Afternoon of day seventeen…

That afternoon, Jasha flings open the door and tells me to go to the dining room. I sit up, shaky and exhausted, and allow myself to hope. I dress as quickly as I can, pulling on a black rayon maxi-dress that floats around my ankles. I frantically pat on makeup, then put on a scarf. I look like a train wreck, but it will have to do.

I hurry in, eager to see my cousins and Lukas. I want to reassure my cousins that this will all be over soon. I want to introduce them to Lukas, and I want to tell him that I didn’t abandon him.

I hurry down the hall after Jasha, humming to myself.

When we walk into the dining room, my heart plummets.

The room is empty, and there is one platter sitting there at the head of the table.

So that’s how he’s playing this. Motherfucker.

I swallow my rage and sit down. I force myself to eat most of the blini and sausages. I need to keep my strength up.

I glare at Jasha as I stand up. “Your employer is a subhuman piece of crap. The world will be a better place when he dies. Please tell him I said that.”

Genuine anger sparks in his eyes. He actually cares about Sergei. What the hell did Sergei do to inspire that in anybody?

“Careful.” He grinds out the word.

I throw my arms out wide. “You want to hit me? Come at me, bro. That’s what you cowardly little bitches do to make yourselves feel like real men, don’t you?” I barely recognize myself these days. Who is the wild woman shouting out these words?

He moves toward me, and I am afraid, but only in the way one feels when the roller coaster cart is at the very top of the tracks, about to plunge down.

“I’m waiting,” I snap.

Something flickers in his gaze, and he takes a step back. And I know why. Sergei wouldn’t want him to hit me, so he won’t. If I tried to attack him or escape, I’m sure he wouldn’t hesitate to hit me, but he’s not going to smack me around just for the fun of it.

He points at the door. “Out.”

When I go back to my room, there are a few of Sergei’s men in there, removing the broken furniture. One of them is Jon.

As he walks by me, he slips something into my hand. He flicks his gaze upward and whispers, “Closet.”

I get the message. There are cameras everywhere in here except the closet.

I wait until all the men are gone, then I go into the walk-in closet. It’s as big as a small bedroom, hung with all the clothes that Sergei bought for me; the old stuff that my uncle bought for me has been removed by Sergei’s men.

Even as he’s pushing me away, he has to control me, down to the clothing that drapes my body. He’s still touching me, caressing my skin, clinging to me, even when he’s not there.

I unfold the little piece of paper that Jon gave me. It has a smiley face drawn by Helenka – I know, because she made little hearts for eyes. And Yuri drew a picture of a mouth with a tongue sticking out. I start to cry, and smile through my tears at the same time.

This tiny act of defiance on Jon’s part ignites a flare of hope. Maybe he’s planning something. Maybe he’ll rescue us.

But…he’s my uncle’s man, so if he gets us out of here, he’s just delivering us from one hell to another.

Still. An idea starts to form in my mind. An idea I won’t share with anyone.

I lift up the carpet in the back of the closet.

My fake ID is still there, and the pathetic sum of two hundred dollars, and the burner phone that I charge up every so often. And one other thing that I bought a year ago, and which may or may not still be functional.

The fake ID was purchased by my mother. And the reason I have so little money? I’ve always paid for everything with my uncle’s credit cards. The men in the family like to keep the women on a short leash. I wasn’t allowed to get a job. The only way I could get cash was to return some of the clothing and jewelry that I bought. I’d done that for a while and built up almost five thousand dollars, but then my uncle found the stash hidden behind a drawer in my dresser and took every last bit of it. I received quite the tongue-lashing, with words like “ungrateful whore” flung at me.

That was last year. I had just started building up a little cash again when Sergei appeared on the scene, and after that, we were all kept on a very short leash. We were afraid to go anywhere, in case Sergei struck against Vilyat’s family to get at him, and when we went out we were surrounded by bodyguards.

The ID and the stash of money give me the slimmest thread of hope, but in these terrible times, I will cling to that thread like it’s a life-raft.

* * *

Day twenty-one

SERGEI

I haven’t seen Willow in days, and the craving is physically painful.

