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She stayed calm. Always calm. She learned that early—she had to. She was the one who took care of her mom and her sister. I learned patience from her.

“Mariah was so patient,” I say, my voice shaking.

“I hated that my first impulse was toward anger. I had to walk away. But Mariah explained that when you're raised like that, it’s harder to break the cycle. It becomes second nature. You have to willfully break the chain. Learn. Do better.” I shrug. “And she was right.”

I blow out a breath. “I pride myself on the fact that, to this day, I’ve never raised my hand to my son. Not once. I’d rather be too lenient than someone who takes his anger out on a child.”

"I agree," she says. "He’s not spoiled. He’s a small child. You’ve given him guidelines and discipline. Discipline doesn’t have to involve pain or shame." She shakes her head. "It’s almost like we had the opposite childhoods," she says. "You already know what I grew up with."

I do. Her mother was too sick to care for the kids.

There were nights they didn’t eat—food insecurity was constant.

They lived in a dilapidated apartment they could barely afford, not until Mariah started working to help keep them afloat.

I would’ve married her when we were barely twenty.

She wouldn’t marry me until Ruthie was old enough to stand on her own and we could get her mother the help she needed.

That was who she was—always carrying someone. Always putting herself last.

I hated it, sometimes. Just the way the world never gave her a break, and she never asked for one. Like she believed suffering was something noble if it kept the people she loved breathing.

I feel Ruthie watching me. Her silence isn’t passive but deliberate—a weight pressing into my chest.

When I finally look up, she’s staring at me like she sees all of it. The guilt I try to bury. The man I used to be. The one who couldn’t save her sister.

She doesn’t speak right away.

She reaches across again, this time gripping my hand—not gentle, but grounding.

“And you’re not the only one who lost her,” she adds, barely above a whisper.

I nod. Because if I speak now, I might say the wrong thing. Or worse—say everything I’ve never let myself feel.

Ruthie lifts her glass again, but her hand wobbles. Is she drunk? I look in surprise at the tray of empties beside us.

She stares at me for a beat too long.

"You wear your grief well, Vadka."

The words fall out soft. She swallows hard and sets the glass down. “I do the same thing. And it’s not a compliment. It’s… armor. You wear it so no one can touch what’s underneath.”

I don’t respond. She keeps going like she can’t stop herself. “Sometimes I think you like being broken. Like it gives you permission to not feel.” Her voice falters. “Makes it easier to push everyone away.”

Is she talking about me ?

Or herself?

My stare sharpens. My grip on my drink tightens. But she doesn’t flinch. She leans back in her chair, her eyes glossy and defiant. “I get it. I do. But it’s not really any way to live, is it?”

Her mouth opens like she wants to take it all back… but she doesn’t.

It’s too late anyway.

She sighs. “People mistake it for strength though.”

My voice is quiet. Dangerous. “You think I want anyone’s pity?”

“I think you don’t want anything.” She sways a little, then steadies herself. “That’s the problem.”

I lean forward. Just a little.

She falters for a second. Then her mouth twists into a smile. Defiant. Reckless. “I shouldn’t have said that.”

Regret? From Ruthie?

I shrug. “You never held back from saying the truth, did you?”

Something flickers in her expression. A crack in the bravado.

“I don’t pity you, Vadka,” she murmurs. “I just… I see you. And sometimes I think, maybe that’s worse.”

I get a text from Zoya at the same time as I get one from Rafail.

Zoya

Luka’s asleep.

Rafail

We need you now.

I place my phone down and stifle a sigh. Duty calls.

For one small sliver of time, I felt relief—from the grief I carry, from the responsibilities that hang over my head like a noose. For one little moment, I felt like myself again. And I want that back.

“We have to go,” I say quietly, and I imagine the look on her face tells me she felt the same. I don’t know if that’s a good thing.

We head to the back. Past the bathroom doors, past a locked supply closet. There’s an unmarked hallway where the floor changes from warped wood to new linoleum.

At the end—an unlit door behind a row of industrial trash bins. No handle. Just a black panel on the wall.

I punch in the code.

Click.

The door hisses open just an inch.

“Wow,” Ruthie mutters, stepping past me, eyes darting. “This is some next-level James Bond shit, huh?”

But I see it in her shoulders.

The tension.

The fight-or-flight instinct flaring under the sarcasm.

Because she knows now: This isn’t just hiding.

It’s war.

“Yeah,” I say with a short laugh. “Remember a couple of years ago, when Rafail married Polina, and we had to borrow a safe house?”

She shakes her head. I guess those weren’t the kinds of things we talked about publicly. I forget she’s not technically Bratva.

“Well, after that, Rafail decided we needed our own. The larger the safe house, the easier it is to find—and then we’re fucked. So instead of one big one, we have multiple small ones scattered throughout the city and on the outskirts of Moscow.”

“Oh. That makes sense. Except… it’s a large family, so…”

“Rafail figured that a lot of people were often not home.” As his brothers have gotten older and married, started families of their own, and his sister Yana relocated to South Africa with her husband, the number of people at the Kopolov compound at any given moment was smaller than it used to be.

She looks up at me, her eyes luminous, her gaze just enough unfocused to make me look away. I have to protect her right now.

“What happens next, Vadka?” she asks quietly.

I swallow and hold my head up high. “Next, I keep you and my boy safe.”