Page 51 of Corrupted Guilt

He had to do it on his own schedule and in any case, this was about me coming to terms with Dmitry for now.

I feel like I should be beating the ground with my fists, wailing loudly, uncontrollably. But I guess that’s the thing with grief, it doesn’t look the way it does on TV or the movies. And it never feels the way it’s supposed to. There is no to, it comes like this, and that’s how you know it-- jumbled up, confused, not the way it’s supposed to be at all.

I stare at the grave and take a deep breath, I almost hear Dmitry’s voice, his laugh, his smile, I lose all my nerve.

I hear Dmitry’s words. “Fear is a waste of time, Katya.”

I take a deep breath and repeat his words again.Fear is a waste of time.

I can do this.

Those words lift the weight off my chest.

I can breathe again.

“Dmitry,” I say, the words coming easier and easier. “I’m so, so sorry.”

The memory of our last conversation weighs heavily on my shoulders. I still can’t believe I was so cruel, so heartless.

I was young, I told myself. I couldn’t have known it would be the last words I had for him.

I hear this in Yuri’s voice, flat and confident as if I was silly forever thinking otherwise. I feel the weight being lifted off my shoulders, finally, after all these years of carrying this guilt around.

I start gushing to Dmitry, I tell him about Yuri, everything, the good and the bad. Saying the words makes me realize how I feel towards Yuri : several things but now, gratitude because he pushed me to do this, to unload myself of the guilt for Dmitry. This was only the start, but it felt so good, I wanted to thank Yuri, hug him, make him let me hug him until I was all hugged out.

I get to my feet and go to find Yuri.

I creep up to the SUV and hear him talking. I can’t make out the words except for my name, so I stalk quietly closer, careful he doesn’t see me and stop talking. I hear his angry, venomed tongue speaking in a raised voice but calmly and slowly, “That’s why she’s bait, cheese for the mousetrap. We’ll lure Petya and find out who the mole is in Viktor’s Bratva so we can start fresh once we take over.”

I freeze, a chill runs up my spine at the words. I’m the bait? The cheese for the mousetrap? I nearly start crying but hold it back, then start to creep away from his truck and his voice fades. He doesn’t see me.

I walk back to Dmitry’s grave in a daze. So happy and grateful one moment and devastated the next. I can’t keep letting him yo-yo my emotions like this. I can’t let him continue to have this kind of power over me.

I keep deluding myself that I’m something to him, something more than a possession, more than cheese to lure the rats out of my father’s Bratva so he can take over without aninfestation. But it is only a delusion. He needs me now, when it’s over I’ll be thrown away with the mousetrap and the rats.

I could swear I saw something more in his eyes last night, that he wanted me and needed me and even enjoyed and cherished me but clearly, I saw what I wanted, not what was actually there. He has nothing but coldness in his eyes, the dirty chipped ice gray because they are ice, like the rest of him.

I’ll never be anything more to him than a possession. If only I could make myself necessary to him for good and all. But how? That’s a dead end, there’s nothing more he could want from me once this is over.

I asked Dmitry to disabuse me of this, he knew Yuri best, once. But there’s no answer, I listen, maybe the wind will tell me.

Nothing but silence.

Until I hear a truck racing its engine. I look back to see if it’s Yuri, but it’s not, it’s a strange red escalade racing its engine, spinning its wheels, then finally gripping the crushed gravel road and bucking towards me, out in the open. I freeze again, I can’t move, and fuck it, why should I?

22. Yuri

“She’s cheese for the mousetrap, that’s all she is to me,” I tell him. “Where the hell is she anyways,” I mutter out loud.

Since telling her about Dmitry, I had been feeling lighter than I had in years and it was all thanks to her. There wasn’t going to be any future with Katya beyond a convenient marriage for the Bratva but if I ever wanted the real thing, I couldn’t think of anyone better than her.

This trip to the cemetery was all for her, she needed to confront her own feelings about Dmitry and his death, which was the only way forward for her and allowing it was paying her back for all she had done for me.

Her potential escape plans were the only things holding me back from installing her in her own place. But treating her like bait for Petya—and letting my Vors know how important she was to the plan— was a way to halt any potential escape attempts by her.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a flash of red. A maroon escalade was speeding down the road. In horror, I looked ahead and saw that it wasn’t going to slow down.

It was coming too fast, way too fast. It was going to hit Katya.

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