Page 16 of Dirty Crown
“It’s there,” Avery said brightly. “Holy shit, it’s there!”
“That should be enough for you to start your life away from these two losers,” Amara said. “Now, go! Get out of here while you can.”
Avery nodded, took a step and then another. She looked back as if she was expecting us to be like Maksim and do something terrible to her after giving her freedom. She realized Amara was serious and we weren’t going to impede her progress so she moved faster.
She finally bolted out of there, and I heard the door to the rooftop deck slam shut as she pushed her way through.
It was strange to watch her go, and part of me regretted the terrible way we’d treated each other.
But life had taught me to be more pragmatic these days, and I understood that whatever fantasy I had about being her friend would never come to fruition. We were two different people with different lives, and it was best for her to live far from mine.
“Well that’s over,” Amara said, lowering her gun. “Now get your loser fucking kid out of here and don’t cross us again or you’ll fucking regret it.”
Ilya looked foolish enough to fight back. He had a momentary lapse of reason and squared his shoulders as if he was going to argue.
But he looked at me, Ivan, the Kings one by one, and finally Amara and he thought better of it. He could tell there was the thinnest veil of polite society keeping all of us from kicking his ass, and his son had already been through the ringer with my violent revenge.
Ilya backed away from us, his eyes burning with anger and I knew it wouldn’t be the last we saw of him. He’d come after us again, he would have to. He lived by the code of an eye for an eye, but he didn’t understand his own part in it. Our damages to him and his family had been reactions to his attempted destruction of all of us. We were reacting, he was acting, there was a big difference.
But sadly, Ilya was too stupid to understand the difference.
We stood still until the helicopter lifted off, and as it grew smaller in the distance, Ivan let out a loud groan and collapsed onto the roof next to me.
Until then, I had thought he’d made it through without issue. But he was hurting, he was just really good at hiding it from all of us.
We gathered around him and formulated a plan get him downstairs and healing again.
It was strange to have him back, but not more strange than having to rescue him.
What a bizarre life I had.
* * *
“Hold still,”Amara said as she dabbed ointment onto Ivan’s wounds. “This isn’t exactly pleasant for me, either, you know. And moving around makes it worse.”
“I’m sorry, it fucking hurts,” he hissed and writhed under her ministrations. He had been taken care of, relative to the rest of us that was. He hadn’t been tortured too much and he hadn’t been subjected to starvation or other forms of abuse. He had, however, been tied up most of the time so he had sores on his body from remaining motionless, and his arms and legs were stiff and twisted.
He would need physiotherapy to complete overcome the pain and regain full function. At least that’s what the doctor had said when we brought her in to examine Ivan.
Amara, however, would need something more. She had been hurt mentally and physically in ways that I suspected, but hadn’t confirmed. I thought she would probably need some time off to take care of herself after this, and I was right. After Amara left us alone, Ivan looked at me and said, “I’ve sent her away. She needs to spend time alone to recover. She will be at a wellness spa in Switzerland for a month before returning to the US.”
“What are you going to do?” I asked. “How long do you intend to stay in London?”
“Not long,” he said and then he paused. “You don’t need to stay with me. I understand you have some legal troubles back at college.”
“It’s a long and stupid story, but yes,” I replied. “They started because of my association with you. Avery set me up to get my attention, apparently.”
“I’m sorry this opened up such a terrible situation for you,” he said and sighed as he relaxed back into his chair.
“What did?” I asked.
“Being my daughter,” he said, closing his eyes as he leaned back. “I’m afraid your life will not be easy because of that.”
“I think it will stay interesting, I suppose,” I replied. There was no sense in complaining about it to him, Ivan already seemed to feel horrible about what had happened. And he was my biological father, there was no point trying to deny it.
“You do like life to be interesting,” he said and he opened his eyes to look at me. “What is the story with your friends? I’ve overlooked it all this time because I thought it was a phase you were going through, but they appear to be permanent.”
“You mean my roommates?” I laughed and then grew serious. “They’re here to stay. I’m sorry if it feels weird, and I know it must look strange from the outside, but they’re my partners.”
