“With your death, things will finally click into place. I’ll kill you and the heirs to both the FetisovandMoretti lines, moving on to the rest of the Bratva families before they have a chance to react. I’ll be the last man standing. And once the Bratva is under my control, I’ll move on to the Camorra.”
He grins. He’s not done yet.
“As for Gabriel, I won’t kill him. That’s the gift I’m going to give myself. I’ll take everything he has—the Camorra, his territories, his reputation. And then I’ll let him live with the knowledge that he failed, that he had twenty years to protect the little girl he promised to save, and in the end, she died with his baby in her belly.”
He’s practically squirming with delight as he speaks. “It’s a nice plan, yes?”
“It’s sick,” I spit. “And it’s not going to happen. Gabriel’s going to kill you. And deep down, I think you know it.”
He lifts his eyebrows at me in mild surprise. Then he shrugs, pours another drink, and tosses it back.
“If that’s the fantasy you want to have, I won’t stop you. After all, it’s no fun unless I get to break your spirit in the process.”
With that, he gets out of his seat. I can tell by the slight wobble that he’s already feeling the alcohol.
“Sit tight,malyshka. I won’t be long.”
He turns and walks toward the door, his goons lurching out of the booth and catching up with him.
The silence that follows is like a tomb. All I can hear is the sound of my heartbeat thrumming in my ears, and the hum of the refrigerators behind the bar.
Sylvie hasn’t moved. She’s watching me from the other side of the booth with an expression I can’t quite puzzle out. I can’t tell whether she feels bad for me, or she’s happy I’m getting what she feels I deserve.
I curl forward and wrap my arms around my stomach.
Then the tears come. They’re ugly, messy tears, the kind that shake your whole body and steal your breath. I cry for my family. I cry for Sylvie.
And I cry for my baby, who hasn’t even been born yet and is already being hunted.
Gabriel. He’s somewhere in the city right now, unaware that the woman he loves and the child she carries sit in some rundown nightclub, praying he comes.
CHAPTER 44
THEA
Isit with my hands flat on the table, my vision blurring as I stare down at nothing in particular. I breathe. That’s all I can do—focus and take slow, steady breaths. I try to push everything else away and devote myself to the single thing I seemingly still have control over, moving air in and out of my body, while my mind tries to catch up with what’s happened.
He knows about the baby. He’s going to kill us both.
Stop.
I press my palms harder against the table until my arms shake. I can’t go there right now. I can’t think about his threats and the danger that my baby and I are in, or else I’ll come apart. And I don’t have the luxury of doing that, not with everything at stake.
I don’t know how much time I have. Kolya could come in right now with a gun in his hand and end it all, or he could wait, take his sweet time, make me stew and squirm.
I breathe in one more full breath, release it slowly, then wipe my face. I don’t feel strong, and I sure as hell don’t feel brave. But I have to. I don’t have any other option.
Sylvie’s still seated in the booth across from me. There’s a strange, almost dazed, look in her eyes, like she’s physically there, but her mind is a million miles away.
I’m scared to talk to her, scared to face what happened, what I did. I could’ve tried harder, could’ve pushed nonstop from day one to find her, to save her. But I didn’t. And the consequence of that is whatever hell she’s gone through. Is still going through.
But I have to try.
“Sylvie.”
Nothing.
“Hey. Sylv.”