Page 141 of Lethal Alliance

The Orlov sparrow is still there. But now the red wings drip blood, and rising behind them are another set, these made of vivid gold. A double eagle head looms above the sparrow, talons holding the other bird like broken prey.

The symbolism is brutal—and undeniable: the Romanov crest, the symbol of the old-world treasures our family has guarded so carefully, triumphant over the broken power of the Orlovs.

“Darya.” Alexei says my name quietly. He inclines his head in my direction, but makes no move to embrace me. “I am glad to see you are well.”

“And I you, brother.” This strange, stiff exchange is nothing like the family ease I grew up with. Even more than back at the ballroom, my brother seems like a stranger to me. “Please.” I gesture at the open door in welcome. “Come in.”

But Alexei isn’t looking at me. His eye, still shielded behind the glasses, is locked on Papa. His jaw is clenched hard, but I can see the faint flicker of tension beneath his silver scars, sense the emotion he’s fighting to keep hidden.

“Otets.” His voice is gravelly, and he doesn’t move toward Papa, just stares at him from behind his glasses. “Ty vyglyadish’ zdorovym.”You look healthy.

I remember, with a faint shock, that this is the first time Alexei has seen Papa since the night we fled Miami.

Papa nods at him, his face grave. “Ya rad tebya videt, syn moy.”I am happy to see you, my son.

Neither moves to approach the other. Papa’s eyes roam over Alexei. I notice the small signs of tension in his old form: the hard set to the rangy shoulders, the stiff set to his jaw. Papa is doing a good job of hiding his shock at his son’s appearance, but it’s there.

Part of me has wanted this, to see Papa forced to confront the impact of his decisions, just as I’ve also wanted to see Alexei hesitant and apologetic before me. But now that the moment of reckoning is here, the hard core of resentment I’ve carried for so long just washes away, overwhelmed by a salty, trembling wave of love and compassion.

Whatever pathways have led to this moment of reconciliation, my brother and I have both traveled them in darkness, forced to grow up amid danger and hostility, fearing every moment might be our last.

If there is any lesson to take from those dark years, it’s that life is too short, and those we love too precious, to hold on to past grievances. The old ties no longer bind any of us. Those who sought to hold us captive to the past are dead, defeated, or both. We might be family, but that is no longer a curse we have to live under. We’ve all earned our freedom.

Now we must learn what it means to be a family united by love, rather than by pain.

I step forward and walk slowly down the steps toward my brother’s tense figure. “Alexei,” I say softly, opening my arms. “Thank you for saving our children.”

His face tightens, his entire form stiffening. “Never thank me for that,” he says roughly, almost recoiling from me.

“I understand.”I know the guilt he must feel at being forced to hold children captive in the same way we were ourselves. In the same place that he has been held and tortured all these years.

I take the final step toward him, placing my hands on the rangy shoulders so like Papa’s. “Then let me thank you for helping Papa and me escape.” I reach out and take his glasses off, revealing the fierce emotion swirling in the dark blue eye. “For staying and enduring all you did under the Orlovs. And most of all, Alexei, thank you for surviving what most men never could—and for saving our family legacy.”

I wrap my arms around his neck. For a long time, he doesn’t move, just stands stiffly in my embrace, his body a hard board held away from mine.

Then, finally, I feel his arms tentatively circle me.

For a brief moment we stand very still, simply readjusting to the new people we both are. Then Alexei’s arms fall and he steps back, his jaw clenched tightly against whatever emotion he has learned to suppress. His eye slides to Papa, and he passes me to mount the steps, saving Papa the indignity of trying to navigate them with his cane.

He halts a few steps from where Papa stands, his back to me. Papa props his cane against the stone pillar. “Syn moy,”he says in a low voice, gripping Alexei’s hand.My son.“I am honored to be your father.” Papa speaks in Russian, not trying to hide the emotion in his eyes. “But I also regret the pain and suffering my name has caused you to witness.”

I can’t see Alexei’s face, but when he speaks, there is a wry twist to his Russian words. “Glaza boyatsya, a ruki delayut.”

The eyes are afraid, but the hands do.

Tears spring to my eyes. I remember my father saying those words to my brother years ago, when Alexei was small. It was the saying he used to encourage Alexei to leap from the high diving board or ride a horse for the first time. I realize I haven’t heard Papa say it since the night we ran, when he was forced to leave my brother behind.

I stay long enough to see the savage rush of emotion animate the hard lines of Papa’s face, his sudden surge of strength as he draws his son into a crushing embrace.

Then I slip back inside the finca, leaving father and son on the portico, bound by love, honor, and the burden of the lethal legacy they have both endured so much to carry.

“I am trulysorry we kept so much from you.” Alexei almost smiles at me. It is later in the afternoon, and the three of us are sitting around the small table out on the terrace. It’s littered with a half-empty bottle of vodka, a samovar of tea, and an overflowing ashtray next to Papa that I’m trying not to glare at.

Smiling once came easily to my younger brother. Now, I’ve realized, his smile is a deeply hidden thing, as are all his emotions. His stillness is almost disturbing at times, as if he could fade into the stonework on the terrace itself, like a human chameleon. But if I find his camouflage disturbing, I’ve also felt his eye on me more than once, digesting the changes I’m sure he finds equally jarring. It happens again as I speak in response to his apology.

“I understand why you felt it was safer to keep some things from me.” I look between them. “I’m not saying I agree with it, but I understand you thought that your silence would keep me safer, especially if the Orlovs caught me again. But things have changed now.” I feel Alexei’s gaze resting on me, assessing my tone, the confidence with which I speak. I know he is seeing a different person than the fragile sister he grew up with. “We are none of us what we once were, back when Papa and I fled Miami. So I guess what I want to know is what happens now?”

Papa and Alexei exchange a glance. I feel a familiar surge of annoyance. “I think,” I say stiffly, “that I’ve earned the right to be included in our family decisions.”

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