Page 57 of Ruthless King
They stop short near the road, and at the end of the driveway, a van appears, speeding toward the house. I vaguely recognize it as one of the family vehicles, but it’s instantly apparent that something is wrong. A jagged crack slashes through the windshield, and shards of glass glitter over the lawn, falling at random from all four main windows. In a violent spray of dirt and gravel, it sways on and off the road before skidding to a stop in a bed of roses. The door to the front seat opens, and the driver staggers out.
Her slender shape sets her apart from the usual men Mischa employs. Horrified, I recognize her pale face, contorted in pain. Ellen.
I don’t even register moving before I’m already running across the lawn on bare feet.
With a roar, Mischa barrels past me, gathering her into his arms. She resists the embrace, reaching for the mangled body of the van.
“Eli…” Her voice is a faint shadow of its usual cadence as if it’s taking everything in her just to speak. Blood paints a startling bright path from her forehead down to her shoulder, staining her yellow dress.
Whatever pain she’s in doesn’t deter her from her sole focus. Persistent, she reaches for him, oblivious to Mischa. “Eli,” she murmurs, her eyelids fluttering. “Eli…”
One of the men wrenches open the door to the back seat, and my knees buckle at the scene awaiting within. Blood paints the tanned leather in a vicious spray. Amid the carnage, slumped on his side is a figure so small, so pale…
I barely recognize him.
My mouth opens for a soundless scream. I can’t hear. My pulse surges through my eardrums too fiercely, drowning out everything else. I reach for him, swaying on my feet. Only when Evgeni climbs in beside him and feels along his neck can I breathe again.
“He’s alive,” the man says. Easily, he lifts the boy into his arms and carries him out onto the lawn. What the light reveals churns my stomach even more. He may be alive, but his right arm is twisted at an unnatural angle, drenched in blood from the shoulder down.
“Fuck,” Mischa rasps. His eyes dart helplessly from his wife to his son. I’ve never seen him like this—paralyzed.
“We need to get him to a hospital,” Evgeni deduces. Turning to another man, he snarls, “Bring another car around! Now!”
“Is he alright?” Ellen demands, clawing desperately at Mischa’s forearm. She’s too weak to lift her head enough to see the boy for herself, no matter how hard she tries. “Please, is he alright?”
Even as she speaks, Mischa swears and drops to his knees, cradling her against him. He snatches a handful of her skirt, and I realize why. Ellen’s whiter than snow in his arms—I’ve never seen the color drain from anyone’s face so quickly. Not all of the blood staining the fabric comes from her forehead. A glaring amount streaks her legs, and a growing stain paints the fabric near her waist.
“Stay with me, Rose,” Mischa pleads, stroking her cheeks as her eyes finally shut.
“The car is arriving, sir,” Evgeni calls.
In a coordinated effort, at least six guards carefully arrange Ellen and Eli into the back of a different van, and Mischa takes the front seat.
“They were attacked on the road,” I hear Evgeni explain, scrambling into the driver’s seat. “Adamo was killed trying to drive them to safety. It was an ambush.”
“Who?” Mischa demands, his voice nearly drowned by a sea of guards shouting out various positions and directions.
Evgeni looks at me as if noticing my presence for the first time. “Stay inside, Ms. Stepanova. Victor!” He nods to another man who comes up behind me, placing a hand on my shoulder. “Get her inside. Secure the property while we’re gone.”
The van starts to move, heading from the property with alarming speed. Even so, a cruel gust of wind throws Evgeni’s parting words in my face, uttered in a tone I’m not intended to hear.
“My men are on the scene,” he declares. “But you won’t like what they’ve found…”
20
WILLOW
Night has already fallen when a commotion erupts from below, and I startle to awareness in a leather recliner positioned in between two small beds draped in pink sheets. A distant thud rattles the house to its very foundation—that of a door slamming. Even from here, I can sense the tension crackling in the air. Uneasy, I glance around the nursery, from the girls beside me, to Ivan asleep on the other side of the room. Marnie stirs, mumbling in her sleep, but as the seconds pass, neither child wakes up.
Gingerly, I untangle myself from the girls, gently interlocking their grasping hands together. As I slip from their room, my footsteps echo throughout the deserted hall, disconcertingly loud. Among them, I catch a series of muttering voices drifting from the direction of Mischa’s study, but this time he isn’t alone.
“It isn’t proof,” Evgeni warns, his tone neutral. I advance toward the doorway and find him standing before Mischa’s desk, his back to me. My father sits slumped in his customary chair, his face in his hands. My heart aches as I take in what little of his haggard features are visible. In little under a day, he’s aged an eternity.
“But my men were able to identify one of the attackers found near the market,” Evgeni says. “He was already dead, but they are almost certain that he worked for—”
“The bastard taunted me,” Mischa says over him with a cold laugh. Incredulously, he shakes his head, still laughing. The sound grows louder and louder, so booming that I’m sure it could wake the children. Suddenly, he stops, his gaze fixed ahead, beyond this room, I suspect, at something Evgeni and I cannot see. “That son of a bitch. Right to my face…he taunted me.”
“I must insist upon caution, sir,” Evgeni insists. “I don’t have any right to advise calm after what happened today, but I—”
