Page 169 of Gilded Cage (Kovalyov Bratva 1)

“Oh… oh,” she says, sounding shell-shocked.

“Tam? Can you help?”

“Right, right… I’ll be down in two seconds.”

I hang up and hand the phone back to the driver. “She’s coming down.”

He gives me a sheepish smile. “Sorry, but can’t be too careful, ya know,” he says. “I’ve been fooled by a pretty face before.”

“I understand.”

“The prettier the face, the more careful you gotta be,” he continues. “My old man used to say that all the time. And you’ve got one of the prettiest faces I’ve ever seen.”

I give him a tight smile and look out the window just as Tamara rushes out of her building with a couple of dollar bills clutched in her palm.

“There she is,” I say, before jumping out of the cab.

Tamara looks at me like I have a second head sprouting out of my neck before hurrying over and paying the driver. Then she grabs my hand and pulls me back into her building.

The moment we step into the elevator and the doors close, she turns to me.

“What the fuck?!” she breathes.

I shake my head. “Where do I even start?”

“How about you start from the beginning?”

She reaches out and wipes something off my cheek. I turn my head to the side and catch my reflection in the mirrors that hang on either side of the elevator walls.

It’s enough to make me want to scream.

My eyes are huge and bloodshot, my cheeks look like they’ve hollowed in, and my hair is a dirty, matted mess that clings to the side of my face.

I’m half a ghost myself.

The elevator doors open on the sixth floor and I follow Tamara down the broad corridor, around the corner, and into her apartment.

I stop one step over the threshold. Tam realizes I’m frozen in place and turns around to face me.

“Esme?”

I don’t trust my voice. She wants an explanation for why I’m showing up at her doorstep unannounced and broke, looking like hell warmed over. She wants to know what happened. She wants me to start from the beginning.

But what was the beginning?

Was it when Artem had stormed the compound and murdered my entire household?

Was it when our paths had first crossed at The Siren four months before then?

Was it the day I was born into this horrible world?

I see the concern in Tamara’s eyes, pure and honest. That’s what unravels me.

I open my mouth to explain, but only a sob comes out.

And then I’m crying—full, hacking sobs that double me over and drain the breath from my lungs.

Tamara’s face crumples as she moves towards me and wraps her arms around me.

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