I should feel guilty, but my chest was light, taking in breaths easier for the first time in years.
There was nothing particularly wrong with Carter. Our relationship was amicable, maybe, if I reached a little, even nice. But when it came down to it, the last time his lips were on mine, I spent the entire kiss mentally conjugating French verbs for my upcoming exam.
Papa didn’t know about the few online courses I’d taken. He’d blown a gasket at my request to attend college, which meant he silently stared at me like I asked to visit North Korea before he said, “Nyet.” So I thought it was best to keep my classes on the down low.
The first four voicemails from Ivan sounded very Ivan-like and straightforward, excessively informing me he would land in Moscow at three a.m. and demanding I stay in my hotel room until he arrived. The fifth, however, raised the hair on the back of my neck.
He blew out a rough breath, then a curse, and a thump sounded through the line, as if he actually hit something. “I cannot believe you did this. I trusted you not to go to Moscow.”
“I didn’t promise you anything,” I muttered to myself.
It went silent for a moment, and then his imploring tone became cold, hard fact.
“You want the truth for once? Fine. If you want to play games and do not tell me where you are, Mila . . . I’m a dead man.”
He sounded so serious, I actually believed him. For a moment at least. Surely, he didn’t think my papa would murder him. This was more likely just a desperate attempt to keep me from finding out he had a secret family.
Too late, I thought bitterly.
But I was a pushover, so I called him back to leave a message and put him out of his misery, only to realize I had no bars. I raised my phone in the air, turned it upside down—all the tricks—and nothing. My cell was supposed to work in Moscow, but I didn’t know service would be this unreliable.
With a sigh, I slid my phone into my coat pocket. Then, looking up, I stopped. My shoes crunched on gravel as I turned in a slow circle. The sun had fallen, more than half of it hiding behind the horizon. Only a crumbling apartment complex and a few concrete buildings surrounded me.
I was completely lost.
Fighting the shiver that rolled through me, I started to walk.
The wind whistled.
The shadows grew darker.
And I suddenly missed Ivan very badly.
A crawling sensation stroked the back of my neck and slid down my spine. It was the feeling of being watched. I gripped my bag tighter, fighting the urge to look behind me, but the suspense turned into an anxiety that tightened my lungs, and I couldn’t resist the pull anymore.
A man—undoubtedly, by the size and swagger—followed me. He wore jeans and a dark coat, and his eyes held steady on the black driving gloves he was pulling on, though I somehow knew I had his full attention.
I turned my head forward, my chest cold.
A gust of wind whipped at my ponytail, and with it, one word rode through my mind on a whisper that sounded like a pitch-black room and goose-bumped skin.
D’yavol.
I glanced behind me. He drew closer with every step, his strides much longer than mine. Only a few yards away now, I could see a jagged scar slashed across his face, from ear to jaw. The last ray of sunlight glinted on a silver knife in his hand.
Facing forward again, my breath escaped in pants, misting in front of my face, while my blood froze to solid ice. When parked cars and light from the windows of a building came into view, I dropped my bag and ran.
My long legs had always put me at the front of the pack during cheer practice in high school, but the footsteps hitting concrete behind me now were close on my heels. I wasn’t going to make it to the front door, so I changed course for the back and prayed it wasn’t locked.
Please, don’t be locked.
I came to a halt in front of the door, and in an instant, one of those black riding gloves wrapped around my ponytail and pulled. I cried out in pain as I went flying backward. My head hit the pavement, and a kaleidoscope of lights flickered behind my eyes.