Page 59 of Blazing Embers

I take it. It feels like a book.

“Now…” She pulls a knife from her cape and flicks out the blade. My eyes widen, and I stiffen. “We need to get rid of that device around your neck. It’s not just a shocking device. It’s a tracker.”

Thirty minutes later, with my shoulder stinging as the numbing agent wears off, we stop at what looks like a private airstrip. A jet stands lit up on the runway.

The door opens, and Clyde stands there grinning at me.

He leans in and hugs the woman, “Don’t worry, Mother. I’ve got her.”

“This time, see to it that you keep her safe,” the woman he calls Mother bristles.

As I get out of the car, she grabs my arm. “Be safe,moya golubka.May you remember and one day be able to forgive what I had to do.” Her voice is sad. “It’s much like the decision you had to make.”

My breath catches as memories flood back. Gentle hands rocking me. A lullaby in Russian was sung to me in that low, soothing voice.

I stare at her. “Did you save me, like you did the other Jewel Initiative subjects?”

She smiles faintly. “Oh, nomoya golubka. You saved me. You're the reason that even in the darkest times, I always found my way. Because I knew it was one step closer to getting back to you.”

“We have to go,” Clyde pulls me from the car before I can respond. The car door closes, and the car drives off.

“Wait,” I yell, wanting to run after the car. “I have to know.” I don’t even realize I’m yelling still. “Who are you?” I whisper as Clyde drags me to the aircraft.

Once the plane takes off, I open the gift and I suck in a breath. It’s a book. A children's book. I know it.

It’s called Moya Golubka.

It’s dedicated to me. I see that the artist's name is Ofeliya Zorin, and the author's name makes me gasp.

My eyes fill with tears, and just like that, memories long forgotten of that fateful night twenty-four years ago come flooding back.

“I see you met,Mother?” Clyde's knowing eyes hold mine, and he smiles.

“I did.” I nod because all the questions that drove me to Russia nearly a year ago are answered. But now I have other questions. “Will you tell me about her?”

Clyde smiles and nods. “Gladly. What do you want to know?”

For the next six hours, I grill Clyde on the woman who ripped out her own heart to save me, the woman I’ve called mom for twenty-four years, my sister, and my father—the woman Clyde and his team call Mother.

20

RUSLAN

I’m sitting in my law office in Moscow, staring out at the gray skyline like it might hand me a fucking miracle. It’s been nearly six months since the ceremonial wedding, and still, I don't have Tara back.

My jaw clenches as I think about our wedding night. What a fucking fool I was. I knew in my gut something wasn't right about the story of her miscarriage. I should've pushed harder to get the truth about that.

It was damn awful and she nearly died when her placenta erupted, and it was one of the worst fucking nights of my life I can still see all that blood and Tara... I swallow and move my thoughts away from that.

But what it did do was expose the truth. The first doctor who had been there that night and come to address us after he'd saved her life, Dr. Tomas Ivanovich, although I have an axe to grind with the prick, told us the damage was so severe that Tara nearly had to have a hysterectomy.

The next day, Doctor Ivanovich asked awkward questions about Tara giving birth, and when I told him she'd miscarried, I saw the confusion in his eyes. But he'd nodded and continued without pressing the issue. The next day, he was gone and replaced by another doctor, whom I now know works with the woman who kidnapped me.

All I know about her is that she's called Mother and somehow sits on the Dragunov High Council, hand-picked by my grandfather. The other members of the council are also unaware of who she is, having never seen her face. They refer to her as simply The Lady. She's a fucking chameleon. I have started to refer to her as Medusa.

I take a deep breath and move away from that sensitive topic and focus back on the fiasco at the hospital Tara was in. The new, fresh-faced doctor contradicted what Doctor Ivanovich had told me. Fresh Face had told us Tara did have a hysterectomy. Showed me the chart and then said the other doctor knew who I was and was probably too shit scared to tell me it had rendered my wife baron.

That should've been my first red flag. Doctor Fresh Face wasn't even the slightest bit scared of me. Then I found out why. The night of the wedding ceremony, my third test came in the form of the truth—a report from the scorned Doctor Ivanovich.

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