Page 29

29

ERIK

“ Y ou’re late.” Viktor glares up from the table as I arrive.

“You’re lucky I’m here at all,” I reply sharply.

“I have better shit to be doing.”

“Better than sitting down with me?” Viktor’s eyes narrow.

“You’ve been dodging my calls for days.”

“I’ve been busy.”

“Doing what?”

I shrug, sliding my jacket from my shoulders and placing it on the back of the wooden chair.

“Stuff.” I won’t go into detail.

The last thing I want to talk about is how I’ve spent the past few days trying to follow Anastasia and keep her safe from a distance, but it’s been a struggle.

Being banned from the estate means I’ve been resorting to snippets of information leaked from the few friends I still have on the security team.

Other than that, Anastasia hasn’t been leaving the estate.

She’s scared.

She must be.

She’ll be waiting for me to tell Viktor the truth, but I’m not going to.

“Can I get you anything to drink?” calls Hazel from the bar.

“Not tonight, thanks.” Taking my seat, I lean back slowly.

“So, what’s so urgent?”

“Are you serious?” Viktor’s eyes narrow.

“You don’t call. You don’t write. I was beginning to fear that Anastasia had you killed! Did it bring you joy to worry me so much?”

My eyes narrow a fraction.

“You were that worried?”

“Of course I was! I have no fucking clue what’s going on. She fired you and you didn’t immediately come to me?”

My eyes drop to the coaster sitting in front of me and I twirl it between my fingers.

“I had some things to figure out.”

“Like?”

“Viktor, do you remember all those months ago when the parking lot was blown up?”

Viktor’s attention immediately moves to the beer in front of him.

“What about it?”

“And the attack on the construction site.”

He doesn’t reply.

“Do you know who that was? Who was behind those attacks?”

“Why would I?” Viktor lifts the bottle to his lips.

“I figured you might have an idea,” I say, leaning my elbows on the table.

“Because the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it was weird how those attempts on Anastasia’s life stopped after I got close to her.”

“So?” Viktor raises his wiry brows.

“You want to complain because you did a good job?”

“No, I just thought you might have had some insight given how good you are at cleaning up messes.”

“No, I have no clue. Not that it matters because they forced Anastasia to trust you and you got closer to her than anyone else ever has. I hardly see it as an issue,” he replies.

“Besides, that has nothing to do with why I wanted to see you.”

“I know,” I sigh.

“I just hoped there was something I was missing, y’know? That maybe we got whoever was responsible but didn’t realize.” In truth, I was hoping Viktor would have some answers because the lack of a threat on Anastasia’s life worries me.

The gala will be here soon, and there will be no better opportunity to take her life than when she’s on stage, unprotected.

“If I had to take a guess, it was probably a relative of one of the generals she slaughtered,” Viktor replies.

“So do you want to tell me what the hell went down with you two and why it feels like months of investigation just went up in smoke?”

The truth dances on my tongue as Viktor and I look at each other.

I could tell him the truth right now.

I could let him know that everything he suspected and feared was true, that he was on the right path, and that if he so chose, he could get the justice he desires.

But I won’t.

Because Anastasia is doing well.

She’s messy at it, and it will take time, but she’s done more good for this family in seven months than her father did in seven years.

So I settle on a version of the truth.

“We talked about Sergey,” I say.

Viktor’s face lights up like a cat that’s spotted a mouse.

“And?”

“She didn’t do it, Viktor. She had absolutely nothing to do with her father’s death. You’ve been looking in the wrong place for months. But I do have a lead.”

“Bullshit!” Viktor slams his fist down on the table, making his bottle jump and earning a sharp warning cough from Hazel.

“Listen, Viktor,” I say quickly.

“I have a lead. He had a partner for some kind of secret deal.”

“What?” Viktor’s eyes snap to me.

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“He was about to send this family crashing into a future that involved child trafficking.” The words taste like bile in my mouth.

“And he was working with someone else to do it. Now, I don’t know who he was working with, but it’s pretty plausible that something went wrong with the deal and he was killed for revenge.”

“No,” Viktor growls.

“No?” Confusion twists like fog in my chest.

“What do you mean, no?”

“Exactly that. It wouldn’t have been his partner,” Viktor says.

“This sounds like Anastasia trying to get you off her scent.”

“Viktor—”

“No!” He slams his fist again and this gets Hazel’s full attention.

She glares daggers at the both of us and when I catch her eye, she taps the shotgun behind the bar.

I flash her an apologetic smile.

“Viktor, listen to me. There’s more at play here than just her, okay? For one, this new deal he was working on is so unbelievably twisted that it opens him up to a whole new host of people who could have targeted him, including this mysterious partner. We have no way of knowing.”

“I know,” Viktor hisses sharply and he gulps down his beer.

“I’m sick of this shit. We get so close, and then she spins you some kind of tale, and you immediately believe her!”

It dawns on me slowly, like all my muscles have been stretched thin and are slowly relaxing.

Viktor is blinded.

No matter what information I present to him, he will never change his mind.

He’s so set on blaming Anastasia that even if she were truly innocent, he wouldn’t care.

It pains me, but I won’t let her go down for this.

“Show me, then,” I say coldly.

“Show me how you know. Show me whatever the fuck it is that has you so convinced because I am telling you right now that she didn’t do it, and we have new suspects, and you are like a fucking dog with a three-day-old bone!”

“Did you know she was pregnant?” Viktor asks suddenly.

My heart skips a beat in my chest as his question completely derails my thought process.

“I…”

“Is that why you left?” Viktor asks.

“Were you jealous that someone fucked her?”

My lips part wordlessly for a few seconds, trying to work out how he even knows this.

Then I sigh.

