Page 8 of Broken Embers

Clyde, followed by Ivan and then Syd step in first and my gut twists when I hear Clyde hiss, “What the fuck!”

I’m about to retreat with Elena when Syd and Ivan step aside, and I stare at the four people who are standing in the foyer with a mix of disbelief and confusion.

“What the fuck!” I repeat Clyde’s initial shock.

Carla, my Aunt Galina, Mark, and Nikolas are standing, staring back at us, and they don’t look shocked to see us—it’s clear that they knew we were coming.

My brain stalls. I blink once, twice, and Elena starts to wriggle in glee, her little arms reaching out toward Carla.

“You’re all alive?” The words tumble out, a mix of shock, anger, and accusation.

“Hello, Oleksi.” My aunt steps up to me and kisses my cheeks. “You sound disappointed to find us alive?” She smiles as she leans toward Elena, taking her little hands, kissing her cheek. I hear my aunt whisper. “Privet, moya malen’kaya printsessa, tyotya Galina ochen’ skuchala po tebe.”

My heart stills for a few seconds, and suspicion swirls through me as my aunt steps back. Her words rush through my head:‘Hello, my little princess. Aunt Galina missed you very much.’I’m struck with the thought:does my aunt know who Elena really is?

Before I can ponder on it, Carla is there, lifting a now incredibly excited Elena, who obviously loves Carla and my aunt very much, from the baby sling, and I find myself having to stop from snatching her back. I’m struck by just how possessive and how much Elena has come to mean to me.

I take a mental deep breath and try my best not to curl my hands into fists. It’s taking every inch of restraint I have not to snatch my little angel back.

“You look like you were expecting us,” I say, gritting my teeth.

Nikolas offers a faint smile. “Your driver called me as soon as you were on the road. After all, he does work for me.”

My gaze snaps to Clyde as he steps in and nods. “We thought they were missing, remember?”

“True.” I nod back and turn back to the four people in front of us, my eyes narrowing when my aunt takes Elena from Carla. My mind is ticking over as the questions start to pile up, but before I can voice any of them, Carla pushes me aside to see who the last two people are who are with us and still standing in the doorway.

Carla’s eyes scan them, her expression shifting from surprise to concern. “Where’s my daughter?” she demands, turning to me, her voice rising. “Oleksi, where is Sabrina?”

The words hit like bullets, reopening wounds that are still raw. My chest tightens, and I can barely force the explanation past my lips. “At roughly four this morning, my house in Moscow was stormed by a group I now know as the RMSAD, led by that fucking butcher General Ergorov…” I swallow at the image of Sabrina kissing me and telling me tofind us,which hits me like a sledgehammer to the heart. “He took her.”

Carla’s face drains of color, and she staggers. “No, no, no,” she whispers, desperation cracking her voice.

I see her sway as her knees start to buckle, but Mark catches her before she falls, wrapping her in a protective hold, steadying her.

Carla’s breathing becomes shallow, and her eyes fill with tears as she turns to Nikolas. “They have both my girls, Nik.”

My eyes narrow with confusion, but before I can say anything, Clyde demands, “What do you mean?” His eyes dart between Nikolas, my aunt, and Mark, landing on Carla. “The RMSAD has Tara, too?” The muscle on the side of his jaw ticks. “How do you know?”

Carla nods, wiping a tear from her cheek and clearing her throat. “The day you were shot, Clyde. We believe that when she left you at the hospital, Tara made it to the New Jersey safe house, but she was apprehended by somebody who we believe to be an RMSAD operative.”

“One of my sources in Georgia sent me this.” Nikolas pulls out a phone and scrolls to a photo he holds up to show us. “My source followed them but lost them at the Russian border, where they disappeared.”

Clyde takes the phone and studies it. “Christ, it’s Tara.” He hands the phone back to Nikolas. “She wanted us to find her. I told her to wear those ratty old graffitied sneakers and that hoodie with the sunflower in the hood to ensure we could identify her if she were taken.”

Clyde hands me the phone. I look at the tall, broad-shouldered man in a baseball cap, guiding a hooded woman to a vehicle. My gut twists. The clothes are unmistakable, and it was clever of Clyde to come up with that. Nikolas leans forward and flicks to the next photo.

“This shot confirms it was her,” Nikolas tells us. “My contact managed to snap it because as Tara was being pushed through the door, I think she was trying to look up at one of the security cameras.”

“Just like I told her,” Clyde mutters, pride in Tara following his instructions shining in his eyes. “Your contact couldn’t ID the man with her?”

“No.” Nikolas shakes his head. “The man knew how to keep from being seen and had shades on.”

“That’s fucking just great,” Syd says, shaking her head and leaning in to look at the photo. “What’s that?” She points at something on the man’s wrist. “It looks like some sort of mark.”

I blow the photo up, but all I see is a blob that looks like a tattoo or blue birthmark. “I can’t make it out.”

“I have my technical guys trying to clean the photo up,” Nikolas tells us.

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