Page 1 of Vow of Silence

ONE

Nastasya

From as young as I can remember, I knew my family was different. Never allowed friends over to play, never allowed to go out alone—I didn’t experience a lot of the things other kids took for granted: school bus rides, prom, football rallies. Instead, I live a privileged life caged behind gilded bars made from the hatred of our enemies. A prison of my parents’ making and one I accept as my own.

But until now, their dealings have never had a direct impact on me. I was protected and shielded as a precaution. Mainly from the enemies within. Women are still to be seen and not heard in our family, and keeping me locked away from the reality of what my father does to provide for us was as much for their protection as mine.

“Caroline.” Hand to my best friend’s forearm, I shake her sharply.

She doesn’t stir—strapped into the driver’s seat and on an awkward angle. Rain pelts the forest canopy above us, a steady soundtrack that matches the tempo of my rattled heart. Droplets encroach the protection the car offers through tiny cracks in the windscreen, spattering my face with liquid, cool, in stark contrast to the warm blood that runs past my eye.

Zero to sixty in 4.2 seconds, I gifted myself the Lexus RC F when I earned my first six-figure year. An achievement I didn’t take lightly after hustling and grinding on my own for so many years. My father insisted I upgrade the car on its second anniversary earlier this year, but I refused. I’d gained respect with this ride and found my freedom—fleeting as it was. She just wanted to drive, Caroline. Begged me to take the keys and feel what it was like to control a car with more power than double her old banger’s.

“You’ve got to wake up now, babe.” I release the catch on my seatbelt and fall against the door panel beneath me, the side of the racing-style seat digging painfully into my ribs. The steady rumble of an engine on the roadside above us blends with the tapping of my cooling V8.

The blacked-out sedan came out of nowhere. We raced alone down the semi-rural stretch leading to Caroline’s home, nothing but the rain-darkened trees to bear witness to our reckless behavior. One second, it was the two of us re-living our youth; the next, a car shadowed our every move. I told her not to slow down. She panicked, eyes wide as she reminded me she’d never driven that fast before. I could have told her to pull over and taken the wheel. After all, Papa ensured I had sufficient defensive driving courses as a teenager to near qualify me as a low-level stunt driver. He’d insisted that I learned how to speak to the machine beneath my touch, how to manipulate and pre-empt every move the car would make no matter the conditions. It’s how we stay alive, he’d explained. It’s what keeps us one step ahead of our enemies.

But here I lie, one step behind, struggling against gravity as I try in vain to curl myself onto my knees so I can reach up to where Caroline lies suspended above me. Her golden hair falls from her shoulder in a waterfall, streaks of red slowly turning the locks pink in intervals where the evidence of her head injuryslowly trickles down to my side of the interior. The corner was too tight, too sharp for her inexperience. She did her best to fling us onto the last straight before her estate, but understeer is a hell of a thing to control. We slid off the side of the road, majestic and smooth, until the side of my coupe collided with the unrelenting trunk of a redwood. End to end, we spun. The shock of the final impact still throbs in my spine.

“Babe,” I whisper, pushing Caroline’s hair aside to feel her pulse. “We have to go.” The beat is faint but undeniable.

I take a second to give thanks, eyes closed as I whisper a quick prayer. The swish of wet undergrowth draws my attention toward the back of the stranded vehicle; the lack of light makes it nearly impossible to see anything past the dented rear of the car.

“Stas?” The single syllable scratches from Caroline’s throat. “Stas? Are you okay?”

“I’m here.” I touch my best friend’s face, gently padding my fingertips into her hair to find the source of the blood. “I’m okay.” A gash meets my touch, deep and wet.Fuck—not good.“Can you move?”

“I think so.” She lifts one arm to the door above her and grabs the handle before grimacing, air hissing between her teeth. “My left leg.” Her breaths are short, frantic. “Can you see it?”

I push the fabric of her skirt aside and squint into the darkened foot well. A dull glint catches my eye, but nothing seems out of place. “I can’t see anything.”

“My calf.” Her head whips toward the side window above as the footsteps grow closer. A distinct pair rather than the single person I thought it to be. “Who is that?”

“I don’t know.” I reach for her seatbelt. “I need to undo this so you can get out.”

“No.” She sets her hand over mine. “Something has my leg stuck, Stas. You need to see what it is.”

The ticking of the cooling engine slows, ominous, like a countdown until we’re found. Our pursuers need only to follow the trail we no doubt left as the car skidded down the bank. Contorting my body in the sideways cabin of my sleek car, I nudge a shoulder into Caroline’s stomach so that I can get my head closer to her legs. The steering wheel stops me from getting too close, so I trace the long line of her shin with my palm. I recoil when something sharp slices into the side of my finger. Something wide and most definitely lodged in her leg. “Damn it.” I drop to my haunches and pop the glove compartment open. Dull light floods the car’s interior.

“What are you doing?” She cranes her neck both ways to locate our stalkers. “You need to go.”

“Shut up.” I feel around for my handgun and come up empty. “What the fuck?”

“You have to go, Stas.” I tilt my head to find Caroline watching me intently. “I won’t get out, but you can. It’s you they’re after; I’ll be fine.”

She doesn’t know much about my family, my bestie, but she understands enough. Enough to know that the words she just fed me are laced with bullshit and barely a believable lie. “You won’t.” I turn my search efforts to the rest of the cabin. “It must be here somewhere. I need to buy us time.”

“Babe.” She pauses as a branch snaps close by. “It’s not in the car.” Her level words implore me to reach into my subconscious and accept the logic in this fucked-up situation.

I opened the glove compartment. If the fucking gun were in the car, it would still be there. To be thrown free in the crash, the compartment would need to be open already. I won’t find my handgun. Not tonight. Not when I need it most.

“You have to go, hon.” Her peaked eyebrows frame shimmering eyes. “Now.”

I don’t want to. My father raised me better than to stand idly by while those we love suffer. He taught me to fight, defend, and protect. I’m a Kuznetsov, and we don’t lie down quietly. I don’t want to leave her, but Ineedto. Fighting for your people is honorable, but not when you know there’s little to no chance of success.

They have weapons—I don’t. There is absolutely nothing I can do, and that’s what fills my limbs with enough rage-fueled adrenalin to move.

“I’ll be back,” I whisper as I twist myself into position to push the broken windshield with the soles of my boots. “Play dead, Caro. Close your eyes and hold your breath.” Pathetic, but the only option.

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