Page 116 of Shattered Cradle (Makarova Bratva Duet)

“I’m sorry I’ve had to keep my distance.”

“Does he know you’re here right now?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “What Aleksandr doesn’t know won’t hurt him.”

“He’s probably got spies checking on me. Or you. Or both of us.”

“He’s busy at the moment,” she demurs. “He’s not going to notice.”

“Has he really forbidden you from even speaking to me?” I ask.

“Not in as many words,” she says. “But he was so… rattled the other day. I thought that keeping my distance would help calm him down a little.”

“Yeah, not sure that’ll work on your son. He’s… what’s the word? Oh, yeah: an asshole.”

She gives me a half-hearted smile, but I can’t bring myself to apologize. She knows it’s true.

“He’s being unfair to you.”

“He’s being unfair to both of us.”

She nods serenely. I’ve always been impressed by how Yulia composes herself. It’s like nothing can affect her.

But I want her to get riled up about this. I want her to reach my level of outrage. At least then I wouldn’t be alone in my anger.

From the looks of it, though, I’m out here on this limb alone.

“He is living according to the example he was taught,” she explains in a soft voice. “Like father, like son.”

I frown, trying to imagine Vlad as even half as monstrous as Aleks. I don’t doubt he was; I just can’t picture it. Right now, he’s a quiet, peaceful old man.

“Men like Vlad…” Yulia shakes her head. “Life has to really destroy them before you can see any scrap of their humanity.”

“Wow, that’s uplifting,” I mumble sarcastically.

She sighs. Disappointment stains her expression. I imagine that’s how I look every time I think of my pretend husband.

“You may make excuses for him, but I’m not about to,” I say firmly. “He’s your son; you’re being a good mother. I’m just not sure he deserves it.”

She exhales deeply. “I suppose I feel an obligation to justify his actions. It feels like making excuses for myself. After all, I’m part of the reason he is the way he is.”

I listen to her attentively, waiting for her to get the courage to continue.

“I didn’t shield him the way I should have when he was a boy. He was at his father’s mercy. And Vlad… well, he wasn’t exactly what you would call a doting father. He was harsh. Cruel. He loved Aleksandr in his own way, of course. But he didn’t know how to be a father without riding his son. Without bending and breaking him into the image of the man he thought he should be.”

“That must have been difficult to watch.”

“Which is exactly why I didn’t,” she says. “I couldn’t bear it, but I knew I had no power to stop it. So I stayed away. I kept to myself. I suppose, in the mind of a five-year-old, that might have felt like abandonment.”

It’s hard not to feel a grudging sympathy towards Aleks now. Tortured by his father, abandoned by his mother, set on a brutal path that offered no alternatives from the day he was born.

“He’s always resented me for it,” Yulia continues. “Not that he would ever admit as much. He’s too strong now. Too much like his father. In a sense, I suppose that’s a good thing.”

“Care to elaborate? ‘Cause from where I’m standing, there isn’t anything good about it.”

“You cannot survive in this world without being ruthless,” she says. “A don who doesn’t inspire fear is not an effective leader. Vlad’s men respected him, but fear was just as crucial. Perhaps more so. The same is true of Aleksandr.”

“I’m not scared of him.”

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