33. Vitali

THIRTY-THREE

Vitali

E verything around me is slower, duller, than usual. Apart from Val, that dumb fuck keeps staring at me and he looks at my knee as though he can see through my sweats as I keep Stasi on my thigh. I’m hiding behind her, and I don’t give a fuck. My lips touch her cold nape and I hate the way she stiffens when I press my hand to her stomach. I thought she was injured. Not that .

Other than the small flinch she doesn’t pick her head up or even acknowledge anyone. My apology is silent and my eyes close as I focus on the fact she’s breathing. She’s okay, alive, and breathing, she’s not passed out on the floor with a bunch of pricks sneering at her or recounting the fucked-up shit they’ll do – she’s safe.

Sweat beads down my spine and I grit my teeth as a tremor enters my hand. She can feel it, and she unfreezes to gently cover my hand with hers. There’s barely any pressure against me, but I relax as I whisper into her skin, “I’m sorry, malysh.”

The sight of her passed out is right in front of me, even though I know she’s not, it’s still fucking there. My mind keeps it in a continuous loop: the fucker kicking into her stomach, their dirty boot pressing against her cheek while I couldn’t get my head to stop spinning enough to stand, both of them hurting her and even when they were dead, the other two turned up full of fucking glee at what their rapist buddies had promised them.

We stop moving and she peels my arm off her to get out of the car while avoiding everyone. She usually speaks to Dima, but she doesn’t even look in his direction as she walks into the house. I’m not letting Stasi run from me, not now when she’s hurting, not fucking ever.

I get out to follow after her but Vlad stops me when I step into the house and Val is at my back. Stasi keeps walking and I settle as she goes to our floor. The dickhead behind me opens his mouth and stokes my rage as he spits, “Why the fuck were you with Zhang? Did you buy something from her?”

My fist comes up as I turn, and I push every bit of emotional and physical pain behind it. It doesn’t connect with Val’s jaw as I sway, and my knee burns as he knocks my hand away. Dima steps between us while Val stares like a dumb fuck. He doesn’t try to hit me back. He uses his favorite weapon, his tongue.

“Well done, looks like you’re a daddy’s boy after all.”

Our stepdad knows it’s a low blow and he keeps his tone even, warning, “Shut your mouth, Valentin, and walk away.”

Val takes a step closer to me, ignoring it. “Try to do it again, I’ll knock you on your ass.”

And, as always, Vlad waits until the last moment to leash him.

“Valentin. Walk. Away.”

The low threat stops him advancing, and he looks at me like I’m a piece of shit as he scoffs, “Fucking junkie.”

Dima steps closer to me, his hand pressed on my chest as I try to go through him to get to the prick, screaming, “You’re the one who had a kid with a crackhead but I’m the junkie?!”

A rough hand grabs my jaw, forcing it to close and I’m pushed back. Vlad steps to the side, blocking Val reaching me, as he spits out murder. “You think these fuckers can protect you when you talk about my kid? You’re a little fucking puppy because you’re high all the time, so shut your fucking mouth and get your coke whore out of my fucking house!”

There’s a roar in my chest, removing the heartache, it stops the pain in my knee being an issue as I throw my full weight forward, uncaring about anything other than killing the fucker.

Dima and Vlad remain between us, taking the majority of the shots, until we’re both pushed back, and Vlad officially loses his calm. His voice is deadly vibrating off the tile and Dima pins me to the door with his hands wrapped around my biceps.

“Are you children?!”

I don’t give a fuck and try to push the cunt off me as I argue my case. “He’s a mouthy prick. I didn’t do shit to him.”

Val proves my point as he stops trying to move around Vlad. He stares at me with open hate, and the arm pressed against his chest doesn’t stop it reaching me.

“You’re a pathetic, weak cunt,” he snarls. “Fucking useless prick, Len was right about you.”

The temperature turns arctic as both Vlad and Dima stare at him, but I spit out his biggest fear, “And you’re Anika’s favorite little boy. Just like her, you’re a bitter, twisted cunt.”

There’s less weight holding me in place, and I’m stopped from beating the fuck out of him as Vlad grabs his face. His inked fingers dig into the dickhead’s cheeks, and he forcefully turns Valentin’s face to look away from me as he snaps, “Learn when to shut the fuck up. Go. Now.”

