Page 8 of Lethal Legacy

Vilnus spent four years torturing my parents, my brother, and me, in his bid to open the vault. When his efforts managed to actually kill our mother, Alexei and I knew we had to get Papa out.

In the end, though, it was only Papa and I who managed to escape.

I feel the familiar pang of guilt. It kills me every day that my little brother is still trapped with the Orlovs. I would happily have stood between Alexei and those bastards until my last breath. Papa had certainly intended to do just that. But he was sick, Alexei was barely sixteen—and neither of them would even consider running without me.

In the end it was only my fear of what the Orlovs would do to Papa that convinced me to leave Alexei behind.

Not a day goes by that I don’t question that decision.

Papa stirs on the bed. I sit on the mattress beside him, covering his hand with my own. His pale blue eyes flicker open. His hand grips mine suddenly, with surprising strength.

“I’m here, Papa,” I whisper in Russian. “It’s okay. I’m safe.”

But his hand grips mine even harder, with an urgency that makes me raise my head and frown as he tries to mouth a word. He shakes his head angrily as I try one, then two, suggestions. Finally, with an effort that strains his entire body, he gets the word out.

“Ko-rob-ka,” he says.

Box.

I freeze, my heart slowing to a dull thud. I go to the cupboard where I keep the lockbox containing our money and fake passports.

It’s gone.

I slump to the floor, my head in my hands.

Nothing else is missing, but then again, there’s nothing else in the tiny apartment worth taking.

Any opportunist would have taken the lockbox.

I can’t be sure that the thief was the Orlovs.

And you can’t be sure that it wasn’t.

Either way, we certainly can’t stay here.

But we can’t run, either, no matter how much I know we should.

I barely have enough cash in my bag to pay for a room for the night. I think of the tip I told Roman to keep and actually laugh, a choked, strangled sound that I immediately stifle so Papa won’t hear.

What I really need is the kind of power CEO Man represents, the hellfire needed to regain the world that was stolen from my family. But I’m about as close to possessing either power or hellfire as I am of making my crazy fantasies about Roman himself come true.

It takes another two hours for me to gather our few possessions, get Papa and his wheelchair down the three flights of stairs, and check in to a cheap motel down the hill. I leave a note for Mariam, wishing her luck. I can’t ask her to come with us. I won’t put her in that kind of danger.

I get Papa settled as comfortably as is possible, given his wounds, and buy some soup, which he insists on feeding to himself.

Then I kiss his forehead and go back to work.

If we plan to eat tomorrow, I don’t have a choice.

By the time I finally stack the last of the chairs on the tables, it’s after two a.m.

I’m exhausted in a way that goes beyond the physical. I’ve spent all night with a knife slipped under the register, scanning every face that walks in. Anyone could have been watching where I took Papa, even though I made the taxi double back a dozen times, costing me even more money I can’t afford. For all I know, right now, Orlov men could be torturing my father.

As if in response to my thoughts, the sparrow tattoo on my upper left shoulder tingles as if it was a real bird.

Suddenly I’m back in Miami, strapped face down on a table, my skin bare under the tattooist’s needle.

“Do you know what happens to little Russianblyatswho think they can fly away? Do you?”

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