I hear the adhan, the purr of a city vibrating in the distance.
A gentle breeze swirls around me; I feel humidity on my skin; I inhale the smell of exhaust, and cardamom, and salty sea air …
I am in the one place I never expected to return.
Istanbul.
CHAPTER 58
Blindfolded, disoriented, and with a stiff rope shackling my ankles, it’s difficult to maneuver three flights of stairs. It doesn’t help that his greasy hand is coiled around my wrist, tightening every time I stumble; the cloth in my mouth makes me gag.
He drags me down an echoing hall. The floors are smooth stone; with no rugs to soften the sound, his footsteps march grimly in time to mine.
Ahead, a door creaks open. We walk farther. Abruptly, bony hands shove me onto a seat. My arms are raised behind me and yanked down over the back of the chair. He tightens the cord binding my wrists, effectively straitjacketing me. Then, his footsteps fade.
The room is silent, except for the ticking of my watch.
One hour passes. Two.
The longer I sit, the less scared I become. Hatred burns away my fear.
My mouth grows parched. My skin is dry, cold. I try rocking the chair back and forth, but it is solid wood, heavier than me, and possibly bolted to the floor; it doesn’t budge.
Three hours in, I hear footsteps. They start faintly, but grow louder until the heavy door creaks open and I can hear their conversation.
“… then you have a way out, to avoid detection?” asks an unfamiliar voice. “I don’t want this to—”
“A diversion,” a familiar, repulsive voice answers, “Of course.”
Their footsteps click past me, continuing several meters until stopping.
“Remove her blindfold.” The unfamiliar man is speaking English, but his first language is clearly Russian. “I want to see Sophia Antonovna’s face,” he adds softly.
Sophia Antonovna?
I don’t immediately process that this Russian is talking about me—that Sophia Antonovna’s face is my face. I don’t think of Sophia Antonovna as me, and yet she is me.
I am Sophia Antonovna.
And this man knows.
The dirty cloth is untied from my mouth. I spit it onto my lap. The scarf covering my eyes is yanked off. I blink rapidly, my eyes adjusting to the light.
When the shock of brightness dims, I see two men standing before me. The one farthest away is in the shadow beside an ornate desk, watching me.
But the one near me—eyes full of hatred, bony hands, an unrepentant leer on his face—he chills my bones.
Bekami kneels in front of me and curls his manicured fingers around my thighs. He squeezes; his palm pushing down on the still-tender glass-shard wound from Waterford.
“Finally … you are here, fahişe,” Bekami whispers.
Biting down on my lip, I fight every urge to scream; I fight every muscle in my body to remain still, to not recoil. I can’t be weak. He can’t think I’m weak.
“He wants to see your face.” Bekami leans forward until his mouth is centimeters from mine. His breath smells of yenibahar and black tea; his skin still emanates an overwhelming aroma of Yves Saint Laurent. “But I know your face well … I could draw you in my sleep.”
“You don’t know me at all,” I say viciously.
Bekami slides his hand around the back of my neck and pinches my spine so savagely between his forefinger and thumb I nearly black out.
“I know you’re still the spoiled little girl from nowhere,” he taunts.
I can see every pore on Bekami’s smug, malevolent face, every tiny hair above his sneering lips.
Slowly, I tilt my neck back then ram my head forward. My forehead collides into his face with a hard crunch.
Bekami claps a hand to his nose, stumbling backward. Blood gushes from his nostrils, soaking the collar of his shirt.
His face wrinkles in fury. He lunges for me—
“Izam!” the man obscured behind Bekami snaps.
The man has been leaning against a large mahogany desk with a tumbler in his hand, watching. Now he walks toward us.
Disguising his weathered face is a bushy beard and shoulder-length silver hair. He is wearing an Italian navy wool suit with a waistcoat. His leather shoes are shiny and polished. On his left lapel is a pin of the Russian flag. He looks both lustful and impatient, like he wants something now and also has someplace else to be.
Above us is an old crystal chandelier, and when the Russian steps forward into the light, I inhale sharply.
“You look as though you recognize me.” His lips part, revealing dazzling