Vlad
This is a terrible idea.
Alessia shoots me a speculative look as we drive in the back of the limo into the city. Mika’s on the seat across from us, watching out the windows.
“Are you taking me shopping?” She’s been trying to guess where I’m taking her, and I’ve been cagey about it.
Mostly because I’m thinking it’s a huge mistake.
I rub my forehead. “If you like, yes.” Maybe I should scrap my plan and just take her shopping. Nothing makes a woman happy like spending money on her.
Although Alessia might be different, since she comes from money.
I can make Mika happy, then.
“Where are we going? Why do you seem tense?”
The limo pulls up in front of a communist-era government building and stops. Alessia peers out the window, then back at me.
“I think this was bad idea,” I mutter.
“What is it?”
Mika reads the sign. “An orphanage.”
Alessia’s brows fly up. “What are we doing?”
I scrub a hand over my face. “We don’t have to go in.”
“What were you thinking?” she demands, putting a hand on my arm.
“I just thought…” I sigh. “You might like to hold babies. Rock them. They need volunteers. But I don’t want to make you sad. I think this was a bad idea.”
Alessia throws her door open and climbs out. I leap out to follow. Why does it feel like my heart’s up in my throat?
“I definitely want to volunteer,” she says brightly, like I’m taking her to an amusement park or something. Which would’ve been a far better idea. “Let’s go.” She grabs my hand and tugs me toward the door.
Mika climbs out of the limo and follows. “Why would you want to volunteer?” he demands.
“Come in, let’s find out.” She throws the door open and looks over her shoulder at Mika.
He’s clearly unenthused about this whole plan. I still have my doubts, too, even though her reaction is positive.
She might be horrified by what she finds in there. If I take the kittens as any indication, she’ll probably demand I adopt them all. And all I really know is that I don’t want to see her cry again.
I checked beforehand and thought the place looked clean and decent enough for what it is, but she’s an American. She may find the conditions inside heartbreaking. But I’m hoping it could become a project she cares deeply about. Something to keep her here. Something to give her a purpose.
My phone rings and I stop when I see it’s Victor. I hold up a finger to Alessia, who stops and waits. It’s a simple interaction. Basic. Human.
And yet I’m momentarily struck by it.
It’s like she’s a girlfriend or wife. A real wife. Not a kidnapped mafia princess. Not a prisoner.
Her face is open, kind. She’s waiting patiently as I flick my thumb across the screen and answer my pakhan.
Victor has questions and demands, as always. Hearing his voice grates on my nerves, even though he’s the closest thing I have to family now that my mother’s dead.
“I need you here in Moscow, Vlad. Permanently.”
“I’m always available to you. I answer your calls, we talk daily. What is this about? Do you trust my work?”
“You know I do, that’s why I need you.”
This is a generational divide. Or maybe just a product of paranoia as the leader of the brotherhood. He likes to see people’s faces. Sniff out lies. Maybe I should teach him how to video conference. “I handled everything we talked about yesterday.”
“You are too tied up with your hostage-bride to handle my business affairs,” he accuses. “Women have always been your downfall, Vlad. Will I have to clean up a mess from this one, too?”
I bristle. “Sabina was a mistake. This one is business.” I shoot a glance at Alessia, the lie sending bile up my throat.
Good thing she doesn’t speak Russian.
Mika’s frowning at me though. Glowering, actually. If he were a full-grown adult, I’d say he wanted to throat-punch me. I shake my head and point at the phone, trying to tell him I’m just telling stories to Victor. What the boss needs to hear to get off my back.
Bratva are forbidden to marry, so I’ve already violated code. The code that’s punishable by death.
“Sabina is under my protection now,” Victor says.
Huh. Okay. Well, who the fuck cares? She’s a black widow who preys on men to get what she desires.
“She twisted you around her finger now, eh?” I shouldn’t say it. Shouldn’t be disrespectful. I’m not pissed that he has a new woman after my mother’s death. He’s had multiple women all along. My mother was one of a great multitude of lovers. And I’m not supposed to even have a mother according to thieves’ code of conduct, but because my mother’s the one who got me in with Victor to begin with, he let the connection slide so long as I kept it hidden from all others.
“You’ll be respectful when you see her,” he snaps.
As if she deserves my respect. The woman manipulated me. Seduced me without telling me she belonged to Zima. Then pretended she was pregnant and asked me to kill Zima to free her. When I refused, she confessed to Zima so he’d kill me.
But considering Zima’s dead and I was called back from America, my guess is she manipulated Victor into doing her dirty work when I wouldn’t.
“As you wish, Pakhan,” I agree, though. You don’t cross Victor. Not over anything.
Lately I value my life more than I used to.
“You will come to Moscow,” he says and I hear the steel in his voice. I irritated him. Now I will pay. “You will come and bring the girl so I can see this pet you have now. And the orphan you brought home from Chicago. Then we will discuss your future.”
Blyat.
“As you wish.”
“Tomorrow,” he says firmly.
“We’ll be there tomorrow.” I end the call and close my eyes.
“What is it?” Alessia asks.
When I don’t answer, Mika does. “He has to go somewhere.”
“We have to,” I correct. Damn. I don’t want to bring either of them anywhere near Victor. I didn’t want responsibility for Mika. Not to begin with. But now that he’s been my ward for these few months, the idea of turning him over to anyone else makes me uneasy. And Victor will want to throw him into the lowest ranks of the bratva. Teach him to steal, murder and lie. Just like he did to me. I now wish I’d spent more time teaching Mika to hack. Then I could make Victor believe he’s most useful with me.
“Tonight we fly to Moscow.”
Alessia perks up. Whether it’s because she sees travel as a better opportunity to escape me or because she’s sick of being cooped up in my estate, I can’t say.
“Let’s go,” I say tersely, lifting my chin toward the door. I have bigger problems now than whether my bride gets upset by Russian orphans.
I called ahead, so I ask for the director, who bends over backwards to accommodate us. She leads us down a dank corridor to a large room filled with twenty cribs. And one rocking chair.
One empty rocking chair.
Babies are crying and the room smells like urine. Two hassled workers carry babies from a washroom back to their cribs.
The director points at one of the babies newly deposited in the crib. “This one is clean.” She picks up the crying infant and hands it-I can’t tell if it’s a boy or girl-to Alessia. Taking a bottle from the crib, the director hands it over as well.
The look on Mika’s face is pure horror.
Alessia, too, looks shocked.
“This was bad idea,” I say out loud. “Come, we go now.” My accent is thicker because I got tense.
“No, wait!” Alessia is bouncing up and down making shushing sounds. “I want to stay. You guys can go. Come back for me in a couple hours.”
Like hell.
I give her the stink eye to show her I don’t trust her alone for a second, but she’s gazing into the baby’s face speaking in sweet baby-talk tones. The baby quiets and coos back.
“Want some milk?” she asks it, backing into the rocking chair and bringing the bottle to the baby’s lips. “Are you hungry, angel?”
It’s hard to believe she’s considering escape at this moment. She’s totally wrapped up in that baby.
I glance at my phone. I have arrangements to make for our flight and lodging tonight in Moscow. “You stay. Make sure she doesn’t try to leave,” I tell Mika in Russian.
He wrinkles his nose, but nods in agreement. I forget he’s already been on the bottom of the bratva. He may not have killed yet, but he’s certainly known violence.
I squeeze his shoulder.
No way I’m letting Victor take the kid.
And I’ll die before I let him separate me from Alessia.