62. Natalia

62

NATALIA

It's the pain that wakes me.

A dull, nagging pain. I'm achy all over, the same way I used to feel after a night out with Katya. Back then, the culprit was obvious: tequila . It's not as obvious this time around.

I'm stiff, but when I try to move to ease the pain, my hands and legs are unwilling to obey.

No, not unwilling—un able .

My eyes fly open, and I feel the zip ties cutting into my skin before I see them. I take in the small room in one panicked sweep. Sickly, yellow walls. Narrow windows covered in moth-eaten curtains.

I draw in a ragged breath, and the air is dank and stale.

"Anatoly! Olaf!"

My guards were just outside the door, but that was a different door. A different room. Still, I call out for anything familiar.

"Remi? Remi!"

Remi doesn't answer with a whine or a bark, and my voice echoes pathetically in the empty space.

Every second that passes brings my fuzzy memories into sharper focus.

And that hurts worst of all.

A knock at the hospital room door. Anatoly and Olaf standing in the way.

Then everything descended into chaos.

Anatoly and Olaf dropped to the floor, and Remi took their place, snarling and baring his fangs—doing his job.

Then… nothing.

I don't remember what happened between that moment and this one, but my grim surroundings tell me it wasn't anything good.

I glance down at my stomach and pray no one hurt my baby in that blank space I can't remember. Almost in answer, I feel a fluttering kick, earnest and comforting. Despite everything, I smile.

At least my child is safe. At least my little girl is a fighter.

Given what's coming, she might have to be.

Without warning, the door unlocks. A man strolls in like it's any other day. He's tall and broad-shouldered…

And strangely familiar.

"I've seen you before." My voice is hoarse, and I cough. How long have I been here? "Where have I seen you before?"

He grabs a chair along the wall and slides it closer to me. Swinging it around, he straddles it backward and crosses his arms over the top.

"You don't remember?" He sounds almost disappointed. "I'm offended. I thought I made an impression. A couple of them, actually."

I take him in again—strong, pointed jaw; hooked nose; bright, hazel eyes. I shake my head, the answer coming to me but still not making any sense. "You're the guy… the guy who spilled our drinks at Burning Bird."

His grin makes me shiver. "A first impression is hard to undo. I guess I bought you and Katya those drinks for nothing." He shrugs, an easy smile on his face. "I'm not usually that clumsy. I was just so eager to meet you, Natalia."

My body is cold, goose-pimpled with dread. "You're Nikolai Rostov."

He's like an optical illusion in front of me. I tell myself there's no way, but the moment the words are out of my mouth, I can't see anything else.

He is Nikolai Rostov—and he's been here the whole time.

His smirk only gets wider. "Pleasure to meet you, Mrs. Kuznetsov."

"What did you do to my bodyguards?" I spit. "And my dog?"

And Andrey. Where's Andrey? And Mila… Katya… Misha…

The faces of the people I love flicker like a slideshow through my mind, and I grow colder as each one passes.

"I don't know about the bodyguards, to be honest," Nikolai answers with a neutral shrug. "I can tell you the dog isn't dead, though. I don't kill animals if I can avoid it. Nasty business, that."

"But killing people is okay with you?" I hiss, unable to contain my disgust. "Selling women and children is just fucking dandy, but animal cruelty is where you draw the line? Am I hearing that correctly?"

"You're a lot feistier than I anticipated. I can see why you managed to make an impression on Andrey." He studies me closely. "Why you're with that asshole, however, I'll never understand."

"He's no asshole, Nikolai Rostov. You are."

"I'm sure you believe that. He's probably spent a lot of time filling your head with lies."

"You don't sell women and children, then?"

For a fraction of a second, the most terrifying, inhuman rage I've ever seen flies across his face. One blink later, it's gone. His face falls into somber lines—the very picture of sadness.

I don't trust it for a second.

"You don't know me, Natalia. You know only the sick, twisted version of me that Andrey has fed you. He's painted me out as the villain, but all I am is a son—a son trying to avenge his parents." I frown, and Nikolai jumps on my confusion. "He's left that part out of the story, has he, pretty lamb?"

Humming under his breath, he rises and circles behind me. I stiffen when I hear the unmistakable shiiink of a blade being unsheathed.

He bends low, and I'm waiting for the blade to press to my neck. For this nightmare to end in blood and darkness.

Then the ties around my wrists and ankles fall loose. Blood rushes back into my extremities, and I damn near moan with relief.

Nikolai saunters back around and reclaims his seat, tucking the knife away out of sight. "I'm not a bad man, Natalia. Far from it." He eyes me carefully. Sizing me up, maybe, though God only knows why. "I know about your parents. About how they died… Do you still love them?"

I scowl at him. He has no right to talk about my family, but what choice do I have other than to play along? "You don't just stop loving people just because you lose them."

The hazel in his eyes melts and boils. I swear there are demons in him begging to come out.

He once again clears his throat and looks human once more. "I can't say I ever felt the same about the people who birthed me. They made it very clear that they loved drugs more than me."

He rolls up the sleeves of his shirt. I suck in a sharp breath.

His skin is peppered with cigarette burns and tiny scars notched from elbow to wrist. He doesn't explain them, but I get the feeling that some stories are better left unspoken.

"I lived on the streets more often than not. It felt safer than staying in that house with those parasites. I'd have ended up there sooner or later, anyway. My mother overdosed; my father went to jail. I became what I had to be: a street rat doing unspeakable things to survive. Sometimes, I had to let other people do unspeakable things to me to survive."

