19. Vlad

He opened the window.

He killed Vanya.

This is all his fault.

I can't focus on anything. There is no sound, sight, or smell. Just the motherfucker who killed her. Grabbing Len's wrist holding the lighter, I crush his fist around the object, making sure it stays closed.He won't take anyone else from me. He won't burn my fucking wife and child.

He killed her.

It's repeating like a chant in my head, bouncing off my skull and muting the bones crushing.

My Vanya, solnyshkuh, with her big, beautiful eyes and how she'd always smile at me when I came home. But he fucking stole her.

Once his hand is immovable and the metal hits the floor with a wet thud, I release every ounce of anger from the two decades of mourning I've been put through.

"You took her from me!"

There's a noise, but I don't give a fuck, he won't fucking survive. Blood drips from my chin, racing down my neck, and it coating my teeth, for the second time in my fucking life. I feel all the heartache resurface as I continue driving my fist forward.

My soul was ripped from my fucking body.

But I didn't do it, I didn't kill her. It's still my fault because I should have stayed home.

I hold his throat with one hand and my fist doesn't stop meeting his face.

Not when it's bloody.

Not when his bones break.

Not when it turns to squelching.

The sick cunt drops to the floor lifeless, but I can't stop. He needs to feel everything. Be cut apart and have his fucking heart torn from him. It still wouldn't be enough because he stole her. He stole my solnyshkuh when I did everything he wanted. I gave him everything and he fucking killed her.

I let them earn from my body so they could eat.

I let them pit me against grown fucking men to boast.

I let them do whatever they wanted, and he took her.

The crack as I kick into his ribs doesn't register, and the bastard slides across the floor, hitting the wall.

"Why?! She was innocent, she didn't fucking do anything to you!"

There's no fight back. Yet, I can't stop, all I can imagine is what I could have had. Vanya would have been with me, Valyusha, and Vitya. She'd have been happy. She would have loved Viktor and the horses. But he stopped me having it.She would have always smiled at me.

I wouldn't forget her eye color.

I wouldn't forget her scent.

I wouldn't miss her.

A soft, tear-filled voice breaks through with one word.

"Vlad?" Turning towards the sound, Inessa is shivering, her clothes and hair are stuck to her, and the room is lighter. "Let him go."

There's no color on her face, but she doesn't look fearful of me as I numbly blink. She walks towards me with her palms flat, hand outstretched in front of her, so I can see before she touches me. The soft smile she gives me is wrong and she pulls on my arm, adding more incorrect qualities to the air.

"Please, lapachka. He's dead, I promise."

She's not supposed to beg. But I look down and realize she's right. There's blood everywhere, mixing with the smell of alcohol and gasoline.And Len is unrecognizable with his body awkwardly folded.

She guides me closer to her, and the sun is coming up. That's why it's light. It's too early for it to be light, I only just got here. My brothers are standing near the entrance with wide eyes. There's fear on their faces. Fear when they look at me when I've gone my entire life making sure they're safe. But not my queen's as she keeps walking me towards the bar and sits me down. When her arms come around me, vodka fills my nose, and it's on her breath as she whispers, "You're okay."

She keeps repeating it and the burn in my broken hands is nothing to the one in my chest as I cup her face.

Speaking softly, there's no order but a plea, "Go with Valentin to the hospital, meelaya." The taste of alcohol on her cheek burns my lips as I kiss her cheek. I give her what will never be enough as I whisper, "I'm sorry I couldn't protect you."

It's a night of my failings, every single one being pointed out and I'll never be able to fix them. But Inessa is alive, and she'll live a long life. The apology has her moving in a haze, like it's fucked with her head and she's not capable of thought as I call my brother over.

"Get them checked over, private room, and no wait. She might need her stomach pumped."

Nodding once, he gently holds her arm and guides her away.She sways on her feet, and he quickly lifts her as he chokes around his own promise, "You'll be okay, hold on to me."

