Caterina
Viktor ended up sending the car back to the loft, with only me in it. I don’t know how he’s getting back, but I can’t bring myself to care. I’m shaking the entire drive back to the apartment, my hands knotted together in my lap until my knuckles turn white.
I know what he’s going to say later. That this is a necessary evil. That it’s what his family has always done. That he’s doing something “better” for these girls. I wonder what Sasha would say about that if she thought her life was better or worse before she was kidnapped to be sold as a concubine for some rich man. If she’s happier now, working in our home, or if she wishes she’d never been taken at all.
I can’t reconcile any of it.
The last thing I want is to go to another gala with him tonight—to dance, make small talk, pretend to care about anything anyone there says. Part of me almost misses Franco—at least with him, by the time I really got to know him, there was no question that he was selfish and arrogant, an asshole in every respect. With Viktor, it’s confusing. He’s a good father at home, generous in bed, and respectful to me in most ways. He could be a good husband—if not for the fact that he buys and sells women, traffics in sex slavery.
I can’t come to terms with it, no matter how I try. I simply can’t.
I lean back against the door of the apartment, closing my eyes and trying to breathe. I feel disgusted with myself for ever thinking that things could be different, for wanting him, for imagining a real marriage. I feel horrified at what I just saw, the faces of those girls imprinted on my mind, and I want nothing more than to go home.
But I don’t even really have a home anymore.
I rip my dress for the gala tonight off of the hanger, striding into the bathroom. As I strip down to put the dark blue silk gown on, I press my hand against my stomach, still so flat that it’s nearly concave. I think of how many times Viktor and I fucked since last night, how many times I encouraged it, and I feel sick.
What if I’m already pregnant?
The thought is terrifying. Imagining my son standing where Viktor was today, watching kidnapped women walk off of a plane, is terrifying. I don’t know how I’m going to do it. How I’m ever going to give him a son knowing that this life is what he’ll be brought up in, made to think is okay. Desirable, even.
I ball the dress up in my fist, trying to think. To think of a way out—but there’s nothing. No way for me to escape without breaking what Luca so carefully tried to arrange.
And besides that, the thought of leaving Anika and Yelena hurts. They’re not mine, but I’m coming to love them anyway and want to be there for them. To keep caring for Yelena, to be a good mother to Anika until she comes around one day, hopefully. To be a light in the dark world that they’ve been born into.
I want to stay for them, if nothing else, but I can’t stand the thought of bringing another innocent child into this life. I’m horrified by how easily I was taken in by Viktor again, even after seeing the truth in his office the other day. It makes me wonder if his first wife found out, too, if she couldn’t handle it. If Viktor removed her from the picture because she couldn’t come to terms with the man she married.
I decide, then and there as I slip into the dress and press my hand against the flat of my stomach again, that I won’t give Viktor the son he so desperately wants. I’ll find a way to get my hands on some sort of emergency contraceptive as soon as we’re home tomorrow, and I’ll find a way to get on the pill. Anything to keep him from bringing up a son to inherit this ghastly empire of his.
Lying to my husband and preventing us from having children together might be a sin. Still, I think bringing another child into this family would be a much greater one.
I’m almost finished pinning up my hair when a knock comes at the front door, firmly and then more insistent.
Why is Viktor knocking?He has a key to his own home. I wonder if it’s one of his brigadiers, come to tell me that he’ll be home late.
Maybe they’ve come to tell me he won’t be going to the gala tonight at all.
I could only be so lucky.
“Just a moment!” I slide the last pearl-tipped pin into my hair, trying desperately not to think of the way they scattered across the floor last night when Viktor buried his hands in my hair, pulling it down around my face as he’s kissed me wildly. I stride out of the bathroom and towards the heavy front door, pulling it open only to see a tall, pale man with bright blue eyes and two heavily muscled men behind him.
They’re no one I recognize, but I don’t know anyone here. I stare at them for a beat before raising my eyebrow as authoritatively as I know how, looking directly at the man in front. “Well? What did Viktor send you to tell me?”
“Nothing,” the man says with a smirk.
My heart skips a beat. “Well, he’s not here, but if you give me your name, I can tell him—”
“We’re not here for him.” Before I can slam the door in his face, the pale man strides forward, shoving the door open as the two bigger men push their way around him. “Grab her.”
“What? No! My husband will—” I shriek as one of the men clamps his hand over my mouth, and I try to bite it without much effect. The other is grabbing at my wrists, my clawed hands, binding them behind my back with plastic cuffs as the pale man advances towards me, his hand raised.
I see with absolute, bone-chilling terror that there’s a syringe in his hand, liquid beading at the tip of the needle. I try to scream again, but the hand over my mouth is too heavy, and all I see is it descending towards me as I kick and squirm.
The last thing I hear as the needle slides into my neck and the world starts to spin is the pale man’s accented voice, ringing in my ears.
“We’re here for you, Caterina.”