Page 7 of Inevitable Endings
Aslanov
Time has lost its meaning.
I don’t know how many days have passed since they declared me dead. Weeks? Months? I count by the beat of my own heart, by the way my muscles ache and my bones grind against each other when I move. I used to track by the meals they gave me, twice a day, maybe? But hunger doesn’t come like it used to. It’s dull now, a background hum of emptiness that I’ve grown used to.
I haven’t seen the sun since they took me. Haven’t felt fresh air on my skin. Just four walls of reinforced concrete, thick enough to silence the world outside. No windows. No cracks of light. Just the hum of fluorescent bulbs that flicker unpredictably, casting long, warped shadows against the cold, damp floor. The air is stale, metallic, like rust and sweat, soaked into the stone after years of suffering. There are no sounds except for my own breathing and the occasional scrape of boots outside my cell.
The door is a solid slab of steel, featureless except for the slot where they shove my meals through. Sometimes I hear voices outside, muffled and brief, but they never speak to me directly. The only time the door opens is when they take me somewhere else, another room, equally empty, with a single chair bolted to the floor. The lights in that room are even harsher, glaring white and blinding, designed to disorient.
They moved me after the world buried me. After the fire, the riot, the wreckage they used to sell my death. They covered their tracks well. Even I believed it for a moment, staring at the scorched remains they wanted the world to think were mine. It was almost poetic, in a sick way—erased from existence by the very chaos I once controlled.
The men who come and go are ghosts. Their faces covered, their words few. Tactical, precise. Dirty feds, most likely, the kind who don’t work for the government but for themselves. The kind who sell loyalty to the highest bidder and burn the evidence when it’s over. Apparently, Nick was the highest bidder. I don’t ask them questions. I know better. When I was in control, I would have done the same: kept my prisoners in the dark, let their own mind break them before I ever laid a hand on them.
Nick doesn’t hide behind a mask like the others. He doesn’t need to. He wants me to see him, to remember. His face is the only thing in this place that isn’t a blur. It’s always clean-shaven, eyes calculating, mouth set in something that isn’t quite a smirk but isn’t far from it either. He watches me like I’m an animal in a cage, something dangerous, something unpredictable.
Nick doesn’t just watch. He acts.
When he needs something—intel, names, details about the Bratva’s network—he makes sure I remember his presence. The first time, he asked politely. The second time, he didn’t ask at all. My body tells the story of his persistence: bruises that never fully heal, ribs that ache with each breath, a split lip that reopens every time I try to speak. He never pushes too far. He doesn’t want me dead, he needs me alive.
For now.
Nick is playing the long game. The Bratva is a beast without a leash, and I’m sure he wants to be the one to reign it. I made sure there were no heirs, no lines of succession. With me dead, there is no one to challenge him, except Dominik.
My cousin.
My blood.
He is the only one left standing between Nick and complete control. If I were to fall, Dominik would inherit the empire. He knows this. He must already be moving, consolidating power, keeping the men loyal. But for how long? I don’t know what lies Nick has spread. What strings he has pulled. If Dominik even knows the truth, that I am still alive, breathing in the dark.
I am not the only one here.
There are cells next to mine. I hear movement, hear the ragged breath of another prisoner. The first time I whispered, I got no answer. The second time, I heard my name spoken back to me.
Petrov.
Two men with exclusive power over the entirety of Russia, held captive and erased from existence. Nick is waiting. Waiting for the right moment to strike, to take it all.
He underestimates me, he thinks there is nothing left of me. That I have become weak, weak ever since I’ve met her. But the reality is far different, I have never been as alive.
He doesn’t know that I am waiting, too.
I lean my head back against the cold stone wall, exhaling slowly through my nose. My body is weaker than it used to be, but my mind? My mind is still mine. And I hold onto that. Because they haven’t beaten me yet.
The nights in this place are indistinguishable from the days. There is no clock, no rhythm to follow except the ache in my body. Sleep comes in fragments, stolen moments where exhaustion forces me under, only to be ripped away by the scrape of metal against stone, the sound of my own breath too loud in the silence.
I dream of open air, of cold wind biting against my skin, of smoke curling from the tip of a cigarette held between my fingers. I dream of fire, of warmth, of the feeling of Isabella’shands ghosting over my skin. Of her voice, her freckles, her soft red hair and her pale skin.
Nick will slip eventually. They all do. And when he does, I’ll be ready. He will wish he was the one buried six feet deep into the ground when I get out of here.
Because no matter where they bury me, I always find my way back to the surface.
Chapter 4
Once Upon a Time, an Angel and a Devil Fell in Love
Isabella
The snow is endless.