I am forced to admit a terrible truth to myself. After I raged through the room and opened myself up to her, I felt better than I have in years. Not so much feeling good about myself, but – there was less pain and pressure. It was like lancing an infected wound and letting the poison seep out.

It only lasted for a few minutes. Then she rejected me, turned me away, as she should have. As I made her do.

I wasn’t angry when she rejected me. I was numb.

I know my men are worried about me now. They’ve seen my blackout rages, but they always pass quickly. This has been going on for days. I find myself pacing the floors and talking to myself without noticing it.

To anchor myself, I sit in Vilyat’s office and watch the execution video of Latvi, again and again. Today, Jasha and Maks are with me.

We paid off Latvi’s mistress to kill him. She was happy to do it. Like all the Toporov men, he got his sexual thrills from degrading his women. Not that I’m one to talk.

But he did things to her that turned my stomach. Tied her down and let a dozen of his men violate her in every hole until she bled and passed out, then dumped cold water on her to revive her and started all over again. Pissed on her. Burned her with cigars and cut her with knives in places that wouldn’t show. Her stomach is dotted with raised red circle-scars. He actually carved and burned a tic-tac-toe game into her back.

Why didn’t she run? She has a kid. A one-year-old daughter. Latvi held that over her head, so she stayed, while he killed her by inches. It’s funny what people will do for their kids. Like Willow.

I could do anything to her, and she’d take it, and forgive me like a fool. A sweet, kind, loving fool.

But as soon as I started messing with Lukas and her cousins by keeping her from them, she really, genuinely hated me.

That was what I needed. That was why I did it.

And now I’ll never be able to make her love me.

No. Shut the fuck up. Don’t think about that.

“Sir?” Maks’ voice is startled, and I realize with dismay that I’ve said it out loud.

“Nothing.” I turn back and hit the rewind button for the video.

How ironic. I tried to destroy Willow, and she’s destroyed me instead. She’s won. I am sticking to my decision not to go near her again. Ever.

And I am going to send her family away with her. And she’s going to take my fucking money, as a condition of me letting her family go. She won’t leave without them, and so I will send them along, to get rid of all of them, to finally be free.

I have fake papers printed up for them, and they’ll be able to start a new life. Edik and Vilyat will be dead soon enough, but even then, it will be safer for them all to be anonymous. To be invisible.

I haven’t let her see the kids, and I haven’t told her my plans, because I’m furious with her. Not for rejecting me. For changing me.

She’s made me weak.

It’s petty, it’s stupid, it accomplishes nothing. It makes me hate myself even more. She’s right. I am hurting the kids, for no reason. I make myself sick.

The video starts up, and I watch Latvi wake up shrieking like a woman, in his own bed.

Sarah drugged him, tied him down, and slowly tortured him to death. He screamed for help, but his bodyguards were now on my payroll, so they just stood outside his door and listened. She burned him with a red-hot poker, again and again. Put his eyes out. And finally cut his dick off as the coup de grace.

It took him hours to die. The grin on her face was crazed. I don’t think Sarah’s going to be all right, in the end.

I don’t care.

I am paying for a new face for her, and new identity cards for her and her kid. We’re setting her up half a world away. She’ll be rich. She’ll be safe. After the way those men fucked with her head, I think she’ll self-medicate until she overdoses and dies, but that’s not my problem.

Edik is in hiding now, terrified and furious. Not just with me; with Vilyat. Vilyat has brought this doom down on their family. Edik’s trying to find men who will agree to take out a hit on me, and he’s having a hard time. Edik’s also reaching out to former allies in Russia, trying to get to Vilyat, but since Vilyat’s so much in the public eye these days, he’s not having much luck either.

Darkness crowds the edges of my vision.

I hate feeling hungry more than anything in the world, and the hunger is crawling inside me, chewing at my insides, but it’s not a craving for food. It’s hunger for a woman who is just down the hall from me, and a million miles away at the same time.

“Bring me a drink!” I yell at Maks. I hit the rewind button. I crank up the volume. Best movie I’ve seen in ages.