Page 150 of Shattered Altar (Makarova Bratva Duet)

I notice an edge of surprise work its way up one half of his face.

“So I’m stuck here until your son gets what he wants,” I continue. “Which I’m sure happens all the damn time. Was it like that for you, too? When you were in charge?”

He jerks his head forward again.

I nod. “Thought so. Must be nice.”

“It… was,” he croaks.

“Hey!” I say. “I understood that.”

One arm rises slightly and drops. “Used… to… me.”

I grin. “Well, I’m a fast learner.”

It looks for a moment like he’s smiling. The simple gesture tugs on my heart strings. I wonder if this is what my father would have been relegated to if he had survived his heart attack.

He would’ve hated it, but having him in a wheelchair would be better than not having him at all. It’s probably a selfish thought on my part. And yet I can’t deny that it feels true.

“My father died about seven years ago now,” I tell him softly.

His eyes are on me, so I know he’s listening. Perceptive. Awake.

“We were really close,” I continue. “I mean, we all were, my whole family. But my dad and I, we had a special relationship. Everyone always assumed I was an accident because I was born ten years after my sister, but Dad never let me believe that. He’d sit with me in the garden and we’d do some project or the other and he’d tell me about how I came to be born.”

I haven’t thought about the story since he died. It hurt too much to remember those sun-soaked days with him. The familiar rasp of his voice. The way he’d laugh in all the same spots during the telling.

But sitting here with Vlad at the edge of a lake that never seems to end, it feels okay to go back to that memory. It feels safe.

“Dad was the one who wanted another child. Mom felt like she was done, but he told her that they had more parenting left in them. So she finally caved after a year of nagging. He used to call me his bonus child. He said he’d never had a best friend growing up, so he figured he’d just make one.”

I swipe at my watery eyes.

“He was the best dad in the world,” I whisper. “I never had any doubt that I was the most important part of his life.”

I look at Vlad, whose expression is hard to read, and not just because of his half-paralyzed face. He has Aleks's reservedness. His ability to hide any and all emotion so that the other person has no idea where they stand.

“What was Aleks like?” I ask on a whim. “As a child?”

Vince breathes raggedly. “He was… never… much… of a…. ch-child…”

“Yeah, I get that,” I say. “I can’t imagine him running around in this garden, doing kid stuff. He told me you taught him to fight and shoot as soon as he could walk.”

“Life… skills…”

I snort. “Maybe if you’re in the Bratva. Did he even have a choice?”

His head jerks again, but in the opposite direction.

That’s a no.

“Do you regret not giving him one?”

“Regret… is… a… waste…”

“Normal people live with it all the time, though. I know I do.”

“Why?”

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