Page 70 of Violent Possession

His plea breaks me in a way that anger never could. I see him. I want him to know that. Beyond the myth of the angel. Beyond the radiance he created for himself.

I thought that, today, there would only be a caricature of him. Someone who no longer fit the man I knew. But there isn’t. It’s like before.

How am I going to reconcile this? How do I reconcile the one who gave the order for all the blows of that machete with the one who still cares?

If he came trying to kill me, maybe there would still be something for me. I could still squeeze anger from somewhere.

“Lucian,” I say. His name—hisrealname—sounds strange in my mouth after so many years.

He looks away.I see you.

Then, he spies the alley entrance.

“I need to go,” he says. He pulls away from me. “Your escort will come looking for you any minute.”

Alexei’s babysitters. I had forgotten about them. There’s no way to think about anything buthim.

“Be careful, Myrddin,” he says one last time.

I want to ask him to stay. I want to scream for him to come back. And I can’t.

He disappears into the dark of the alley.

My legs give out.

I slide down the cold brick wall until I’m sitting on the dirty ground, among the trash and stomped-out cigarettes. And I cry. It’s an ugly sob for everything that could have been. For a fantasy. For an idiotic thought that things could have continued as they were for so long, with him, if this fucking arm were still real—for the fucking angel who gave me the only light I ever knew.

I don’t know how long I stay there. But, at some point, I hear footsteps. I also create this fantasy: Seraphim returning to the alley. I don’t want to think about it, but it’s automatic. His memory always is.

“Mr. Griffin,” I hear a voice. One of Alexei’s men. “We need to go. The area isn’t safe.”

“Get the fuck out,” I say. I don’t lift my head. I let him think whatever he wants.

His hands are suddenly on me, on my arms. He lifts me from the ground with impersonal efficiency. Like a bag of trash.

I push him hard.

“Go fuck yourself,” I say. Automatic.

It’s the stone-faced man, with empty eyes.

“I know the fucking way,” I say as I turn. “Don’t fucking touch me.”

He doesn’t draw his weapon. I feel him watching me, following me. And disappearing, somewhere in the middle of the street. Back into the car, I imagine.

I walk back home, pretending to have some control.

ALEXEI

Vasily is panicking.

My men report discreet “conversations” behind the scenes. Ivan’s men, on the other hand, report not-so-discreet interrogations. My brother is sniffing around, desperate, trying to catch the scent of the ghost who eliminated his key witness. He’s sniffing in the right direction—Ivan—but for all the wrong reasons, convinced that the brutality of the crime scene is the unmistakable signature of our most passionate cousin.

While Vasily’s paranoia consumes him, the source of all this new revenue—the fight circus—thrives. Karpov is happy. I gave him the title of “Chief Promoter”, a generous percentage, and a front-row seat. He watches the fights, drinks expensive beer, and feels like a king, unaware that everything operates undermyrules. A satisfied puppet is the best kind of puppet.

And at the center of it all, Griffin.

Vasily would never connect such a public and extravagant figure to a dirty, quiet job like Kirill’s elimination. He’d seeGriffin and think: “another one of Ivan’s stupid toys that Alexei is monetizing.”