He mumbles something, but I don’t quite catch it. I move a little closer. “Can you repeat that again?” I ask. “Slowly.”
I don’t hear much else the second time either, but I do catch the word “brunette” and “son.”
“Your son likes brunettes?” I parrot back to him.
He jerks his head forward half an inch. I take that as a nod.
“Well, trust me,” I mutter, “that’s not why he married me. It’s all part of his evil mastermind plan to thwart my brother’s attempt at catching him for his crimes. Not to get too dramatic or whatever.”
I notice an edge of surprise work its way up one half of his face.
“So I’m stuck here until your son gets what he wants,” I continue. “Which I’m sure happens all the damn time. Was it like that for you, too? When you were in charge?”
He jerks his head forward again.
I nod. “Thought so. Must be nice.”
“It… was,” he croaks.
“Hey!” I say. “I understood that.”
One arm rises slightly and drops. “Used… to… me.”
I grin. “Well, I’m a fast learner.”
It looks for a moment like he’s smiling. The simple gesture tugs on my heart strings. I wonder if this is what my father would have been relegated to if he had survived his heart attack.
He would’ve hated it, but having him in a wheelchair would be better than not having him at all. It’s probably a selfish thought on my part. And yet I can’t deny that it feels true.
“My father died about seven years ago now,” I tell him softly.
His eyes are on me, so I know he’s listening. Perceptive. Awake.
“We were really close,” I continue. “I mean, we all were, my whole family. But my dad and I, we had a special relationship. Everyone always assumed I was an accident because I was born ten years after my sister, but Dad never let me believe that. He’d sit with me in the garden and we’d do some project or the other and he’d tell me about how I came to be born.”
I haven’t thought about the story since he died. It hurt too much to remember those sun-soaked days with him. The familiar rasp of his voice. The way he’d laugh in all the same spots during the telling.
But sitting here with Vlad at the edge of a lake that never seems to end, it feels okay to go back to that memory. It feels safe.
“Dad was the one who wanted another child. Mom felt like she was done, but he told her that they had more parenting left in them. So she finally caved after a year of nagging. He used to call me his bonus child. He said he’d never had a best friend growing up, so he figured he’d just make one.”
I swipe at my watery eyes.
“He was the best dad in the world,” I whisper. “I never had any doubt that I was the most important part of his life.”
I look at Vlad, whose expression is hard to read, and not just because of his half-paralyzed face. He has Aleks's reservedness. His ability to hide any and all emotion so that the other person has no idea where they stand.
“What was Aleks like?” I ask on a whim. “As a child?”
Vince breathes raggedly. “He was… never… much… of a… ch-child…”
“Yeah, I get that,” I say. “I can’t imagine him running around in this garden, doing kid stuff. He told me you taught him to fight and shoot as soon as he could walk.”
“Life… skills…”
I snort. “Maybe if you’re in the Bratva. Did he even have a choice?”
His head jerks again, but in the opposite direction.
That’s a no.
“Do you regret not giving him one?”
“Regret… is… a… waste…”
“Normal people live with it all the time, though. I know I do.”
“Why?”
“Why?” I repeat. “Because, well… I could have chosen differently. I could have—I dunno, saved my dad, maybe. Instead, I went to a party so I could pine after a boy who ended up making out with my best friend just to hurt my feelings. Reminds me of someone else I know, actually.”
“You have… a type…”
I frown. “I do not!”
Then I catch his tone and realize: he’s teasing me.
I shake my head. “Mike’s right: I do see where Aleks gets it from.”
Vince makes a sound that alarms me at first. Like a blender grinding up concrete. It takes me a moment before I see it for what it is: laughter.
My worry melts and I feel warmth spread through my chest instead.
I’m not quite sure, because of course, you can’t be sure of anything in any life, especially not mine.
But this may be the start of a beautiful friendship.
32
ALEKS
“It doesn’t look like he’s stopping the investigation after all,” Demyan informs me. “Our back channels say everyone is scoping us out—local PD, feds, everyone in between. The fucking Fish and Wildlife service probably has some agents detailed to our case. Two Bratva locations in particular have been flagged.”
“Not surprised,” I say. “She told him about the fucking scarf.”
“Question is, why didn’t you tell the owner of the scarf?” Demyan asks.
I roll my eyes. “She’s got enough on her plate.”
“In another world, the two of you would be the perfect couple, wouldn’t you?”
For the second time in as many seconds, I roll my eyes. “Moving on. Which spots got flagged?”
“Don’t duck the question. The warehouses on Daley Street and Scottswick.”
“They think I’m going to be hiding kidnapped women there?” I snort. “I’d have to be the world’s biggest idiot.”
“Are you surprised? You are the big, bad woman stealer.”
“Apparently, that’s a popular opinion.”
“Good thing you don’t care about other people’s opinions,” he says.
“True. But I care about the consequences that come from their opinions.”
“The ol’ Catch-22 in action. How are you going to deal with this?”
I lean back in my seat. “Put pressure on Lawrence. He’s going to have to cave at some point or else he’s compromising his sister’s safety.”
“Are you sure you can bring yourself to hurt her?” Demyan asks.
“I can bring myself to do anything,” I snap. Then I relent. “But I don’t need to hurt her. No, this is a psychological game. One I’m going to win.”
“She’s not the shrinking violet she seems to be though,” Demyan warns. “Girl’s got some spunk.”
“You noticed, have you?”
“Nothing gets past me, brother,” he says, tapping his forehead. “I’ve also noticed something else.”
I frown. “Do I even want to know?”
He gestures past me towards the lake. I can only see a sliver of it from our vantage point, but the wheels of my father’s wheelchair are shining bright under the slanted sunlight.
The person sitting next to him is not Mike, however. I can see her long brown hair flowing down her back. She’s on the grass beside him, her knees pulled up to her chest and her arms wrapped around them.