Page 49 of Vitaly

I thought I knew how to read her. I really did. Obviously, she’s a better actress than I gave her credit for.

“Are you just going to stand there and pretend you didn’t set me up back there?” I ask, my voice calm despite the anger I feel. It shouldn’t be directed at Mila, but it is. I know she hates me, that her whole family hates me. I shouldn’t be surprised by her doing something like this.

But I am.

Guilt settles into her features and sags her shoulders.

I nod. “That’s what I thought.” I turn back toward the SUV.

“I had no idea Olive would be at the bar or that Alik would pick her up,” Mila says, following close behind me. I ignore her.

“Vitaly, please. I wasn’t a part of it.”

My jaw tics at the desperation in her tone, which only makes me angrier. More irrational betrayal eats away at the false idea I had of this woman.

It’s my fault. It really is.

Still, my anger grows.

“You knew exactly who she was when your brother led me to a stool right next to hers. You knew exactly what they were doing.”

I make it to the SUV and climb into the driver’s seat. She slaps her hand on the frame when I go to shut it.

“So what?” she barks, her eyes wild, her chest heaving. “I don’t owe you a damn thing, and neither does anyone else. You can’t just destroy people and expect no retaliation. That’s remarkably naive, even for you.”

I let out a cruel laugh and shake my head.

“What?” She huffs. “What’s funny?”

I lean close enough to her that I can smell her perfume, but the scent doesn’t make me sway like it might another time. It doesn’t even penetrate the bitterness I feel.

“Alikretaliated. He hit me like a man, and like a man, I let him. Thisonce. You used an unsuspecting, meek woman to do your bidding for you while you sat back and watched like a coward… But that’s not the funny part.” I shake my head. “The funny part is you think a snake like you could ever be worth destroying.” I nod to the bar. “Your family never had any respect to defile. So maybe it’s me who doesn’t owe you a damn thing?”

Her face falls, and she steps back like I’ve just kicked her in the stomach. She looks stunned by my words, as if she’d never considered the possibility.

I don’t wait to see if she has a response. I slam the door and start up the SUV, pulling away and leaving Mila behind to catch a ride with one of her dirtbag relatives.

I think about missing my exit. Driving until I don’t recognize the scenery. Leaving this place for good.

But of course, I don’t. Because regardless of my judgment of Mila or her family, I was never here because of it. I was here because of my father’s judgment of them. Ofher. I questioned him then. I’mstillquestioning him.

But he isn’t here for me to challenge. And that’s my doing.

With a low growl, I take the exit for the mansion, my knuckles white as I grip the steering wheel.

14

VITALY

Idon’t see Mila for the rest of the afternoon.

I hardly seeanyone. When I get back to the mansion, I change into shorts and head for the gym, not coming out until my muscles are exhausted and sweat soaks my hair. After a shower, I spend the rest of the afternoon in my old room, pacing, thinking,remembering.

I was so certain that coming back here was the right thing to do, and I still am, but being here is harder than I expected. Everywhere I look, there’s a memory. Everything I touch is a reminder of all that’s changed. Every set of eyes that linger on me do so in admonishment, and though I’ve laid in guilt every night for nine years, here I feel saturated by it. There’s no reprieve, no wise, old man to tame the demons inside of me.

Pulling my shirt off, I walk to the bathroom mirror and splay my palm over the tattoo I got days after leaving prison. It stretches across my chest, covering up the bit of skin I had that wasn’t scarred. It’s the only drop of ink I have that wasn’t meant to cover something up, to mask something.

Abram made me promise I wouldn’t forget him or the messages he tried so hard to instill in me. He was a devout Catholic who spent every drop of candle wax he got illuminatingthe worn bible he kept inside his pillowcase, and for some reason, when I showed up in his barrack as an eighteen-year-old kid, scared and broken, he took a liking to me. I think he saw me as a son, the way I came to know him as the fatherly figure I needed in that place. He saved me in more ways than one on more than one occasion.

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