He pushes him back and for a split second there’s remorse on Val’s features. It’s not deep enough to allow him to voice it, but it makes him walk away while I shout at his back, “Who’s weak now, you little bitch?”

Pushing Dima off me, I take the stairs and grit my teeth as the pain radiates through my entire limb with each step. It gets deeper, more potent, as I reach my floor to see the bedroom door closed. Guilt isn’t something I’ve ever experienced before. Now, it swarms me, clouds my vision, and robs me of energy. The intensity of it is felt in my bones when I act like a coward pausing at the threshold. I can’t hear Stasi packing, it’s still and everything has paused.

I used to think the hardest thing I’d do in my life would be avoiding my parents when I was a child, but I would do that for eternity over seeing my girl shut down. My fingers shake as I open the door to see her laid in bed facing the wall. Despite being unable to see her face I know she’s awake, the air is weighted with all of her thoughts and I gently lower to sit beside her.

She doesn’t argue as I kick my shoes off, or when I fit myself at her back and pull the sheets up over our heads. I hold her and avoid touching her stomach so she’s not uncomfortable. I don’t know how long I lay there listening to her trembling breaths when she blindly turns and wraps her arm around me. The only words I have are ones that are unfamiliar to me, yet they’re easy to say with the guilt forcing them out.

“I’m sorry.”

I couldn’t even pick her up, I made her fucking walk while having a miscarriage because my knee is fucked. I couldn’t stop them hurting her, and a fucked-up part of me is pissed that it wasn’t internal bleeding like I initially thought. She would heal from that; she’d be angry, and I’d kill everyone in apology, but there’s no one I can kill to stop her shutting down. All because I’m weak and, even now, I can’t do shit with the pain coming back and fucking with my head.

Her eyes close as I kiss her crown. For a moment, I think she’ll let me in but her arm loosens before she pushes me away and rips the cover off us. No words, or cursing, she just turns and goes back to staring at the wall.

Everything I wanted was there less than twenty-four hours ago, I had my girl, and she had our baby. Now, I can’t even fucking walk without a twinge going up my thigh as I go to the closet so I can feel like myself again. The safe is already open a crack when I step inside, but none of Stasi’s things have been touched. It’s not open enough for me to see into it fully, and whoever did it is playing a sick game with my lifelines. I pull the door open with too much force as all the emotions band together to form anger. The proof of the fuckers going through my things sits in an empty safe with a note like I’m a kid getting their fucking homework back.

Office .

Fucking prick. I’ve gone through their shit, but I had the decency not to fucking tell them and I always make sure that everything gets put back in the same place. Maybe they’ll beat the shit out of me. The threat was there when I last got caught taking drugs. It’ll stop the ache in my bones, and I couldn’t focus on anything else when Val had his little tantrum, so it will serve a purpose. It will give my mind something else to focus on.

My stomach rolls with the urge to be sick as I go to find my pills. They’re prescription drugs for fuck’s sake, not anything nefarious. Even if I didn’t get them by legal means and Alia modified them so they were stronger, they’re still only pain meds.

My body begs me to stop and sweat coats my skin. There’s no exertion with taking the elevator but every tiny movement is magnified.The descent doesn’t help with the nausea swarming me and my T-shirt sticks to my back.

The fuckers aren’t in the office, and I follow the sounds of their accusations as Val opens his stupid fucking mouth.

“Think he’s selling them or taking them?”

Dumb cunt. He’ll be the easiest to piss off, but his method of pain is mental, like our mother.

He continues speaking as Vlad’s ice clinks in his tumbler. “I bet that’s why he let them fuckers take him. He was probably high as fuck, the Kadares wouldn’t get the jump on him otherwise.”

Stupid prick.

My leg tries to give way and I grit my teeth to stop from telling the cunt it was because of this fucking family they grabbed me. This is the second time I’ve had to pay for their shit, but now they involved my girl and she’s fucking breaking.

Words leave me more harshly than I’ve ever spoken before as I stop at the threshold of the living room.

“Give me them.”

I manage to walk a few more steps to hold on to the back of the sofa so I can take some of the weight off my knee and stare between my dickhead family.

