Page 78 of The Tsar's Obsession
Fuck. In my own fucking house. My own fucking butler. I stared at him, the realization overtaking all of me—someone slipped past all my security measures.
Not waiting another second, I was already walking out the front door and carrying a distraught Mia in my arms. I called Yuri on the way.
Shaking like a leaf in the front seat of my Ferrari, Mia stared ahead, doing her best to catch her breath. "I was barefoot," she stammered, looking over her bloodied hands. "Just like–" Her breath hitched. "Just like–” she stuttered and immediately caught my attention as I sped away to a safe house across town.
"Just like what, baby?!"
My hand reached for hers, but she recoiled, slowly swaying back and forth in the seat, the chatter of her teeth like sharp nailsupon my conscience.
Before I could get any answers, Dmitry's phone call interrupted. "Brother, get out of your house!" His shouts pierced my ears in the confines of the car. His words and Mia's panic made it close to impossible to keep my eyes on the road as I tried to piece together whatthe fuckwas happening.
"Tell me. Quickly," I ordered Dmitry, hearing sirens somewhere behind him.
"My apartment—blasted! I escaped by accident. The Italians are not fucking playing!"
"Get to the apartment. Call Polina."
With these last words, my attention was back on Mia, who was desperately trying to wipe the blood off her hands on her jeans.
"Baby, I'm sorry. Mia? Hey, hey—look at me." I tried to engage her with one hand on the steering wheel and the other on her chin. She was physically beside me, but her mind was somewhere else, her eyes glossed over, and that plump bottom lip quivered uncontrollably. "Fuck." My little exclamation did nothing to ease the situation.
And it only got worse—the situation got way worse. It descended into absolute hell. Into unknown and very dangerous territory.
"Mia, my love, can you come with me?" I crouched in front of Mia's open car door, and she stared at me.
"Yes. Yes, I can. I'm okay." She nodded without any confidence. "I'll be okay. I just– I just can't believe he's dead." Her efforts to catch enough air were going to make her hyperventilate. Without waiting for anything else, we climbed the little stairs to the hidden apartment.
The safe house was a small two-bedroom apartment in Chinatown, right above a home goods store. It was private, and only four people had knowledge of it: me, Dmitry, Polina, and Yuri.
It smelled stale, the dark surroundings suffocating as soon as we walked in. Mia asked no questions. She clutchedmy hand and followed obediently, evidently doing her best to keep herself together.
But as soon as the front door closed behind us and we were left in the dark and quiet hallway, I knew right away that we weren’t alone. That feeling—it was like a little shiver on the back of my neck. There was a very faint sound of creaking. Not footsteps; it was subtle, unusual.
"Don't move. Stay here and do not move, Mia." I caught her wet, sparkling eyes in the shadows. "Do you understand me?" She quickly nodded and pressed herself into the corner.
On the precipice of a tragedy and against my better judgement I stepped further into the apartment, my weapon ready to annihilate whatever was happening to me on my birthday.
The creaking intensified with every silent step I took toward the living room, reminiscent of a rope on a yacht. A rope. But we weren't on a yacht, and a sickening understanding overwhelmed me when I noticed a shadow on the wall. A silhouette, dangling feet, swinging solely on inertia.
In all my years of witnessing and bringing death, never had it been as bitter as today.
Finally stepping into the room, the gruesome sight graced me fully. Hanging from the ceiling by a short, thick rope was a woman, one of her heels kicked off, her fingers stuck between the rope and her throat.
Fucking hell. In my fucking safe house, a corpse dangling from the ceiling. Who the fuck was this, and how did she get here? But all my thoughts were arrested when the body swung a centimeter my way, and I recognized those facial features right away. That ginger hair. That freckled nose.
Polina.
"Mia! Stay back. Do not come close!" The words rushed out of me, my body approaching dead Polina, disbelief screaming inside my own brain.
I stared up at her limp body, recognizing that sixteen-year-oldgirl once again. That girl who lived a tragic life, trapped and abused. And what atragicend.
Working quickly, I slashed through the rope with my switchblade and caught her body before she hit the floor. I was in a vortex. My partner of the last sixteen years rested in my arms, slumped over, her facial expression blissfully unaware of the heartbreak inside me.
Polina and I were thrown together under awful circumstances, and it seemed that we would part the same way. Had nothing changed in all this time? We had money, we had power, we had loyalty, but evidently, all that was fleeting. None of that mattered if this is how death found one of us.
"Oh fuck…" Mia's quiet voice jerked me awake, and I shot my eyes up to see her standing in the doorway of the living room, her trembling bloody hands at her mouth.
"Baby,please!Please don't look!" I implored her, unable to feel Polina's pulse. Her skin was warm underneath my fingers, and that realization layered onto this whole evening: this must have happened incredibly recently, and whoever did it may still be in the apartment.
