Not with me. Never with me.