Dropping my chin to my chest, my eyes and lungs burn. I went to that cunt for help, I made him a deal and he laughed in my fucking face only to kill her. Then he tried to kill my wife, the woman who fucking helps people, and has a heart bigger than her mouth. He couldn't have done it alone. The chair splinters against the floor from the force as I stand, and the puddles of blood and flammables splash against my legs as I thunder towards the door.

Vitali blocks my path with his voice coming out too small, too childlike.

"Where are you going?"

It's worry and I feel lighter knowing my task. My hand lands heavily on his shoulder and the pain shoots up my arm, but it's not a deterrent. Smiling back at him, I tell him the truth as I stroke his hair like when he was a baby.

"To do what I should have done the minute you were born," I smile, wonder filling my voice as I feel the first breath of relief enter my body, "make us orphans."

He freezes and I brush past him, uncaring what happens. I take the steps two at time, ignoring the way it jolts my broken hands.

I can't drive for shit, but I'd crawl over broken fucking glass to right this wrong. My hands are already swollen, making it difficult to grip the steering wheel, and I like the sting. The pain is grounding me in reality, stopping it all from sinking in. When it does, I'll burn but everyone else will feel it before I do.

My brothers will make sure Inessa and the baby are safe for now. While I make sure history never fucking repeats itself.

* * *

Growing up,I was never allowed luxuries, even when the fuckers paid for their lives with my soul. Tearing pieces off for a price and selling them to sick cunts to satiate their fantasies. Now Anika has every luxury she could imagine, but no protection. The guards are fearful of the Vartanov name because it's mine — not hers or fucking Len's.That's the reason they will all become deaf, blind, and mute to her screams tonight.

Walking into her house, I drop the ptichye moloko on the kitchen table and go on the hunt for the bitch. Even on the other side of the world, I could have known she'd be fucking someone. The noises coming through the door turns my stomach. It's nothing new considering her need to fuck Len in any room I was sat in.

I kick against the door, not wanting whatever filth is on it to touch me.The bitter cunt I fell out of lays there squealing like a filthy pig as the dickhead doesn't even pause his thrusts. They're lost in their own world, and I don't allow my head to dip to see his pasty ass move as I close the distance and grab his hair. My smile widens as they both scream, finally noticing someone is in the room. I tilt his head back, so he's looking up at the ceiling. My smile continues growing as I open one up on the fucker's throat. It covering Anika's rancid body with blood, so I don't have to witness it again. Her scream just makes me laugh. It's almost poetic that she'll be covered in blood and cum while eating ptichye moloko. After all, it's what she did to me, the cunt.

The gurgling stops, and the dead weight drags forward. I let go of his head and laugh. She screams with his dead body covering her and I'm not going to help her.

There's no room for argument in my bark. "Get the fuck up."

As though it's only just registered who I am, she turns to stone, and I can hear how fast her heart is beating. She sobs as I press the tip of the blade to the thin skin under her eye. The blood clings to her lashes, and she sobs in an attempt to save herself.

"I did what you said."

No fucking apology or sincerity.

Leaning over her dead fuck buddy, I dig the tip of the knife under her eyeball. The thin skin slowly parts and the scream of pain is music. The best composers in history couldn't produce anything better. Yet it doesn't drown out the facts of everything this cunt has done.

My voice is deadly, more than anything I've ever produced before, as I ask, "Did I tell you to go near Vanya?"

The dumb bitch impales her own eye on my knife as her sobs increase. If she wasn't so obsessed with fucking everything that moves, I'd be surprised she managed to procreate.But she is a whore, she is sick and twisted, a pervert, and the worst form of creature to exist because she profited off a child.

Grabbing her hair, I drag her with me, refusing to look at whatever fucking state she's in. I'll happily kill her and sleep easy. Seeing Anika naked is something I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. My hold on her hair is tight enough that she follows as she's dragged from under the dead fuck still bleeding out. But my swollen fingers can't grip the strands tightly to stop her knocking into every surface. Such a shame.