“No, that wasn’t why she got rid of me. That baby is mine.”

“Was,” Viktor corrects.

My heart stalls in my chest.

“What?”

“Was yours,” he says, sounding oddly gleeful.

“She lost it. That night we all argued? She was bleeding because of a miscarriage.”

The world falls away from me.

Suddenly, I’m floating.

The bar and Viktor seem incredibly far away from me and a strange roaring sweeps through my ears while sharp pain cracks through my chest as if my ribs are just eggshells.

A miscarriage?

She lost the baby?

My baby?

“How?” I gasp, and my voice sounds distant.

“What happened?”

Viktor shrugs.

“Doesn’t matter. You dodged a bullet for sure. We all did. If she spewed out an heir, it would make all of this a hundred times more complicated.”

“Was it stress?” I ask.

“Is she okay?”

Is this my fault?

Did my confession push her over the edge?

“It doesn’t matter,” Viktor insists.

“Look, the important thing is, she isn’t going to complicate this with a baby. I’m sorry, Son. I was too hard on you. I put you in a terrible position and asked too much of you. No wonder she was able to get her claws into you.”

“No,” I say quietly.

“That’s not…”

Nothing feels real in this moment.

I learned about that baby only a few days ago and I wouldn’t have expected to have any kind of connection to it.

Yet as I sit here processing the news, it’s devastating.

Like something has been snatched right out of my soul.

“Don’t worry, I’m going to take care of everything,” Viktor says, his voice still distant.

“I will take care of Anastasia, and then I will return this family to his former glory. We will be the top dogs and we will fucking act like it.”

“Wait, what?” I lift my gaze and blink quickly as unshed tears blur my vision.

How can I cry for something that barely existed?

“Listen, Son. While Anastasia has been fucking around acting like our criminal empire can survive on the debts of the wealthy, I’ve been doing the real leg work.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone.

“Sergey had already laid the groundwork to deal with the Cartel. He always knew they would come looking for their money. He just enjoyed making them beg. He liked having that kind of power over dangerous people, but Anastasia was clearly too preoccupied with making babies to look deeper into his finances.”

Viktor passes over his phone, and I take it numbly.

Half of his words don’t even make sense.

I want to know how Anastasia is coping.

Is she well?

Is she sad?

Does she feel the same aching loss in her chest that is blooming in my own?

I blink slowly and the tears fade.

Viktor’s phone screen comes into view and I refocus on his words.

“So if she’d just paid attention, she never would have had to worry about money.”

“What is this?”

“It’s one of Sergey’s offshore accounts.”

“I…” Breathing deeply, I shake my head.

“I thought they were all closed down because Anastasia couldn’t get access. She didn’t have the passwords and stuff.”

“She also didn’t know about them all.” Viktor smirks.

“If she’d just asked me, I could have pointed her in the right direction. But regardless, all the money there will go to the Cartel once I’ve taken care of Anastasia. Two birds, one stone.”

I’m about to pass the phone back when something catches my eye.

The name on the account is familiar.

Лучик.

Sunray.

Where have I seen that before?

“You… you’re the only one with access to these accounts?” I lift my head and meet Viktor’s gaze.

He nods.

“So don’t worry, that money isn’t going anywhere until she’s taken care of.” Viktor takes his phone back.

“I’m sorry I asked so much of you, my boy. But I will fix this, once and for all.

Sunray .

Why do I know that?

Watching Viktor pocket his phone, it hits me like a ton of bricks.

The assassins.

The one from the construction site. He had been paid from an encrypted account that no one could get into, and that was the name on the account.

Sunray.

It was… Viktor? All this time, all the attempts on her life, even from the beginning when I hadn’t even had a chance to get close to her, it was him.

“Viktor…

”

“What?” He narrows his eyes at me.

“What is it?”

Is it all him?

If Sergey trusted Viktor enough to give him access to his encrypted accounts that even his daughter can’t get into, then they were close.

Really close.

Close enough that Sergey surely would have run any business plan past him.

My thoughts tumble back over our conversation right back to where Viktor immediately deflected the topic by mentioning the pregnancy.

Viktor spoke with such confidence that Sergey’s mysterious business partner wouldn’t have killed him.

Because it’s him.

My eyes widen and my heart pounds up into my throat, and I’ve never been more thankful that I agreed to meet at The Black Ox.

“What is it, Son?” Viktor prompts again.

“Viktor, listen to me,” I said firmly.

“Anastasia is innocent, do you hear me? She did not kill Sergey.”

Viktor snorts.

“Whatever.”

“I can prove it,” I say earnestly.

“I can. I can prove she’s completely innocent.”

Viktor looks me in the eyes and his look doesn’t change.

He doesn’t care.

He’s so hungry for revenge and power that blaming Anastasia for Sergey wasn’t because he was grieving.

It was because he wanted to rule.

And he still does.

“It doesn’t matter,” Viktor says stiffly.

“It’s too late for that, anyway.”

“What? Why?” Coldness seems down my limbs, sending shivers curling across my back.

“Viktor, what have you done?”

“Anastasia will die at the gala,” Viktor says calmly.

“And no one can stop it. You should be grateful since she killed your baby.”

“You son of a bitch!”

“What?” Viktor yells back.

“Did you really think I would take this lying down? I trusted you to help me and instead, you were fucking her! You were like a son to me and you stuck your dick in that cunt like family meant nothing to you!” Viktor stands abruptly.

“Well, now you’ll see. She’s going to get what’s coming to her, and me? I will take my place as Pakhan where I belong!”

“I won’t let that happen,” I snarl, rising just as quickly.

“What are you going to do?” Viktor sneers.

“You left her. She’s all alone, without a soul in the world to protect her. That seat is as good as mine!”