I don’t want anyone to remember I’m here. There’s some faint hope in me that if enough time passes, someone will come for me, but whenever it flares too high, I remember that I jeopardize Viktor and his family now, and Max is gone. The one person who I could have counted on to come for me, no matter what, can’t any longer.
Part of me wants to trust Natalia, to cling to the idea that I could have a sister, a family member who cares for me. I want to believe in her, but my gut warns me not to, that if I give her the names she’s asking for, Obelensky will go after them.He wants proof that Viktor tried to protect me,I tell myself, every time the urge to tell her everything the next time she comes back rises up.If I can’t help myself, I can at least protect them.
She comes back a second time, and I refuse to speak to her, turning away and doing my best not to listen to her as she pleads with me to listen, to talk, to let me help her. The pain in my chest grows with each passing moment, fear that I’m making a terrible mistake in not trusting her, twisting with the surety that I’d only repeat the mistake I made with Art in doing so, around and around until I feel crazy, unable to know what the right thing to do is.
In the end, I can’t be sure that talking to her would save my life–and I can’t be certain that it wouldn’t doom others I care about. I want Caterina and the children safe more than I want my own life to go on–especially without Max.
So I ignore her, until she finally stops talking, and then slips off into the shadows again. I assume that she won’t come back.If she does,I tell myself,it’s proof that I shouldn’t trust her.No one would keep coming back just for a half-sister who won’t talk to her. If she comes back, it’s because Obelensky is making her.
Maybe that’s the only reason I’m still alive.
My dreams are worse after that. I don’t dream about Max any longer–at least not the way I wish I would. I don’t dream of his hands and mouth on me, of the pleasure we shared together, of him begging me to come for him as he slid into me, hard and needing me.
I dream about him on the ballroom floor, his blood covering my hands, my dress, and my chest. I dream of hands dragging me away from him, of him reaching out for me, pleading for me to help him.
I dream of my father, standing over me with a gun, taunting me with Natalia standing next to him, telling me that I can have my freedom, that I can live, as long as I give up Caterina and the children. I dream of them in the same room, quaking with guns at their heads and Obelensky shouting at me to choose.
I always choose to die instead, and I always wake up, heart pounding and sweating, in the moment before he pulls the trigger.
The only way I can get any grasp on the days is by the meals brought to me, and I’m fairly certain I’ve been here a little less than a week when I start to feel sick and feverish. I curl onto the cot, wrapping the thin blanket around my shivering body, and wonder if this is how I’m going to end up dying instead. Natalia hasn’t come back, and I wonder, too, if that means I should have trusted her. If I might be on my way out of here by now if I’d given her the names she asked for.
When she does come back, I almost think she might be a hallucination brought on by the fever. She’s wearing a silky shift dress and another pair of high heels, glowing like some kind of angel in this dark and dismal place. This time, instead of hovering outside the bars, she turns a key into the lock and slips inside, smirking at my look of shock as she closes the door behind her.
“You’d be amazed what men will give you if you just flirt with them a little.” She flashes me a dazzling smile. “I got the key to come in here and sit with you–and this.” She opens her palm, and I see a white pill there. “You need antibiotics. I brought you some.”
She fishes a pill bottle out of her purse. “Here’s the rest. I’m not going to do all of this to try to save you from our father just for you to die of the flu.” Natalia reaches out, tucking the bottle under my pillow. “Don’t let them see.”
I look up at her, my brain feeling too foggy and slow to argue. Slowly, I push myself up to a sitting position, reaching for the pill.
I’m not entirely sure that I trust that it’s an antibiotic, butwhat’s the worst that could happen?I ask myself as I take it and the small cup of water Natalia hands to me. At worst, it kills me, and I’d rather be poisoned than shot, if given the option. This isn’t the best way to die, on a cold cot in a Russian cell, but it’s better than kneeling in terror, waiting for the gunshot to come.
Maybe this is my father’s mercy,I think grimly, swallowing it. Natalia must see the expression on my face, because she looks at me a little sadly.
“I’m not trying to hurt you,” she says softly. “Here–look. I brought you something else.”
She reaches into her purse, rummaging around for a moment, before she pulls something out. It’s dangling on a chain, and it takes me a moment to see what I’m looking at.
It’s an oval locket with a cursiveNon the front, an antiqued gold color, hanging from a similarly colored chain. Natalia holds it out to me, and I take it gingerly, looking at her with confusion.
“What is it?” I ask her dumbly, and she smiles.
“Open it up.”
It takes me a moment to get it open, my fingers feeling stiff and useless, but I manage at last. Inside, there’s a picture of a baby, round-faced and smiling toothlessly, with a small shock of blonde hair.
I have no idea who it is, but something clenches in my chest anyway, a painful ache that takes what breath I have left away for a moment. “What is this?” I ask thickly, feeling the words catch in my throat, and Natalia reaches out to touch my arm.
“When my–our–father had your mother killed, he wanted the assassin who did it to bring him something as proof. He tucked this away, and I took it yesterday to bring to you. I doubt he’ll miss it. It was stuffed away with some old papers. It’s her locket–see, it has her initial for her name, and this picture–”
“It’s me,” I whisper with sudden realization, a fresh pain gripping my heart. “Oh god, she–-all these years–”
“I don’t believe she wanted to give you up,” Natalia says gently. “She had to, or you both would have died long ago. Her husband was important enough that so long as the pregnancy that made him a cuckold was covered up and kept a secret, our father couldn’t have her killed as well. By separating herself from you, she tried to save you. But she always loved you and kept you close to her heart.”
“What–” I swallow hard, trying to fight back the tears. “What was her name?”
“Nina. Nina Polovna by marriage–Federova by birth.” She smiles sadly at me. “She tried to protect you, Sasha. And now I’m trying to do the same.”
“But–why?” I blink back the tears blurring my vision, trying to look clearly at my half-sister, to make a decision that could change everything for better or for worse. “How do you know anything about her–”