If anything, she’s seemed… a little steadier, like some things have begun to click into place after that first conversation.
Another ten minutes pass by, then twenty. We give her a thirty-minute grace period before Roman starts pacing.
“I don’t like this,” he mutters. “She was supposed to finish with school two hours ago. Where the hell is she?”
He pulls out his phone again, thumbs moving fast as he types something. I already know he’s telling Matvey to check traffic cams and public routes, seeing if she was spotted en route. Maybe she stopped for food or had a doctor’s appointment she forgot to mention.
“She could’ve finally gotten spooked,” I offer, my eyes drifting over the empty apartment. “He may have said something that made her doubt herself.”
Roman grunts. “We’ve been listening to all of her phone conversations. She hasn’t told him jack shit.”
“She’s pregnant and scared. That would make anyone want to run. The second two strange men show up at your door, telling you the person you love is living a double life? It’s instinct. You don’t trust them. You bide your time. You get your affairs in order. You figure out how to disappear before they can drag you into something worse.”
He doesn’t argue, but the silence between us turns colder.
I glance around, forcing myself to take in every detail.
There are two half-drunk mugs on the kitchen counter, one with lipstick smudged on the rim. An open book sits on the couch’s armrest, dog-eared and spine-broken, clearly having been read a hundred times before. The scent of a freshly burned candle lingers faintly in the air, lavender and sage.
I move toward the window that faces the street, the blinds tilted just enough to catch the early afternoon light, pale and golden. A soft breeze slips through the cracked windowpane, tugging at the edge of the curtain and brushing cool air against my face.
None of it carries any answers. No clues as to where she’s gone or when she’ll be back. If ever.
Roman’s voice cuts through the silence, following my line of sight. “If she was taken, we would’ve seen something.”
“Not if he knew how to do it right,” I reply, my tone flat. “You know what he’s capable of.”
Roman’s face darkens at that. “We should check the school. See if she even showed up this morning.”
I nod. “Good idea.”
Best case scenario, we pull footage from the CCTV outside the school. We watch her leaving that afternoon, track her movements, figure out where our pregnant mistress has decided to run off to. Worst case scenario, we trace the point where Mikhail or one of his men grabbed her and use that trail to take us deeper into his network.
Either way, we’ll follow it. We have to. Like Ivy, she’s in too deep now. Whether she knows it or not, she’s part of this war, and that means the only way out is through.
10
IVY
The hallway smells like old takeout containers and freshly brewed coffee. It’s a tired, human smell, clinging to the peeling paint and worn carpet, soaked into the air like secondhand smoke.
I trail my fingertips along the wall as I move toward the living area, the drywall cool and slightly rough beneath my touch. Katya’s burner phone is still clutched tight in my hand, the cheap plastic digging into my palm. My thumb keeps brushing the edge of the keypad over and over, using it to distract myself from my conversation with Lettie.
What I find at the end of the hallway is what I can only describe as a makeshift security hub. Katya and Andrey are shoulder to shoulder at a long dining table that’s been stripped of anything resembling domesticity. The surface is buried under tablets and laptops, loose maps with circles drawn in red ink, and pieces of paper covered in hastily scribbled notes.
A tangle of extension cords snakes across the floor, feeding power into an army of devices. More cords wind toward two overloaded power strips taped to the baseboard on the opposite wall, their little red lights pulsing like warning beacons. Four forty-five-inch monitors flicker in the far corner, throwing a rainbow of shifting color across Matvey’s face as he clicks through security footage.
His expression is focused and unblinking behind his thick-framed glasses.
Above it all, a larger TV is mounted to the wall, playing a muted news broadcast. Subtitles scroll across the bottom of the screen like a silent scream while the anchor’s lips move without sound about some scandal somewhere else.
For one strange, dizzy second, I’m profoundly grateful Mikhail didn’t put a camera on me before I left. Hecouldhave easily. A button lens hidden in a coat, a pendant that isn’t actually a pendant, a microdrone disguised as jewelry.
He could have forced me to record everything I’ve seen since stepping into this safehouse, all of it piped back to him in real time like some macabre livestream. Instead, all he gets is audio.
My face heatsup at the thought—hot, mortifying shame creeping up my neck as a memory flashes in my head of what Maksim and I did last night.
God… and no doubt, Mikhail heard it all.