Page 88 of Broken Sins (Volkov Bratva 3)

I started to ask Mateo those questions—“What do you—I mean, how am I supposed to—” But for the third time, he stayed silent.

Because he knew damn well that I already knew the answers.

It had all become so crystal-clear last night, in the hallway with Vito. Vito must have fallen and hit his head or something like that, because when I rounded the corner on my way back to my room after the wine cellar encounter with Mateo, he was lying on the floor, bleeding and groaning like he was having a nightmare. He kept muttering again and again, “If you stop, you die.” I don’t know what the hell that meant, but it was obviously significant to him, because he wouldn’t stop saying it.

We fell asleep there in the hallway after he finally calmed down. I was still drunk from the bottle of wine I shared with Mateo, so it was easy to slip off into a deep and dreamless sleep.

When I woke up, Vito was gone.

There was a trail of blood leading up the hallway and through the door of his bedroom. I thought for a long time about following it. I went up to it and rested my cheek against the wood. I imagined that I could hear his breathing on the other side, though the door was far too thick for that to actually be the case. I just wanted to know that he was alive. I wanted him to know that he could stop and breathe if he wanted to, if he needed to.

Of all the brothers, the darkness is coiled most tightly in Vito’s heart. One by one, each of them has come to me and I’ve taken some of it from him. Vito has tried so hard to refuse that. He thinks he’s a martyr. He thinks that he is the only one who has suffered, and he is ashamed of that, like it marks him as lesser- than. I want him to know that that’s not true.

We’ve got sins. All of us. The blood that runs in my veins is its own kind of sin. I saw years ago what kind of man my father was, what kind of things he did. And I chose to ignore it. That’s the sin I have to live with.

But now, as the sun dies in the window outside and my father waits on the other side of this door, I have a chance to fix it. I can save lives.

I grip the handle and push it open.

My father is facing away from me, looking through a window onto the garden below. He is wearing a suit—the dark navy one I like so much. He turns to face me when he hears the door open. When our eyes lock, he stiffens.

“Lubimaya,” he breathes. “My love.”

I want to do a million things at once in that moment. In all those dark days and nights in the dungeon cell, how badly did I dream of this: Daddy coming to rescue his little girl and save the day. He’s been my hero for as long as I can remember, and I thought that this would be no different.I can handle anything you need, he told me during that phone call in the parking lot outside the boxing studio. That feels like lifetimes ago. I believed that he would handle this. It was only a matter of time.

And, sure enough, here he is. He hasn’t changed. The lines in his face are as rigid and proud as they’ve always been. The steel in his eyes is exactly the same.

But I have changed.

I’m not the same girl who was dragged out of a hotel room two weeks ago. I’m not the same daughter he once knew. I am not Milly van der Graaf, nerdy college girl.

I am Milaya, princess of the Volkov Bratva. I mean something to the Bianci family too, though I have no idea what kind of title would be appropriate for that tangled, sordid little arrangement. I am a woman. I am an adult. I am myself.

And I need to make things right.

“Dad,” I say back. He opens his arms to welcome me into a hug, but I stay rooted in place. He must see the set in my jaw or the look in my eye. He ought to know that look—he taught it to me, after all.

I feel a deep kind of sadness, to go along with the rest of the cocktail of emotions simmering inside my heart right now. Sadness for the loss of innocence, maybe. I think back to that spa party, how funny it was to put a mud face mask on my father. And then how heartbreaking it was to see those cucumbers lying forlorn on the concrete floor. I think of the night I saw him beating that man senseless in his office with Uncle Alexei.

I’m no longer a little girl who loves her father unconditionally. This isn’t the rescue I dreamed of. This is something I never could have prepared for.

“What have they done to you?” he asks. He steps forward to cross the distance between us and raises one hand as if to stroke my cheek. But when I flinch, he freezes before letting his hand fall to his side. “What have they told you, my sweetness?”

It takes all the willpower I can muster to say, “We need to talk, Dad.”

He nods slowly as he studies my face. “Okay,” he says. “Let’s sit.”

We sit down at the table set before us. It’s just two chairs and a small, ornate wooden tea table. The evening sky is gorgeous, and from this vantage point, we can see for miles. The sun’s pinks and oranges are skewed into abstract pastels by the Los Angeles smog. I want to frame the sky and put it in a museum.

I have so much in my heart I want to say to him, but I don’t know where to begin. He must sense my uncertainty, because he clears his throat and says, “I am sorry it took me so long to get to you, my daughter. I looked everywhere.”

“I know,” I say, tears threatening to crack at the edge of my voice. I don’t doubt for a second that he did. I don’t doubt for a second that he loves me. Those things have never been the issue. If anything, they’re the problem.

Because it’s what he does in order to safeguard that love that has brought us here. The lies. The blood. The bodies carried out under cover of darkness. It can’t continue like that. One way or another, this has to come to an end.

He starts to say something else, but I hold up a hand to cut him off. “You killed so many people, Daddy,” I whisper. I’m crying now. I can’t hold them back anymore. Tears are streaming down my face and my voice is choked and pathetic. But I don’t give a shit. Let him see me cry.

That’s the problem with all these men—my father and the brothers alike. They’re all broken, numb, shrouded in darkness. Somewhere along the way, someone told all of them that to feel anything is a failure. ButIfeel things. I feel enough for all of them.

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