My eyes narrowed on this blond woman, and I found myself laughing incredulously. “I was shot and almost died, trapped underneath my dead family, feeling their flesh turn cold as their blood seeped into my skin. My twin brothers were stolen and tested upon like animals. I have just found out my much-loved elder brother Anri died in an underground death match, and I have been in hiding for twenty years to escape our enemies who were still hunting me when my body wasn’t found!”
My anger wrapped around me, and I added in a cold voice, “I was eventually told Zaal had survived after I’d long given up hope that anyone else in my family was alive. For the first time ever, I no longer felt alone in the world, only to seek him out and be kidnapped and tortured for days—”
My words cut off when the last of the heaviness finally cleared and a pair of blue eyes engulfed my mind. Shaved black hair and maps of raised scars on a roughly handsome face. The most prominent scar stretched from his temple to his chest. A face like that nightmare should have brought fear; instead it brought me peace. It brought me warmth.
My heart beat wildly as the events of recent weeks came flooding back with the force of a tidal wave: the Mistress, the collar being reattached to Valentin’s neck, the Mistress ordering him to kill Zaal … then she brought the drugs to me. She’d wanted me to die through the drugs.
I snapped my eyes to my arms; needle marks were still prominent on my skin. “Valentin.” I whispered the scarred man’s name aloud and ice ran down my spine.
I confronted Zaal and demanded, “Where’s Valentin?” My body began to shake at not having him by my side. I fired off questions: “Did he survive? Did she kill him?”
Zaal’s hands fisted at his sides, but he refused to speak.
“He died?” I whispered. A new kind of heartbreak shattered in my chest. The kind that was impossible to endure.
“He’s alive,” Luka Tolstoi informed me, drawing my attention to him.
“Where is he?” I demanded. “I have to see him. Is he okay?”
Luka glanced to Zaal. I followed his lead to stare at my brother. His huge body was radiating red-hot rage. “He tortured you,” Zaal said coldly. “He hurt you.”
“Yes,” I replied. “The woman forced him to wear a collar that made him hurt me. But we fell in love despite our awful situation. We fell in love and he tried to save me.” I narrowed my eyes. “He tried to save you, too. He’s a killer, one that never fails, and he was sent for you. His love for me stopped him from carrying out the hit on you, didn’t it?” I could feel that was the truth.
“You fell in love with your captor?” Zaal snarled. “He tortured you and you fell in love? The male is evil, Zoya, too far gone. You can see the killer in his eyes. And you fell in love? Do you hear how messed up that sounds?”
I stepped up to my brother, his Russian fiancée moving aside. Meeting my brother’s huge chest, I peered up and said, “Do not judge me. You do not know how it is between us. You do not know me, Zaal. You do not know me as I am now, and you do not know Valentin. You do not know what that woman did to him and his sister.”
“His sister has been taken. The woman who was his captor sent her to her brother in Georgia. The Blood Pit.” Talia spoke from Zaal’s side. Tears dropped down my face on my hearing this information.
“Does Valentin know?” I asked Zaal, not Talia, my heart tearing at the thought of Valentin alone, no one to comfort him, to hold him, to share his pain. Inessa being gone would destroy him. My chest constricted at the sheer amount of pain he must be in.
“Take me to him,” I whispered, unable to speak out with all of this confusion in my heart.
“He’s in our cells,” Talia answered again. My eyes met my brother’s. My stare burned through him. I was talking to him.
“Cells?” I questioned coldly.
Zaal raised his chin. “I saw the video of him hurting you at the Mistress’s mansion. I saw him hurting you, torturing you, making you scream. Fuck, Zoya! He was breaking you!”
Realization hit. “You harmed him. You punished him for hurting me.” Zaal’s silence told me all I needed to know. “Take me to him!” I commanded. Zaal remained unmoving. A twinge of nostalgia twisted in my stomach. This Zaal I knew. The one fiercely protective of his little sister. The big brother who would never let me be harmed.
My Georgian warrior.
I held his stare, refusing to back down. Zaal never moved.
Surprising me, Luka’s wife moved behind me and, with her hand on my shoulder, quietly said, “I’ll take Zoya to Valentin.”
Her husband frowned at her, but she waved her hand in dismissal. She addressed Talia. “Tal, get Zoya some of your clothes—jeans, sweater, boots. They should fit well enough.” Talia looked at me with sad eyes. She seemed to want to say something to me, but she held back and quickly left the room. Part of me felt guilty seeing the desperation written on her pretty face, but I just couldn’t handle all this right now.
Kisa moved beside me and said, “Let’s go to the guest room, Zoya. My car will take us to Valentin, after you dress.”
Thankful for someone taking the lead, I followed her out of the room. Zaal took hold of my arm as I passed. “Zoya,” he whispered brokenly, almost breaking my resolve. “Please…”
Almost.
Confused to hell with my current reality, with the stream of revelations, I sighed and pulled my arm free. “I dreamed what this day would be like since I woke up, age five, alone and scared in Georgia. Avto was by my side telling me everyone I loved was gone.” I fought back the sting in my chest at the memory and said, “What was said earlier was right, Zaal. You’re not the brother I remember, and I’m not the sister you remember. Maybe I was naive to believe that after all these years we could be anything other than strangers.” I walked off before I broke down into his familiar arms. I winced when I heard him calling my name. I didn’t turn around. I couldn’t.
I just needed to see Valentin.
Talia passed Kisa and me in the hallway. She stopped and stated, “I’ve left the clothes on your bed, Zoya. It’s cold, so I’ve put a coat out for you.”
I kept walking, unable to talk to the woman right now. The pain was too much. This was all too overwhelming. I heard her sigh in defeat and enter the room where I’d left my brother. I almost stopped and ran back, freely forgiving him for finding love with the enemy. Because he had found love after all the pain. But a stubbornness and a sense of family pride kept my feet moving. It is peculiar, I thought. I had spent my entire life waiting to run into his arms, but now the opportunity presented itself I found myself running away.
It seemed that this answered prayer came with consequences.
My heart pined to see Valentin, so I dressed quickly. Kisa silently led me to a waiting car. The driver didn’t speak, clearly knowing where to go. The silence was heavy in the secure and private backseat. I glanced to the woman beside me and saw her hands gently running over her raised stomach.
She smiled when she saw me watching her hands. “It’s strange, but I can’t stop touching it.”
Her kind voice set me at ease, and I found myself asking, “How far along are you?”
“Six months,” she said. I could hear the excitement in her voice.
I turned to look out of the window, envious that this woman was so content with her life. Then Kisa said, “I understand why you’re angry, Zoya.” I stiffened, not wanting to hear it, but she pressed on, “I really do. I would never dare patronize or fail to see why you are so angry with Zaal. With Talia. With us all.” I tensed, but she continued, “Our families have had a horrid past; there’s no shying away from this fact. I get that you’re still living it, every single day.”
I looked at Kisa, not knowing what to say. Thankfully, all I saw was openness and understanding in her eyes. Leaning forward, she shifted her body toward me. “I was there when Talia told us she was in love with Zaal. And it wasn’t easy for her, either. She loved her babushka very much, and believe me, Talia hated your father for ordering the death of her dedushka. His widow was the woman Talia deemed to be her best friend. A woman she had not long lost.