Taste 2021 edition, p.77
Taste: 2021 Edition, page 77
“She has a connection there,” I say. “A friend.”
He considers my statement, which he knows is a lie, but I wait for him to call me on it.
“And the drive?”
“Still nothing.” I stare into the dark abyss of his eyes, wondering if my own blood could really be responsible for my mother’s death. His own sister. But even as I question it, I don’t doubt that he would kill Kat without a second thought. Vasily is only loyal to one thing, and that is his own selfish desires. He may be a Vor, but he won’t hesitate to forsake his beloved brethren if it saves his own skin. Of that, I have no doubt.
“You have disappointed me,” he says without emotion. “I expected this to be taken care of long ago. It has gone on too long, and I can’t afford to spare you any longer. I need you back to work.”
My jaw grinds together as I consider what he has planned. But all I can do is simply nod. It’s what he expects of me. What he has always expected of me.
“What do you need me to do?” I ask.
“You can start by helping Andrei with some cleanup this afternoon.”
My stomach churns as I nod. “Done.”
Vasily dismisses us, and I follow Andrei out onto the street. But when he heads for his car, I shake my head.
“Let’s take mine.”
He hesitates for a moment before getting inside. Typically, I wouldn’t want my car near anything we might be about to encounter, but right now, it’s imperative I have it available at all times. On the off chance that Kat does call me with an emergency, I can dump this moron on a street corner and get to her fast.
Andrei fiddles with my stereo and tries to light up a cigarette while I start the engine, which I quickly pluck out of his hand and toss out the window.
“What the fuck?” he grumbles.
“Not in my car. Where are we going?”
“My place,” he says.
Fucking great. I spend the entirety of the twenty-minute drive to his house wondering what kind of mess he’s left for me this time. Whatever it is, it can’t be good.
My theory is regretfully proven correct when he leads me into his bedroom, and I find a woman still handcuffed to his bedframe. Her face is beaten so badly she’s unidentifiable, and there’s blood spatter clear up to the ceiling. The body is already starting to smell, and it’s obvious this happened some time ago.
“Fucking Christ.” I turn to him with so much repressed rage, it takes all of my willpower not to cave his skull in right now. “What the fuck did you do, Andrei?”
“Things got out of control.” He shrugs. “Nothing I can do about it now.”
I grind my jaw and pace the length of his bedroom. Fuck this shit. Andrei is so goddamned out of control, Vasily has to see it. He has to know there’s no coming back from this. Every time I turn around, he’s destroying something else. Or someone else. The only logical conclusion is to put him down like a rabid dog.
It’s a certainty I feel deep in my gut as I take in the scene before me. I don’t know who she is, but that’s irrelevant. This woman didn’t deserve this. And I’m sure she has a family out there somewhere. People who will wonder what happened to her. Now I have to make her disappear, and they will never find peace in their lives.
“How do you want to do this?” Andrei asks.
He’s too fucking dumb to come up something on his own, and as usual, it’s left up to me. But this time, I couldn’t care less about cleaning this up properly. Bringing some heat down on Vasily can only help me. Any distraction will work in my favor until I can get my shit sorted out. It’s a risk, but right now, it’s one I’m willing to take.
“Go grab the bleach and some gloves,” I tell him.
Andrei disappears into the kitchen, and while he’s doing that, I snap a good fifteen pictures of the scene. Enough that there are identifiers of his bedroom. It’s not a guarantee, but it’s another insurance policy.
When he returns, I strip off my jacket and get to work. Andrei uncuffs her and rolls her up in the bedding while I hold back the urge to vomit all over his bedroom. When he’s done that, I point at the gloves and the bleach and tell him to get to work. He can’t clean for shit, but that’s exactly why it needs to be him.
“What are you going to do with her?” he asks as I start dragging the rolled-up bedding out of his bedroom.
“We’re going to plant a garden. Brighten up the place a little.”
“In the backyard?” He frowns.
“She’s not fucking going anywhere in my car.” I glare at him. “You should have thought of that before you did this.”
He doesn’t say a word, and it’s settled. Vasily never asks what I do with the bodies. He just asks if it’s taken care of. Unless Andrei decides to open his fat trap, there’s a good chance he’ll never know about this sloppily executed job. At least, not until I need him to.
Once I have the body in the kitchen, I open the garage and start digging through the piles of shit Andrei has accumulated over the years. I don’t know why he’s even bothered to keep half of it. There are at least a dozen boxes full of junk that I have to kick out of the way to get to the shovel. And it’s just my fucking luck that one of them rips at the side, scattering the contents all over the concrete floor.
For fuck’s sake.
I kneel and start shoveling the contents back into the box, but as I’m doing that, something catches my eye. At first glance, I don’t know why I pause. Only that it feels familiar. It isn’t until I pick up the small hand-carved trinket box that it comes back to me. The etching on the top is exactly like the one that sat on my mother’s nightstand. But this couldn’t be hers.
Even as I tell myself that, I’m hesitant to open it up. To confirm what I never wanted to believe. Because if it was hers, this would be a betrayal of the worst kind. A betrayal I could never come back from.
