Page 54 of Collapsed

I launch my entire body at Ivan. We crash through a small table and onto the ground. The detonator pops out of his hand and lands a couple of feet above his head on the ground as my body lies on his. My hand reaches forward towards the detonator, but Ivan is quick. He grips my wrist, yanks it to the side, and pulls my body off of his.

Ivan flips himself over, crawls forward, and grabs the detonator. As I scramble to push myself up, I feel something under my hand. Looking down, there’s the leg of the table we crashed through. It has a pointy end, giving it the appearance of a vampire stake. I grip it in my hand and rush toward where Ivan is still holding the detonator. Raising my new stake, I slam it down on Ivan’s hand. The crunching noise that follows is not from his hand; the table leg also hits the detonator. My heart freezes for a moment, waiting to hear an explosion. Nothing happens.

I get to my feet, and Ivan does the same. He pulls the wood from his hand, yelling out as he does, and looks down at the shattered remains of the detonator on the floor. His entire face contorts, and pure rage has taken over. He grips the broken table leg in one hand while his other hand drips blood on the floor from a large gaping hole at its center.

Ivan charges at me with the wooden stake reared back, ready to strike. I move slightly to the side, feeling the wind of his movement kiss my face. My hand grips around his, keeping the sharp wooden piece away from me as I bring my other fist to his face and uppercut into his jaw. His head juts up, and I push forward until his back is now pressed against the wall. I bring on an onslaught of punches to his face and head, knowing his free hand is of almost no use to him.

His size is his only advantage at this point as he pushes himself off the wall and into me, but he drops the wood in his struggle. I dive to the floor, and Ivan catches my movements. Before I can reach the stake, his foot connects with my side. I flip over slightly and see him preparing to bring his foot down on me again. Rolling my body over, his foot hits the ground next to me. My hand shoots forward and grabs the wooden stake as he brings down his foot again. I hold the stake straight up, and Ivan drops his foot right down onto the pointy end. He screams out in pain and falls backward, the table leg sticking out of the bottom of his foot.

I seize my opportunity and pounce on him, punching the sides of his head and face over and over again. Blood sprays out of different areas until I can no longer see the fleshy area of his face. Instead, it is covered in red, as though I’ve painted him. I pull my hand back again, but it doesn’t come down. Looking up, I see Stryker has a hold of my wrist. I never even saw him enter the room, but I’m glad he’s here and safe.

“I need to finish him,” I demand.

“You will,” he assures me, “but everyone gets their turn.” He’s right. Adrenaline took over, and I was about to end it now, even though I knew everyone deserved their chance with him. I look beyond him to Katia. She needs to make him pay for what he did to her. King will make Ivan feel the same pain he caused him. They all deserve this as much as I do.

I look back to Ivan. He’s not moving. Stryker pulls me upwards until I’m standing and helps me step over Ivan’s limp body. Everyone else moves forward to stand around Ivan’s body except Alexie. He’s still sitting in his chair.

“The warehouse has been secured,” Marcela chimes in. “Alexie’s men are guarding the area. Ivan’s men are dead, though we believe a few got away.”

“We can track them since we know who they are now,” Conrad says. “We can send some of the men left on a hunting mission.”

I can only nod my head at what they’re saying. My body is still in overdrive, and I’m trying to catch my breath.

“What abouthim?” Katia asks innocently. She knows what’s going to happen, and now I wonder if she’ll have the stomach to make him pay for what he’s done.

Alexie stands from his chair. “We make him pay. Each of us gets to play with Umbra here. Not much of a shadow anymore. Nat gets the final blow. Understood?” He tells everyone, and they nod their heads in agreement.

We’ve had Ivan in the basement of the safe house for five days. I thought I would want to be down there to watch every moment of the torture he’s going through, but I oddly find myself wanting to be with my loved ones instead. Don’t get me wrong, I have definitely gone down there to witness the undoing of the great and mighty Umbra. He lurked in the shadows for so long, he seemed untouchable. Seeing him vulnerable makes me realize there is nothing standing in the way of the life I deserve.

