Chapter Eleven
Dimitri opened his eyes. It was pitch black in his bedroom and he had no notion of what time it was. He only knew that something had awakened him. The sound of Toni’s deep even breaths were comforting. She was curled up against his side as he slept on his back. He put his arm around her and felt an overwhelming sense of contentment steal over him.
“Dimitri.”
The low voice was coming from the doorway and it belonged to Anatoli. Dimitri struggled to sit up without disturbing Toni’s peaceful slumber. He extracted himself from her warm, naked body. It was in his mind to deck Anatoli, shove him back out into the hallway, and then just get back in bed. Unfortunately his brother was not the type of problem to simply work itself out.
Dimitri stepped into the hallway and glared at Anatoli. “This had better be important.”
“You might want to get dressed.” Anatoli raised an eyebrow. “I don’t think you want our guest to see you naked.”
“Guest?”
“Yes.” Now Anatoli was looking rather smug. That was enough to let Dimitri know that whatever was going on was probably going to be classified as a disaster.
“Did you and Ivan stick with the plan this evening?” Dimitri didn’t even bother to hide the suspicion in his voice.
“Yes. We tailed Rustikov to a club and then made sure he didn’t go home with a woman.”
“Okay. Then I can’t imagine what you would need my assistance with.” Dimitri turned to go back into his bedroom.
Anatoli grabbed his arm. “Just get some damn clothes on. Do what I ask for once. All right?”
The fervent tone filled Dimitri with foreboding. He slipped back into his bedroom and fumbled about in the dark for a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. His boots were where he’d left them on the floor. He scooped them up and went back out into the hallway.
“Who’s in there with you?” Anatoli asked with interest. He attempted to peer around Dimitri’s shoulders to have a look inside the room. “Did you go out last night and pick up a nice piece of ass? You know it’s way past time to kick her out of your bed. You want me to take care of it?”
“This is not up for discussion, and no. I don’t need your help.” Dimitri shoved his feet into his boots and started walking. Halfway down the hall he had to turn around and give his younger brother a pointed glance. “You said it was important. Are you coming or not?”
“Right. Let’s go. Ivan is waiting in the basement.” Anatoli closed the distance between them in a few strides and led the way.
TONI WAS GROGGY, but not so out of it that she couldn’t hear Anatoli’s assertion that whatever was happening was going on in the basement. She sat up in bed and rubbed her eyes. She threw back the covers and swung her legs over the side of the mattress. She was pleasantly sore and tingly. Really she just wanted to go back to bed, but this was a chance to get into the basement and see what the Alkaevs were hiding. Not only that, but whatever would get Dimitri out of bed at three in the morning was probably worth checking into.
She pulled on her clothes, yawning as she did. Then she headed off down the hallway. The house was still and silent. The only light was in the hallway. The kitchen was dark, and the back door was unlocked. She slipped outside. Carefully closing the door behind her, she made certain it gave a little click before she headed down the stairs. The first flight of steps put her on the ground level beneath the portico. Next she turned and headed beneath the brick and stone staircase. These subterranean stairs led to a set of double doors.
Toni held her breath as she reached for the handle. They had been locked every other time she’d tried to get in here. Now though, she turned the knob and gently tugged the doors open. They gave a squeak but there was nobody around to hear it. Slipping into the dimly lit, low ceilinged hallway, she eased the doors shut behind her.
She was inside what she had privately started to think of as the Alkaevs’ inner sanctum. She passed an open door on the right and saw a desk, chairs, and bookshelves, all covered in a bit of clutter. Obviously this was where Dimitri had his office. It was really quite brilliant. It left the main portion of the house evidence free in case anyone unexpected should come along.
On the opposite side of the hallway she saw a conference room. There was a space that looked like a billiard room with the looming black shape of a massive pool table. She realized there was a bright light coming from the opposite end of the hallway. As much as she wanted to explore these rooms, she needed to find out what was going on first.
She crept forward, barely breathing as she approached. Finally she heard voices. Dimitri sounded angry, Anatoli sounded petulant, and there was another voice that was eerily familiar although she could not imagine what the owner of that voice would be doing here of all places.
“I’m sick of your inability to take action!” Anatoli said irritably. “This whole process will take years if we continue at this rate!”
Dimitri didn’t back down. “If years is what it takes to do things right, without incurring the wrath of any of the other families, then that’s what we do.”
Toni peeked around the corner and found herself looking at a long, low room with narrow windows high up near the ceiling and tile covering both the floor, and walls. There appeared to be a floor grate in one corner with a hose neatly rolled up beside it. The sight of it gave Toni stomach cramps. Was this a torture chamber?