Her nails dig into my already swollen hand, it will be numb soon so she can keep doing it. It all fucking ends today, I don't give a fuck if they have a contingency to send everything to Denis, or I'll be killed before I even manage to leave the house, it all stops because her cunt of a husband tried to kill my wife.

They took Vanya and then they tried to take Inessa too.

Anika screams as I drop her in a heap at the top of the staircase. Her mouth opens to beg but the only thing that leaves is a scream as my leg rocks back. Her hands are outstretched, eyes wide, as those screams mix with my laugh. The tumble has her spine being knocked into the sharp wooden edge of each step on her journey until she lands at the bottom.

I should have recorded the sound to be my fucking ringtone. Humming bayu bayushki, I'm nearly skipping down the steps and I'm more alert than I was with Len, allowing me to savor every bit of her anguish.I'll remain conscious for this part, take my time, and do it slowly to cause maximum enjoyment. She won't know anything other than pain and I'll repay her for her motherhood.

I reach the bottom step with my shoes leaving a dull thud on the wood. They stick to the floor with the blood coating the step and I laugh louder, seeing the bitch attempt to crawl away. She's wheezing and I help her move by kicking into her ribs. She doesn't hit the wall as she grabs the stair post for support, her arms wrapping around it and hugging it. She would always hug me on those days, the ones I woke up thinking I was dying. It lasted six months before she got sick of doing it and didn't drug me enough to keep me asleep. Just enough that I wouldn't be able to fight, but I was awake. I felt everything, and I was right, I was dying. I felt pieces of myself die and I don't recognize that child anymore.

He was stupid, weak, everything Len told him he was. But I'm not.

Anika's forgetting the countless days she spent watching Len trying to train us and stays down. Stamping on the back of her head, anger laces my voice.

"You stand every fucking time."

My heel hits her shoulder and the joint pops with a scream when she doesn't move.I won't drug her like she did to me. My torture is just. There's no joy in a subdued opponent. But there's no fight coming from the woman who gave birth to me. The cunt doesn't move, and I grab her hair. She's latched onto the wood, her head moving back as she sobs louder and fucking begs, "Please. I didn't do anything."

I press my foot into the center of her spine, the exact spot that holds the cards on my back and press down, making her screams elongate.

"That isn't true, is it, Anika?" My threat holds a promise, and I might do it anyway. "Up or I will get one of the men to shove a rat up your poisonous fucking cunt." I lean down and my voice darkens. "They will chew through anything."

Sobbing harder, she lets go.I'm not touching her. There's enough filth on me to last a lifetime, enough that it has tainted the only good things I ever had from childhood to now. But she's a sniveling fucking mess and barely able to stand.

Fucking weak cunt. Inessa was forced to fucking kneel, and her hands never once left her stomach. A queen with her head held high and true fucking strength, protecting what's hers.Her tears are burned into my mind. The sight of them mixing with the liquid dripping off her hair, how they kept dripping into the puddle around her, the blood on her skin. And the way my wife begged when she's a stubborn brat. She wasn't made to beg, or to kneel, she was made to be a spoilt queen, commanding everyone around her without a single worry.

Anika continues screaming and I attempt to get her to shut the fuck up as I drag her to the kitchen. Not verbally, I punch into the back of her head, and it only dulls the sounds. The chair at the kitchen table screeches as I pull it back to drop her in it. She's dumb as fuck and instantly tries to stand when it's clear what I'm going to do. Her shoulder nearly crumbles under my hand as I grab it and push her back down. A pathetic whimper leaves her quivering lips, and she freezes as she notices what is sitting in the middle of the table.

She stares at the cake like it's a snake. There has been no discussion of my childhood since I was twelve years old, it's the knife in the room that will never be mentioned, but I don't give a fuck anymore. Knowing she's going to remain seated, I pull out a drawer and grab a spoon for the cunt. The wood rattles with my bones as I slam the spoon in front of her, the wood denting with the impact and the curve flattening slightly. She looks up at me, trying to garner sympathy.