Horror prickles at the edges of my mind, but I won't let myself feel bad for him.

Not until I know what he's done to the people I love.

"Until I met Elia Rostov." He smiles, remembering it all fondly. "Elia had a gun pointed at his head when I met him. I still don't know why I intervened. I suppose you could call it fate, though a more cynical soul might say I was just a desperate boy snooping where I didn't belong. But I killed the mudak who was about to shoot Elia in the back of the head. Ripped his throat clean out with my bare hands, funny enough. And Elia… oh, he liked that. He liked that a lot."

Nikolai licks his lips, as if the memory tastes good. His voice simmers.

"It was the first time in my life someone had looked at me and seen the potential there. The boy I once was died that day, and Nikolai Rostov was born. I took Elia's name—his mark." He touches the black tattoo on his left forearm. At first glance, I think I see a snake caught in the mouth of a bird. But as Nikolai twists his arm, I see the snake's tail wrapped around the bird's throat, strangling it to death from the inside out.

I swallow, my throat as dry as sandpaper. "What does Andrey have to do with this?"

"Everything!" he snarls with such ferocity that I flinch back in my seat. "Andrey and his father wanted everything Elia had built. Those Kuznetsovs are greedy, hungry leeches. But you didn't know that, did you, dear? None of us did, at first." Nikolai reaches out and rubs a thumb along the line of my jaw. "They say such beautiful words and offer such beautiful pictures of the future. You know exactly what I mean. I see it in your eyes." He licks his lips again. A darting, snake's tongue. "And that's precisely what they did to my adopted family. They came to us offering peace. Cooperation. "

His voice is low and steady, so quiet I lean in.

"We shook hands on it!" he roars, spit flecking his lips and dotting my face. I slam back against my chair. "And then… and then… when the time came to pass the baton, Andrey went back on everything he'd sworn he would do. He overthrew his own father, exiled him out of the country, and assumed the mantle of Bratva pakhan . He went back on the agreement he made with my father and sold my parents out to the FBI."

My heart is beating fast. Not because I believe anything he's telling me—but because he evidently does.

"That was not Andrey," I insist. "He wouldn't. He didn't—He's not a liar."

Nikolai's smile is cruel, pitying. "Oh? Did he tell you that?"

"He doesn't have to. I know him. He would never go back on his word. If anyone ratted out your parents, it was Slavik."

I have no proof of this whatsoever, but I just know.

"Yes, that's what I thought, too." Nikolai sighs. "And don't get me wrong: Slavik is as dishonorable as his unworthy son. Apples rot right next to the trees that birthed them. Slavik is far from innocent. But why would he go to the trouble of selling out my parents just to leave the country—not to mention his entire fucking legacy—behind?" His tongue clicks. "No, Andrey Kuznetsov is the only one who stood to gain. He did gain."

"You believe what you want to believe."

He arches a brow, sliding closer. "I could say the same about you, pretty lamb."

"I'm no lamb," I snap fiercely. "I don't just follow blindly."

"Is that so?"

Silence might be worse than anything Nikolai has to say. If I stop long enough to think, I might lose myself again. And this time, I don't have anyone to care for me until I'm ready to come back.

I have to take care of myself.

I have to protect my baby.

"You expect me to trust a man who would sell children into sex slavery?"

"You think the drug industry is any different?" he demands. "It destroys families just as fast as the skin trade. Trust me, I know. I lost two parents to the Kuznetsov drug ring."

My blood goes cold. "W-what?"

He smiles patronizingly. "Do you think there are any drugs sold in this city that don't come directly from that mudak you defend? Every dime bag of weed, every last fucking line of coke, every syringe brimming with devil's poison… Andrey touches all of it. Profits from all of it. I didn't lose just one set of parents to him—I lost two ." Nikolai gets to his feet slowly. "You know what it's like to lose parents, Natalia. You understand the pain."

His face is creased with loss. For the shortest of moments, I do feel his pain.

But I'm not so far gone that I can't see what he's trying to do.

"Don't feed me sob stories!" I cry out. "If you're really capable of feeling anything at all, then you would never have thrown Misha into the lion's den without any regard for his safety!"

He hesitates for a moment, his eyebrows twisting together to form a bridge across his forehead. "Misha?"

"Of course you don't even remember him. He was the errand boy you sent because he was worthless to you. A pawn you didn't care about sacrificing. Someone unimportant. Expendable."

Nikolai's eyes flare with something: recognition, perhaps?

"You hated the way you were treated; you hated being forced to survive on the streets. But that's exactly what you're doing to other women, other children?—"

"Foolish woman!" he seethes, causing my jaw to snap shut. "I'm giving them second chances. New beginnings. Those women and children I sell have nothing and no one. Without me, they'd be roadkill. With me, they can have a purpose."

"As what ?" I scoff in horror. "Some old pervert's mistress? A punching bag for some rich sadist?"

"It's a better fate than death on the side of the road."

"I'd much rather die on the side of the road than be the possession of sick men like you."

Nikolai stares at me silently for a long time. "He really has done a number on you, hasn't he?" He slips a hand into his pocket and fear rockets down my spine. If he pulls out that knife, I won't be able to fight back. I won't even be able to run.

But he doesn't pull out a weapon. Instead, I find myself faced with a shiny black smartphone.

"You seem to be under the impression that you've picked the hero. Which would make me the monster in your story. I've got news for you: Andrey and I… we're both monsters."

He raises the camera and snaps a picture of me.

"You'll figure that out soon enough."