I’m sitting in King’s room, my favorite room in the entire house, as I look out the window at the rising sun. King is snoring softly in his bed while I snuggle up on the loveseat with a cup of coffee. I couldn’t sleep last night because today was the day we decided it would end. Everyone got their time with Ivan, even Katia took hers. She wasn’t hesitant at all. Something has changed in her, not in a bad way, but she has become more ruthless and does not shy away from the violence as she once did. I watched as she sliced the names of Ivan’s numerous victims across his body. She made sure to carve deeply as she cut the name of our dance teacher that he killed years ago.

When she was done, I made sure to help her get cleaned up. We spent the night together in each other’s arms. We felt a certain peace that evening as we were no longer worried about looking over our shoulders or waiting for Ivan to strike. The entire house has been eerily calm, despite the muffled screams coming from the basement from time to time. The worst sounds came when Alexie took his turn, which surprised no one. He’s always had a gift for torturing someone for a long time without letting them die.

A soft knock at the door draws my attention away from my thoughts. The door cracks open as Conrad peaks around the door. I smile at the sight of him as I wave for him to enter. He comes into the room and says, “I’m done.” Conrad was the last to visit Ivan. I left him late in the evening, and he had not laid a hand on him. He had no desire to torture him physically. Instead, he told Ivan how he would make sure I would live the happiest of lives with all of them. He talked about how much he loves me and all the times I’ve proven or shown that I love him just as much. Conrad’s words seemed to hit Ivan harder than any actual torture. His words hit me too, but not in the same way.

“Are you ready to end this?” he asks.

King sits up in the bed, “not without me there to watch,” he interjects.

“Obviously,” I reply. “I want everyone there to see it. We all need to know it’s final. No more fear. No more shadow. We all watch it end.” Conrad agrees and leaves the room to get the others.

King and I get dressed and head downstairs. Everyone is standing around the kitchen island, but no one says anything as King and I enter the room. Marcela is the only one missing, which means she is downstairs keeping an eye on Ivan. We never left him alone for a second, there was no way we were giving him a chance to escape.

I turn and walk out of the kitchen. All the footsteps behind me let me know that everyone has followed. No one is missing this. We all make our way downstairs and to the cell that I once stayed in.

Ivan is standing in the middle of the cell, arms stretched far above his head, tied to a hook hanging from the ceiling. His head lifts when he hears us enter the space. One of his eyes is swollen shut, but he can see us perfectly with the other. He stares directly at me, but no smile appears on his face.

“Moy Ogon…” he slurs, “I was hoping… to see you… one last time.” He pauses every couple of words while breathing heavily as though it’s hard for him to do. “How will you do it?” he asks. This is something I’ve thought about for the last five days. There was only one clear answer, though.

I pull my favorite dagger from its sheath at my side. Ivan sees it. No one knows what I have planned, even though they’ve all asked. I didn’t want anyone to talk me out of it. This needs to be done, and I don’t want to drag it out. Every breath he continues to take is one breath too many.

I step up to Ivan, and he looks down at me. We are inches apart, a distance I’m sure he enjoys. “My heart was never going to be yours,” I tell him. “It belongs to them. Your heart, however, will be the last thing I destroy,” I say as I raise my dagger and plunge it into his heart. His eyes go wide, and his mouth drops open. He lets out a few hollowed-sounding coughs as his body spasms. Ivan’s body goes limp as his legs no longer support him, leaving him to swing slightly.

A slow clapping sound comes from behind me, and I spin around. Alexie is slowly clapping his hands together. “Fucking poetic,Malyshka,”he remarks. I don’t turn back around to see Ivan; instead, I walk to the door of the cell, facing everyone.

“What do you want us to do with the body?” Stryker asks.The body?I love hearing Ivan being reduced to nothing more than a body. “Should we burn him?”

“No fire!” I shout out quickly. Stryker looks at me, confused for a moment by my tone. “That is what he would have wanted,” I explain. “I will not give him fire.”

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