"Eat your fucking cake," I grit.

Hope fills her beady fucking eyes. Dumb cunt. She really thinks I'm going to beat her, feed her, then fuck off. She shakily picks up the utensil and I drag the edge of the container closer to her to stop my stomach convulsing. My voice is harsher, more deadly, as it booms around the house of horrors built on my back.

"Eat!"

It echoes off the tile, the stone counters, making her flinch and she slowly peels the lid back to have her last meal.

I take a step back away from the smell of sugar and chocolate, but it isn't enough. The boy who died wants to know why when I could give him the reason, but he speaks through me as he asks the decrepit bitch, "Was it all worth it? The money? The parties you'd throw?"

I walk around the table as I speak to get away from the smell, but it follows me, mixing with smoke as I pull the chair back with my foot and take a seat. My hands land heavy on the wood. They're swollen, covered in so much blood I can't even make out the images inked on them.

The bitch pretends to care as she gasps around her tears. My face pinches in disgust at the bullshit and she makes no attempts to cover her nasty fucking body, but I don't look anywhere apart from her eyes.

"Did you have a child just to sell them?"

It's the only conclusion I can come to. She hated my existence for as long as I can remember. She never touched me in the way normal mothers would. The old me, the dead version, once sought comfort from her and the price of that comfort was being violated. Any recognition I got was simply an employer telling their worker they'd done a good job. None of her actions fit her role and opening her legs doesn't make her a mother.

The spoon is held limply in her hand and the true evil nature of her is shown as she answers, "I wasn't aware they were a commodity before you."

A commodity.

Raw material.

To be bought and sold.

She sits taller when I don't say anything. Mistaking my silence for weakness as always, she opens her mouth again.

"You enjoyed it after a while. When they weren't just using you. I helped you. I let them make you feel good in return."

"You helped me?"

She's fucking crazy. Sick and insane. Not only that, she also has the audacity to look incredulous as though my tone is the issue. Before she can spew more shit, I ask, "How did you help me?" Her mouth opens but I continue. "You didn't exactly lube me the fuck up. The only thing you have ever cared about is yourself. Now, eat. Your. Fucking. Cake."

Fuck her, it's not worth the conversation and I push back from the table. The chair hits the tiled floor, splintering on impact and her gulp is audible as she restarts the journey of the spoon.

The lighter fluid is kept in the same place, always five bottles of it, and I grab it from under the sink. Any alcohol I can find is next. Len wanted to burn my wife, now his will go up in fucking flames. She splutters and chokes, ingesting the contents as I douse her while she has her fucking cake. The same reaction I have when it's nothing but a dessert.

I pause as it hits me that this bitch will know all of her husband's secrets.

"Where are the recordings?"

She looks up, and I grimace as the alcohol has rinsed some of the blood off her naked body. Hope stares back at me and she drops the spoon, eager to stay alive. Her eyes don't open fully with the fumes of the accelerant sticking to her lashes and her words rush together.

"Buried in the ground, near the old house. The churchyard."

Anika abruptly stops talking and her eyes go to the side, realizing her mistake. Her breathing shallows more than the fear I instilled in her. That motherfucker, he knew where Vanya was and used her resting place to hide his fucking leash over me.

My arm cocks back, hurt powering the movement as I swing into her jaw and the crack is instantaneous. Blood pours from her mouth, mixing with spit and she smacks her head off the table. I don't carry a lighter and turn to grab one as she mumbles, dazed, attempting to flee.

"He moved her."

I fucking knew it. They were always going to take her from me, even in death. But the holes didn't go deep enough. She's okay, she's still sleeping. Vanya is okay.

