2. Andrey

2

ANDREY

"Easy there."

Misha squints at me, his color still ghostly pale. He attempts to raise his arm to shield his eyes from the chandelier directly above us, but he barely gets halfway before a hiss of pain escapes through his teeth.

"She—" I can't bring myself to say Yelena's name. "—really put a dent in your shoulder."

Clasping Misha's forearm, I reel him forward so that he can sit up a little better. He looks around and catches sight of Remi across the room. Still unconscious, still recovering.

"Wh…what happened?"

I prop a pillow behind him and sit back down. "You fainted. Picked an inconvenient place to fall, too. You whacked your head against the edge of the china cabinet. Dr. Abdulov said you might have a mild concussion."

Misha rubs the back of his head with his undamaged arm, and I feel the urge to pat his knee or clasp his shoulder. I want to do something, anything to wipe that scared, worried look off his face.

But I don't know what the fuck I'm doing.

This is Natalia's area of expertise. She was the one who knew how to comfort and coddle and reassure. She was the one who knew what to say and when to say it.

But Natalia isn't here.

My little bird took flight, leaving behind a broken dog, a traumatized boy, and a bloodstained bullet that I had to pry out of my arm.

"You'll be okay. The shoulder will take a few weeks to heal, though, so take it easy."

Misha looks around the room. I know what he's going to say before he even opens his mouth. "Where's Natalia?"

I dodge the question because I still don't have an answer. "You did great back there, Misha. If it weren't for you, we'd never have known what Yelena was really up to."

His cheeks brighten with pleasure.

"I owe you my gratitude. As do all my men. You single-handedly found the mole in our midst."

"It wasn't single-handed." Misha's forehead wrinkles, his lips turning down. "I wasn't the one to kill her."

There's no denying the bloodlust in his voice. I can relate, intimately. And yet hearing it thick in the voice of my fourteen-year-old ward is unsettling.

I know exactly what Natalia would say if she were here: He's too young to feel so responsible for us.

Then again, maybe I'm just fooling myself. Maybe I have no fucking clue what Natalia would say if she were here. She's already surprised me twice today.

"Andrey?" His voice is barely a whisper. "W-why did I faint?" There's shame driving the question.

"You were badly injured. Adrenaline was the only thing keeping you upright. That and the desire to protect Natalia."

"But Natalia…" He shakes his head as though he's trying to dislodge a memory. "It's all hazy… I don't remember all of it. But I do remember Yelena trying to attack Natalia."

"She tried," I acknowledge. "But she didn't succeed."

"She had a gun," Misha continues. "But she dropped it, and then… did… did Natalia pick it up?"

I don't say a word. It takes only a few more seconds before the memory clicks into place. Misha's eyes flare as he remembers.

He stares at my arm. At the bandage similar to the one wrapped around my torso. I've got a matching set.

"You killed Yelena," he wheezes. "And Natalia… she shot you."

"She was scared, Misha. I'd just killed an old woman—one that we knew and loved—in cold blood. I don't think she could process the brutality of it."

I've had ninety minutes to come to terms with what happened in the living room, including my role in it. I should've done it differently. I should've knocked Yelena out and killed her later, somewhere far from Natalia. I was a fool to think that whatever feelings she had for me would override her trauma.

Then again, I wasn't thinking at all when I took that knife to Yelena's throat. My instincts were simple: Kill the bitch before she hurts my woman.

Misha shakes his head. "But to actually shoot you…"

"I don't think she meant to shoot at all." I saw her face just before she pulled the trigger. She wanted me to stay away from her. When I didn't, she panicked. "It was an accident."

A single tear slides down Misha's cheek. "Where is she now?"

Great fucking question. In the chaos of the moment, she slipped through the cracks and out into the city. She could be anywhere, for all I know.

I settle on the only thing I know for sure. "We'll find her."

Misha looks skeptical, but he swallows and nods. I pat his good shoulder. "Dr. Abdulov will be in to check on you soon. Until then, get some rest. That's an order, soldier."

Misha's eyes spark with life. "Soldier?"

"You proved yourself today, Misha. If that doesn't make you part of the Bratva, I don't know what does."

Stepping out of the infirmary, I come face to face with Shura. His face is set in hard, grim lines. "Have you dealt with her body?"

"The old bitch has been taken care of," he snarls. "The living room has been stripped down and wiped clean. There's no sign she was ever there."

"Good. Now, we have to purge the whole damn manor of her."

I can tell by the dark look in Shura's eyes that he's taken Yelena's betrayal just as personally as I have. "I'm on my way to her room now."

"No," I say. "I want to look through it myself first."

"We'll do it together. By the way, I—" He pauses for a split second. "I know it's not a good time but there's something else you should know."

Fuck. Already, this new information smells of Slavik. "What is it?"

"Vaska and Yuri sent in their daily report. The old man was just seen meeting with the Halcones."

"The fucking Halcones? He must be desperate."

"It might be a desperate move," Shura agrees. "But it could also prove to be an effective one. The Halcones have no code of honor. That makes them deadly."

"Spare me. I know the kind of scum they are. Let them come."

I brush past him. On any other day, this information would have demanded my full attention. Right now, it feels like a fly buzzing stubbornly around my ear.

The smell of gunpowder and bleach stings my nostrils as I pass the living room, but I keep moving.

"Andrey!" Shura grunts, rushing to keep pace with me. "I know you've got a lot on your mind right now, but we can't just ignore this. The Halcones are a dangerous new piece on the board."

I'm in full view of the pool house when I stop short. "Need I remind you that I'm the reason those scum retreated into their holes in the first place?"

Shura's jaw tightens. "They didn't have the backing of Slavik Kuznetsov back then."

Bzz-bzz, goes the fly. I swat it away. "Have you heard from Katya?"

He sighs. "I spoke to her half an hour ago. She's heard nothing."

Natalia's bags are still sitting in the living room. She has literally nothing on her—no ID, no money, no phone. She's untraceable, a needle in a city-sized haystack.

But at least she can't go far.

"She'll come back home, ‘Drey," he promises in a measured voice. "She doesn't have anywhere else to go."

Just what I want to be: a last resort.

Before I can tell Shura to stick his reassurances where the sun doesn't shine, my phone rings. There's only one reason I can think of that Katya would contact me instead of Shura. Answering, I turn my back on Shura.

"Did she contact you?" I demand.

Katya's breathing is heavy on the other line. "Yes. She sounded strange… She wasn't herself."

The woman put a hole in my arm less than two hours ago. This is not new information. "Where is she?"

"Francesca's Pizzeria. She's expecting me to show up with her phone and purse."

She's not so far gone that she's scrapped her escape plan entirely. Unfortunately for her, I certainly have.

If the past few hours have taught me anything, it's that I can't let Natalia out of my sight.

Not now.

Maybe not ever.