Her attention was drawn to the man sitting in a chair. He’d been placed dead center of the room, his hands and feet bound. His head was bowed, but she would have recognized him anywhere. It was her father.
DIMITRI KNEW HE was in danger of losing his temper. He was having visions of releasing Rustikov and then tying Anatoli to the chair and beating some sense into him. What was his brother thinking?
“Did you come up with this idea?” he asked Anatoli. “Because it reeks of Ivan’s interference.” Dimitri cast a glance at his enforcer. Ivan was leaning insolently against the wall, looking bored. “I would expect Ivan to jump the gun on something like this, but I thought you had better sense.”
“You said yourself that the Kabalevskys don’t give a shit about this man!” Anatoli insisted. “Who cares what we do to him. I want to know why he disrespected my sister.”
“And you think that Katya would thank you for this choice you’ve made?” Dimitri asked quietly. “Our sister who would never condone hurting a man she once loved?”
“Who cares?” Anatoli snarled. He began walking in circles, waving his hands wildly. “She’s a woman! You know that women are weak and cannot make a good decision when it comes to business!”
“I have to disagree.” Dimitri pushed his fingers through his hair. He now had a bruised and slightly battered Boris Rustikov in his basement while the man’s daughter was asleep upstairs in Dimitri’s bed. There were so many problems with this situation that he didn’t know where to begin.
“Kill him,” Ivan proposed in a lazy, disinterested tone. “Kill him and dump his body in the river. Katya will be avenged, and nobody will be any wiser. It isn’t as if there’s anyone who would miss the man.”
Dimitri saw Boris stir. He was obviously conscious even though he was pretending to be out of it. Dimitri strode forward and grabbed the man by his stringy, thinning hair. Yanking his head back, Dimitri gazed into his face. Both his eyes were going to be black, and his lip was split and bleeding. He looked like hell, but that didn’t really matter. He was alive.
“What do you have to say for yourself?” Dimitri asked in Russian. “Do you know why you are here?”
“Because you are a coward?” Boris said thickly. His tongue appeared to be swollen as though he had bit it during the beating. “You are a coward and a bastard and you will rot in hell!”
“Actually, I am not a bastard,” Dimitri said calmly. “However you sired a bastard on my sister. Do you have anything to say for yourself? You left her in that condition, refused to see her again, and discarded her like garbage!”
“And now my brother is doing the exact same thing to your precious daughter!” Anatoli said with glee.
Dimitri turned his head so fast his neck nearly spun all the way around. How dare Anatoli say something like that? What was wrong with him?
Boris looked shocked. “You have my daughter? You know where she is? Is she safe? What have you done to her?”
Anatoli minced forward like some demented movie villain. “She’s here in our home, you piece of shit! We’re fucking her and defiling her every night. She’s a whore to every Alkaev in the house. Are you satisfied? We’ve taken everything from you as you took everything from our sister. Now you are nothing, just like your daughter.”
TONI PRESSED HER hands over her mouth to stifle the scream that wanted to erupt. Defiled? Whore? Was that really how Dimitri saw her? It was an awful thing to say to a father, no matter what Boris Rustikov had done to them. Tears stung her eyes and she wondered if shame could stain the soul.
She turned around and made her way back down the hallway toward the entrance. She didn’t care about looking through the office anymore, or discovering any juicy tidbits about Dimitri. If this was how he played the game, she didn’t care if he won. She didn’t care what happened at all.
Out the door, letting it close behind her. Up the stairs and into the house she went. Fear for her father’s safety was tempered by the knowledge that any concern he’d showed for her safety. He had used Toni and her mother all of Toni’s life. Chances were that if she went home, he’d just use her again. Although at least if she went home, she wouldn’t have to look Dimitri in the face again and know that he had only slept with her because of some elaborate revenge plot against her father.
Toni didn’t go back to Dimitri’s bedroom. She went upstairs to her own room. Then she had the thought that it wasn’t her room at all. It was just a place within Dimitri’s home where he had put her in order to give her the illusion of importance.
Sinking down onto the stairs, Toni put her hands over her face and tried to seek her inner calm. None of this mattered. Yes. She had been well on her way to falling in love with Dimitri. Maybe that was part of his plan, but it didn’t matter anymore. She was still Antonina Rustikov. She was a Kabalevsky. She had her own money and her own life and maybe it was time for her to figure out what she wanted to do with it all. She was wasting her time here. Perhaps it was really time to go home. Or at least to figure out where home was.