Page 41 of Broken Sins (Volkov Bratva 3)

“Act like an adult and you’ll get treated like one,” Vito responds.

“Why don’t youactlike you didn’t just say that, and I’ll refrain from slicing a second smile into your throat?”

Now, Vito takes to his feet. The two of them move towards each other and bump chests in front of the fire. They look like two brawling grizzly bears, so big and burly. “Get that pretty little knife out and do it then, you coward. You don’t have the balls.”

“You’re the one who will be lacking balls soon enough.”

“Both of you, sit the fuck down!” bellows Mateo. He has stood up and joined them. Putting one huge paw on each of their chests, he pushes Dante and Vito apart. “This is not the time to be bickering like kids on the playground. If you can’t even have a civil goddamn conversation like men, likebrothers, then maybe we deserve everything that has happened to us.”

No one says anything to that. I can hear Vito and Mateo breathing heavily like boxers in the ring. Gradually, reluctantly, they step back from each other. Mateo helps Dante pick his armchair back up as Vito settles back into his.

My head is whirling. The four of them presented such a united front in uniform at the hotel room and during their turns watching over me in the dungeon. But now, I’m seeing that front splinter into pieces. They don’t even know what they want to do with me. Vito wants to spare me, to use me as a hostage. Dante wants to make me suffer to pay for something, whatever it is that my father did to them. Leo and Mateo haven’t spoken up since I started listening, so I don’t know what they want. All I know is that my life just might hang in the balance.

My arm is falling asleep, so I shift position. As I do, I accidentally nudge the sword where I had set it down.

To my horror, it promptly falls over the edge of the landing.

I feel like time condenses into honey, into molasses, like a thick, viscous substance that slows the passing of seconds to a crawl. I see the sword skittering across the concrete, the metal clanging. The tip of it moves over the darkness below. It keeps going, more and more of the blade sliding from the safety of the stone to the emptiness beyond the landing. I reach out a hand, trying to stop it, but it’s too little, too late. I can’t stop it now. I can only watch as the handle follows the blade and the whole thing tips.

Going, going, gone.

I close my eyes and wait for the sound. There’s an excruciating one or two seconds where the sword must still be falling through the air.

Then it hits the first step and I hear,CLAAAANG!

Again and again, the noise rings out into the stairwell as the sword bounces its way down.

CLAANG!

CLAANG!

It falls for a good while before it finally finds a resting place.

I could run back to my cell and try to hide, but even if I did, there is no way to lock the door behind me. The brothers would know right away that I’d gotten out.

What I should do is get up and try to make a break for the patio door that leads outside. I’m screaming at myself to get up and go. But it feels like my body has stopped listening to my brain. I’m frozen, unable to move even a muscle. All I can do is stare at the ledge where the sword fell over and wonder,Why?

Why me? Why this? Why now?

What did I do wrong?

Or is it not my fault at all? Am I just paying for the sins of my father?

The shadows don’t contain any answers.

And when the tapestry is swept aside and I look up to see the four faces of my captors, staring down at me sprawled pathetically on the landing of the stairway, I don’t see any answers there, either.

I hear only Dante’s voice. “Tsk-tsk, Princess Volkov. You’ve been very naughty indeed.”

12

Milaya

I haven’t had food or water in three days. They took the blanket away, too, and the thin, lumpy mattress, so I have nothing in my cell but a bucket and the chains fastened to my wrists and ankles. I sleep on bare rock. All I can use to mark the passage of time is the tiny beam of light filtering through the hole cut in the upper portion of the wall.

I am being punished for sneaking out of my cell and for spying on their meeting. They wanted me to tell them what I heard, but I couldn’t even find the words to speak. I feel shell-shocked, mute, like the victim of a car crash who is having trouble remembering how to make her lips work. They gave up without trying too hard. It didn’t particularly matter what I heard. It’s not like I will ever have the chance to do anything with the information.

The thirst came first. Then the gnawing hunger in the pit of my belly. The hallucinations arrived not long after that.

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