a long time. Pav might have gone closer just to … be there and make sure the man didn’t try anything.
He didn’t need to.
Vadim couldn’t move far from the wall, and Viktoria had enough space between the two of them. Besides, this was about her, not him. She needed to do this, and he was just here to let her do exactly that.
Nothing else.
“I showed you mercy by asking Konstantin to spare your life,” Viktoria said, brushing her fingers over her jacket to remove any dust that might have been clinging to the fabric from their walk down the dirty hallways. “But you’ll live the rest of your life cold, alone, and without. They won’t beat you—they won’t even look at you. Because you don’t deserve that either, Vadim. You don’t deserve anything, and that’s exactly what I’ve given you now.”
“Poetic, really,” Pav said, more to himself than her.
Because she was right. Everyone had been so quick to deny Viktoria when she’d asked that she be the one to decide Vadim’s punishment. Death was the one thing everyone else wanted, but no, she had something … better.
The vicious ones always did.
She still laughed a bit.
Yeah.
Damn.
He loved her.
So much.
“You deserve to die,” Viktoria said, standing straight but never looking away from her father. “And you will die, eventually, but I get to decide that. You will live the rest of your days wondering when I will decide your time is up. You’ll never know, and you will be so alone and broken and isolated in this dark, cold place—or wherever Konstantin sends you next—that the only thing you’ll wish for is death. Except you’ll have to beg me, Daddy, you’ll have to beg me to let them kill you. Until you gain the courage to do that … well, you can wait while you wonder if today is finally the day I decided you should die.”
She laughed again. “It’s kind of appropriate, if you think about it. You were so quick to teach us that we would have to wait for pain. You taught us that we should love the fear because you were fear … we all correlated fear to a man we were supposed to love. So, it’s your turn, now. Learn to love your fear, Vadim. It’s what you deserve.”
Viktoria stopped at the doorway as she left, tossing a laugh over her shoulder as she added a line to her father that burned even Pavel. “And I was lying, Daddy. You thought we would let you live after everything? Never. Enjoy your place in hell.”
Vadim jerked away from the wall at that statement. They had all known the truth—this would be nothing more than hope to Vadim. This place, and permanent seclusion, to pay for his sins like the monster he was. It would never have worked. It only would have given him hope, and eventually, they would pay for giving it to him.
They had learned their lesson.
Viktoria had truly only asked for one thing—that she be allowed to make her father feel like he had done to her. To put hope and trust in his hands, and then rip them away from him. It was what she had been owed, after all.
“I’ll be upstairs, Pav,” Viktoria said.
He nodded her way, and then she was gone.
Pav still found comfort in this place.
He hated it.
But he knew it well.
Vadim’s gaze drifted to him, but the man still stayed silent even as he tugged against his chains like he thought that might save him from Zhatka. It wouldn’t.
“Nothing to say now?” he asked the man on the floor.
Vadim trembled, but said nothing. Pav didn’t really mind. He didn’t need Vadim to speak for him to have the last word, honestly.
“Do you remember what you told me that first night I spent in the Compound?” Pav chuckled a bit and stuffed his hands in his pockets as he rocked back on his heels. “After you dragged me from the car that I was hiding in … before you decided my life was no longer my own, do you remember what you said?”
The man kept quiet.
Pav understood why.
“You don’t have to speak because it feels most appropriate tonight for me to remind you of those words,” Pav said, grinning just a bit. These walls were no longer his home, but he might come to visit occasionally. Why not? “Beware of those who show you mercy, for those are the people who know the essence of your fear.”
Pav kneeled down, three knives already