Vlad stands with his back to the bar, his daughter at his side, as Val takes up his other side. They stare at me like I’ve got three heads, apart from Vanya, she’s filled with remorse. Or the closest thing to it that she can feel in her fucked-up head.

I need the pain inside of me to leave and push their buttons.

“Who the fuck went through my shit? Do you see me doing that to you fuckers, and your fucked-up lives?”

Val moves forward, only making it half a step before Vlad holds his arm out, stopping him from moving any further.

“Let him spit his dummy out and get it out of his system.”

I can’t stop myself and hate it at the same time as I snap, “Would you rather I bit it off like you?”

I’m going to throw up at the memory of what I found in his private office, but I can’t focus on it with my turbulent emotions taking over.

Val’s dumbass face looks between the two of us, but he saves himself from the knowledge of what has the devil freezing. Vlad doesn’t focus on my anger, instead he asks, “Why are you taking this shit?”

Because it fucking helps!

I don’t say that though, that’s rational and there’s nothing rational about me right now. I look around the room for anywhere they could have hidden the bottles and force my feet to move while my body protests. The sofa cushions are the first thing to hit the floor and I have to grab the armrest when bile burns the back of my throat.

“They’re gone,” Val says, the smug prick. “Sit the fuck down and stop ruining your life.”

A dark laugh bubbles out of me, it’s bitter and the sound would make the normal me wince. “I’m not going to take advice from someone who had to ask who the mother of his child was.”

His anger comes out, it’s not uncontrollable enough to beat the shit out of me and I don’t know how I’m standing as I turn to face them. I look him up and down and smile knowing I’ll get relief in less than thirty seconds.

“Have you ever called out Carly’s name when you’re fucking her sister?”

There’s a line I’ve never crossed, I’m not a disrespectful fuck like my brothers. Those I care about are given my loyalty. And I just crossed it, so I do it again.

“Or do you compare them? You like Dani’s tits but Carly’s as?—”

Val charges forward and sweet pain erupts in my jaw, but ever the fucking protector, our makeshift father steps in front of him as Val rages. “First you talk shit about my kid now my wife?!”

I shrug and add more fuel to the fire. “If you don’t like the truth that’s on you, suka.”

Vanya grabs his arm as he threatens murder. “You’re a stupid little cunt. Keep fucking talking and I’ll rip your tongue out of your mouth.”

I want him to do it. To make it fucking hurt and knock this shit out of my head. To remove the thoughts of a life I could have had and never fucking will, to push everything away so I can’t fucking focus on the fact I couldn’t even fight properly with having to keep my weight off one leg. Or how Stasi sobbed with blood on her fingers.Or how I made her walk through literal shit and death because keeping myself standing was too painful.

The devil speaks and clenches his jaw as he attempts to warn me, “Watch your mouth.”

Hate turns to loathing and I smile, full of twisted satisfaction at what he thinks I don’t know.

“Nah, that’s what you do in your little jerk-off room. Does Inessa know that’s what gets you off?”

I’ve never said anything worth killing me over than that one fucking sentence. But he freezes instead of killing me like I want, and my head is abruptly turned to the side from the force of a hand slamming into my cheek.I can’t feel the sting and turn back to look at who it is. I expect someone other than his wife standing in front of me. She just slapped me across the face so hard I’ll probably have a handprint denting my skin, yet it’s the utter disgust in her voice and eyes that manages to penetrate my fucked-up head as Vanya rushes forward to keep her from hitting me again.

Inessa snarls, “Get the fuck out.”

Going at my brothers didn’t work and Vlad calls his wife back to stop her attacking me.

“Inessa, don’t.”

She whirls on him with fire in her eyes as Vanya gently moves her back, defending me. My niece is an adult, but her voice is childlike, and she fidgets, clearly uncomfortable with the tension.

“If you’re in pain?—”

A derisive half scoff-half laugh leaves me, cutting her off, and I shake my head. Every letter that falls from my lips drips in pain and pulls her face down. “You have the emotional intelligence of a fucking leaf?—”

My body is pushed back with a hand wrapped around my throat and pure violence staring back at me.

“You spew your shit at me, I’ll fucking take it,” Vlad forces out between clenched teeth.

My back hits the wall and I’m lifted off my feet as I choke, “Everyone’s seen how you take it.”

