“You’re lying!” Filip’s gaze darted. “Lying!”
Panicked, I said, “Filip, don’t do this. It’s not too late. We can still fix this.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I spied Sevastyan inching even closer to Filip, until he stood between me and Paxán.
“Freeze, Sevastyan!” Filip cried. “I’ll shoot, I swear to God I will!” Another shaky wave of that gun—
Sevastyan lunged at me just as bullets sprayed the room from wall to wall. Clocks exploded, glass shattering, chimes tolling like church bells. I screamed, the sound cut off when I hit the ground; Sevastyan was atop me, hand cupping my head. In his other hand, a pistol smoked.
Plaster dust clouded the air, but I could see Filip on his back across the room. He was shot in the belly, twisting in pain. Though my ears rang as if a siren was in my head, I could still hear his cries. And something else . . .
Paxán’s breaths. They sounded thick. No, no, no! I struggled to rise, but Sevastyan had me pinned down.
“Are you hit?” he demanded of me.
When I shook my head, he lunged to his feet, charging for Filip.
As Sevastyan disarmed him, I scrambled to reach Paxán. He lay on the floor, blood gushing from a wound in his chest.
Sevastyan snatched the machine gun from Filip, then stalked around the room, checking the perimeter. “Natalie, put pressure on that!” He slammed the office doors closed, bolting them shut.
Kneeling beside Paxán, I pressed both of my hands over his wound. “You’re going to be okay, you’re going to be okay.” Shock—I was going into shock. And then how could I help my father?
In between grimaces of pain, Paxán looked sheepish. “This is . . . not how I planned things.”
“Don’t talk, please don’t talk.” Blood skimmed past my fingers. Lifeblood. He can’t lose any more. “You have to save your strength!”
Sevastyan dropped to his knees on Paxán’s other side. He put his hands on top of mine, knotting our fingers to bear down with even more force. Sevastyan’s expression was so hard, like granite under pressure. About to crack.
Paxán’s wound wasn’t fatal. It couldn’t be. So why were they both acting like it?
What did Sevastyan and Paxán know about shootings that I didn’t?
Everything.
Paxán cast Sevastyan a weak smile. “You know I couldn’t have borne it if you’d saved me instead of her. Proud of you, Son.”
The hazy scene replayed in my head. Sevastyan had been directly between Paxán and me when the bullets had flown. He’d made a choice, tackling me to the ground—instead of Paxán. “Stop this, both of you! Paxán, you have to hold on. You’re going to make it!”
“Be at ease, dorogaya moya.” With effort, he reached for me, brushing my face before his arm collapsed.
Then his eyes went to Sevastyan. “You are bound to her,” he told him in Russian. “Her life is in your care, Son. Yours alone.” He covered our bloody knot of fingers with his hand. “She belongs to you.”
One sharp nod from Sevastyan. More pressure on granite.
With difficulty, Paxán turned his head back to me. “Aleksei will protect you. He is yours now too.” I stared down at our interlaced fingers, awash in crimson—it was like a blood oath. “My brave daughter.”
My eyes filled with tears, drops spilling. “Don’t do this! Bátja, please, just hold on.”
“Bátja?” He smiled through his pain, somehow still evincing contentment. “I knew you would call me Dad.” But the twinkling blue of his eyes was ebbing. Replaced by sightlessness? “I only wish I’d had more time with the two of you. I love you both.”
To Sevastyan, he said, “Make her life better . . . for my having been in it.”
Blood bubbled from his lips. His eyes went blank, his chest . . . still.
“No, don’t go!” I sobbed. But it was too late.
Pavel Kovalev, my father, was dead.