* * *

I watchthe heart monitors as I sit at Inessa's beside, rather than the side of her face that's all bruised. They're not supposed to be hooked up, but I need proof they're both alive. She's already eight months pregnant. I kept myself away for eight months and I never tainted a single waking moment so she would be safe. Our baby had been growing safely before all this shit and there's only a few weeks left until she'll be in the world.

My hand stretches out, wanting to feel her move but my skin doesn't touch. I can't ruin them more than I have. I've spent three days removing anyone who could possibly harm them, allowing everyone to see what I've done to prevent anyone even having the thought of getting near either of them. They'll be safe even though they're my weakness, both of them will exist and I'll only ever have their nights to watch over them.

Inessa is exhausted and hasn't even made a murmur for the three hours I've been sitting here watching them both, so I allow my lips to move. Disuse weakens my voice as I watch her swollen stomach.

"Prosti, moya malen'kaya koroleva1."

Like she can hear me, the monitor beeps and Inessa's belly moves under the shadow of my hand. All it would take is closing the millimeter of space, but I can't. My hands are still pink, stained in blood, and they're swollen to over double their size. She doesn't deserve a violent hand, before birth or after.

My head lowers, giving her the respect she deserves as I move closer. Each word that leaves me brushes the back of my swollen hand.

"I'm sorry, malyshkonuk. You're going to be safe now, just copy your mama, okay?"

My hand on my thigh moves, my fingers alternating between memorizing the screeching beeps showing they're alive.

Warm. Not blue.

I sit back in the seat and try to stop the smell of burning flesh from infiltrating my senses. It's been stuck in my nose for the entire twelve hours since I left Moscow. It doesn't stir any reaction other than disgust because it mixes with the scent of sugar. Burning flesh has a sweet scent anyway, but the artificial sweetness of chocolate makes it worse. My stomach churns, wanting to expel everything at the memory of the cake. Not the woman who gave birth to me burning alive, that brings a smile to my lips as her screams mixed with the sound of the flames roaring.

A gasp has me moving back, ashamed of being caught.

"Your hands."

Two words filled with pain, and I know I've made the wrong decision coming here. I should have left them alone. My hand that was hovering in midair falls to my thigh and I continue watching the monitors as I use both of them to tap each beat of theirs against my knee. I don't look at Inessa as I give her another apology.

"I'll leave, I just wanted to make sure you were okay."

But I don't stand because her heart rate slows. I've been watching it, I know it, I could fucking draw it. It hasn't changed once in the hours I've been sitting here.

Sadness.

That's all I can see when I turn to her. Tears line her lashes, and she gives me the smallest smile in existence as she looks from my hands to my face. The pain mixes with care as she continues flicking those muted dark eyes from my fingers moving to my face. But she can't meet my eyes anymore. She always met my eyes; I didn't dislike it for once. The sad smile increases both in curvature and emotion as she whispers, "You're wearing a suit again."

I want her to keep talking and remain rooted in place, hoping she does.

She doesn't.

She just stares at me.

With that sad smile.

I can't process her sadness and allow thirty seconds more as I finalize their heartbeats before I stroke down my thighs to get rid of the unease and stand. There's a small brush against my little finger, a barely-there touch, and I look down to see Inessa stretching out to hook her little finger around mine. There's no pressure and she forces me to look at her as she gentle says, "You don't have to leave. If you don't want to."

The bruise on her cheek is already blue and there's a cut on her lip.

Blue. So much blue.

His death was too easy, and I can't remember it.

I take a controlled breath and turn to her, making sure my hands don't touch her as I lean over and kiss her forehead. I give a promise I'll never take back until my dying breath.

"Whatever you want is yours."

Dark eyes full of hesitance and a voice that match stare up at me as she quietly asks, "Will you tell me what happened?"

She's always been good at proving I'm a fucking liar and we both know the truth without me voicing it. She's heard too much already. She's seen too much. But I can't put the weight of my failings on her shoulders and slip my hand out of her grasp.

1 ?I'm sorry, my little queen