A fist hits the wall beside me, and Vlad ignores my taunt as he fights himself not to hurt me.

“Speak to my kids like that, I’ll forget you’re my fucking brother.”

I don’t have any control over my tongue and grit, “Fuck. You.”

He fucking promised to never raise a hand to us again when we moved away from our parents. Never to lie or force us to do shit. He promised that we’d have everything that we want, that we’d be fucking safe but the pain in my leg is proof that was bullshit. The one person I’ve hurt the most by being a cunt is the one who comes to my defense as his daughter punches him in the ribs. His hand doesn’t loosen around my throat, but it creates enough distance for her to push her body between us. Her tone is serious and she’s fucking tiny, barely coming up to my chin and protecting me.

“He’s not wrong, let him go.”

There’s no anger directed at me. She’s a psycho and slaps me in the mouth when I shout her name but now she’s fucking calm?!

Vlad looks down at her with his hand flexing around my neck and I continue being a dickhead, so he doesn’t allow the shit back into my head.

“Yeah, let me go,” I say then drop my voice to a whisper, “like you let her go.”

Everyone’s face is filled with rage, and he ignores his daughter as he lifts me higher. My back slides up the wall and my toes don’t touch the floor as he tightens his hand around my throat. I’m struggling to breathe.

Fuck it, if I’m going to die why not today? It’s as good as any and at least I’m at home, not chained in some cunt’s murder dungeon. Or watching my girl be attacked.

Anger and pain mix together erupting from my chest.

I couldn’t fucking move.

I saw their fucking boot kick her in the stomach so she was laid on her back. All their taunts about how they’d break her to get initiated into some sick cunt’s little club scream over the sounds of anything in front of me.

The image is right in front of my eyes, and I swing, trying to disperse it. My fist doesn’t hit air though, it connects with a jaw and my body is jolted as there’s a scream.

“No. Get off him!”

I can’t recognize the voice as my body rocks and pain erupts throughout my face, physical pain. Finally sweet relief that isn’t removed by anyone coming to my defense.

My body keeps fluctuating from hot and cold. The smell of hay and horse shit makes me throw up for the fifth fucking time and I turn my head in time to stop me choking on it. I don’t even have the energy to break the cuffs on my wrist that are keeping my arm attached to the bar. Fucking cunts. They couldn’t beat the shit out of me. They had to fucking choke me out and lock me in this shithole stable when I can barely stand. I was fine earlier, my knee stopped hurting until I remembered everything. Now, it’s throbbing, and I can’t think about anything else.

My dickhead brothers are nowhere in sight and there are no guards on this end of the property from the small opening in the boards. There’s hay stuck to my back from how much I’m overheating, and I can’t even sit up as footsteps get closer. Hay and vomit are a worse combination, but my body is wracked with shivers, and I shake uncontrollably. The window opens revealing faces I won’t look at: Dani and Vanya – the only two people who have tried to speak to me. My girl hasn’t even come down. I left her alone when she needed me, again.

“I don’t know who you became or what you said but you fucked up, Tali.” Dani lays on her guilt trip as though I don’t already feel like death.

They keep doing this shit, coming with food when the smell alone turns my stomach and trying to get me to speak other than asking them to get me out. I’ve learnt that they’re not going to unlock the stable doors, so I remain on my back as I stare at the knotted wood lining the roof. She sighs to herself when I don’t say shit and says something useful. “Stasi isn’t eating, what’s her favorite food?”

“Chicken,” I croak. “With sweet honey broccoli.”

She fucks off and I’d take her disappointment over Vanya’s. She doesn’t stop staring at me, her contacts aren’t in so there’s no one on this side of the property at all with her need to wear them in front of the guards. She walks around to the doors, instilling hope in me until it rattles, and she curses. “For fuck’s sake.”

But she doesn’t leave, and the doors pull as she climbs over the wood and drops down to her feet in front of me. There’s a smile on her face as she stand opposite me. The towels we leave for when Viktor hides out in the stables are piled in her arm and she moves around me, wetting the cloth in the trough.

She drops it over my vomit and tilts her head to the side as she stands above me and asks, “Do you want me to wipe your face?”

Her question doesn’t get an answer and she sighs, dropping down to a squat and wipes my face. She might only be a year younger than me, but she’s still my niece and I don’t need her cleaning up after me.

It helps though and she shows I’m weak as fuck as she sits me up.

Once she’s happy with the position she’s put me in, she sits opposite me cross-legged and takes out a bottle of water that was wrapped in the towels. She pushes it towards me, and her voice is low, contemplative.

“Sometimes when you hurt, you have to make other people hurt. It’s like you need them to because nothing else makes sense.”

Oh fuck, I’ve made her research emotions with my dickhead comment. I look up at her with an apology that isn’t enough, and it doesn’t leave my tongue. “Why are you sitting with me?”

She should hate me and start her torture but there’s a softness in her eyes.It carries into her voice, and she plays with the dried-up strands on the floor. “You were nice to me before we were family and Stasi is upset, she’s always been nice to me.”

My girl’s upset. Stasi who doesn’t give a fuck about anything, even herself, is fucking upset, sad enough for the emotionally inept to notice. My mouth opens without anything to say; I can’t ask how she is when I’ve got an answer, upset. Sad. Showing her emotions freely but it’s not her choice. She’ll hate me for being a weak cunt and not saving her.

Vanya doesn’t have that issue as she keeps talking while staring at the hay between her fingertips. “I’m sorry you had to be around Rowan’s friend because of me.”

I know I have some gaps in my memory, but I’ve never heard the name before and ask, “Who’s Rowan?”

She looks at me and the demons in her eyes are terrifying, even to me, as she says, “The woman works for him. He was going to take you to his Dollhouse.” Her lips twist to the side and she swipes at her arms as though there are bugs on her skin. “He doesn’t like me.”

She sounds so young, and I don’t want to know but I have to. My throat constricts, slowing my speech and lowering my voice to a whisper. “What did he do?”

She shakes her head and, for the first time in her life, she keeps something about herself a secret instead of blurting it out with no emotion. There’s no monotonous recounting of her horrible life, she ignores my question and says, “It’s good that you got away and Stasi will be happy again.”

A pair of boots thud down the path and I don’t have the will to turn my head to see who it is. All I can focus on is the one person who has never batted an eyelid about the horrors of her life, now refusing to tell me if, in some fucked-up way, Stasi and I are currently experiencing the lesser of two evils.

When the chains against the stable door rattle, a phantom drill joins it, and my knee throbs with the memory, but it’s not the fucker who went through my kneecap staring down at me. This one is worse; emotion is on his face and Dima is ready to murder me.He grits his teeth, his nostrils flaring, and venom directed at me as he says to his wife, “Go inside, lisichka.”

He makes it one step before Vanya jumps up, blocking his path and he’s a different fucking person while she continues to protect me.

“No one is hurting Tali, he’s in pain.”

Why the fuck is she defending me? I was a cunt and from the state of my knuckles, I did more than run my mouth. I got what I wanted with the dull ache behind my ribs, yet it’s only added more shit to my head that I don’t want to fucking deal with.

I stare up at the ceiling while he softens his voice. “Go inside for me, you’re not going to be around his shit.”

He doesn’t match the person who half raised me, but Vanya keeps speaking in favor of me when he’s right. “No. He’s nice, it’s not his fault and he didn’t mean to hit me.”

Fuck. I hit her? I hit my own fucking niece. It doesn’t mean shit that she’s full on crazy and has issues. Or that she can fight of her accord. The missing part of our family that I always felt, that I fucking searched for, was hurt by me .

The cool trough burns against my heated skin as my head drops back and I agree with Dima kicking the shit out of me.

“You can go, I deserve it.”

I hit my niece, a girl. Just like that cunt who gave me his DNA, I was another hand that hurt her when I was supposed to protect her. Before I knew she was one of us, when she was just Ana, I was protective over her, I wouldn’t even allow Val to give her shit and both of my parents are going to kill me. Vlad won’t allow me to live for hitting his daughter and Dima is definitely going to kill me when she leaves.

Physical pain is easier to deal with. I can see a bruise or a cut, watch it heal and know each stage is getting closer to the point I’ll overcome it. This shit in my head is a cyclone of every emotion a person can possess. My fingers tingle, the sensation moves down my arm with it being attached to the bar for so long, but I can’t stop it. The numb is slowly settling in. Unmedicated numb.The worst kind to exist.