The hinges creak as I lift the lid, my lungs frozen as I peer inside at what is undoubtedly my mother’s jewelry. Her rings, a necklace, a bracelet. But I still don’t want to believe it. I can’t accept it until I pop the locket open and see a photograph of our family staring back at me.
I claw at my neck, tugging the collar of my shirt down. I feel like I can’t fucking breathe. What the fuck? How did this get here? How the fuck did this get here?
The echo of Andrei’s footsteps in the house snaps me out of my delirium. Slamming the lid shut, I stuff the wooden box into my pocket and leave the rest of the shit on the floor. When he opens the door to the garage, I have the shovel in my grasp and a wild look in my eye. That I can be sure of.
Andrei gives me a questioning look but seems to disregard my sour mood. “I’m done cleaning. What should I do now?”
I stare at him for a beat too long, considering how bad it would be if I tortured him right here in his garage. If I cut off every one of his goddamn appendages and stuffed them down his own throat before I jammed a knife through his skull. It’s what I would have done. Two weeks ago, before Kat and Josh, I wouldn’t have hesitated. But right now, things need to go smoothly. This needs to be a clean break. And I need to fucking think before I act on my impulses because right now, I just want to beat him until his blood explodes across the ceiling.
“Go to the store and get some plants.” I toss him my car keys. “Whatever the fuck you can find this time of year.”
He nods and heads back for the house. But before he does, I stop him.
“Who was she?” I ask. “The woman in your bed?”
“Just some slut from the club,” he says, confirming my suspicions. While it’s likely that Vasily has already deleted the video of that night, there is a strong possibility there is other surveillance from the street. Something I’m counting on.
“Don’t take too long,” I tell him. “And don’t get any fucking blood in my car.”
He stumbles out the door and leaves me to my thoughts. I just want to get the fuck out of here. I need to check on Kat and Josh, and I need to sort through the facts before I do anything rash. There’s also still the matter of meeting with Alexei this week. The sooner I can get out of this shithole, the better.
I haul the shovel out into the backyard and use my simmering rage as motivation. Three hours later, Andrei has a new garden. A hodgepodge of plants and flowers that will certainly be dead within the week. But for now, it’s enough to satisfy the bare minimum. At least until I can figure out how to destroy this sick bastard for good.
23
Kat
Pasha spends the day trying to keep to the background, but Josh is curious and somehow manages to snare him in a game of hide-and-seek in the afternoon.
I get one text from Lev all day. It’s brief, telling me he’ll miss dinner and that he’ll be home late.
I want to tell him this isn’t home. I feel anxious and the opposite of safe even though this is supposed to be a safe house.
But taking Josh and leaving, I can’t do that. I know that. Not that I’d be able to. I have a feeling Pasha is here to make sure we stay in as much as to keep the bad guys out. The few times I’ve walked to the front door, he’s turned up at my side in an instant, reminding me to stay away from the windows.
I think back to our drive after landing in Baltimore. I felt Lev watching me when he thought I was asleep. Well, I was asleep, and I’m not sure what exactly woke me, but all I can recall was the intensity of how he was looking at me.
And I guess what he said more than once is hitting me.
I’m his.
We’re his.
“Mommy?” Josh looks up at me from where he’s sitting on the floor at my feet. I realize the cartoon has ended, and his eyes are sleepy.
“Time for bed, sweetie,” I tell him, standing.
On cue, Pasha turns the corner, coming toward us to take him.
“I got him,” I say.
He nods, stepping backward, and returns Josh’s sleepy smile. I didn’t realize Russian men were so chivalrous.
Josh lays his head on my shoulder, and I carry him upstairs. I pause when I get to the door of his temporary bedroom. I eye the key in the lock on the outside of the door. Each of the bedrooms and the bathroom in the hallway have that. It’s strange.
But I don’t care about that now. Right now, I’m remembering what Lev said. That Josh sleeping with us was for one night. But I bypass his room and lay him down in our bed.
Our bed.
I shake my head and tuck Josh in.
“Want a story?” I ask, lying down beside him.
He nods, puts one thumb into his mouth—something he only does when he’s very tired—and wraps his other hand around a lock of my hair. He closes his eyes as I start to recite from memory Good Night, Gorilla and can’t help the tear that slides down over the bridge of my nose as I watch him sleep.
They wouldn’t hurt him, would they? Would they hurt a little boy?
I was three when I lost my mom. Will history repeat for Josh? Is alive better than dead if it means foster care and caregivers like the George family?
No. Alive is always better than dead.
I slip my hair out of his hand and climb out of the bed, wiping the stray tears. From our duffel which I’d laid on a chair when we arrived, I find my scarf. I dig it out and inhale the smoke smell that still clings to it.
I go to the bathroom and lock the door. Filling the sink with warm water, I set about cleaning the scarf, draining the dirty water several times until it finally runs clear.
I think about Nina as I wash her blood away. And I think about Joshua, about when he gave me the scarf, as I squeeze the excess water out of it. He’d stolen it. We were at the mall with the Georges, and I’d been looking at it. Mrs. George thought the pink ugly and childish and told me to leave it. I think I may have liked it even more because she hated it.
Later that night, when we were supposed to be asleep, Joshua snuck into my room and gave it to me. I still remember how surprised I’d been. How happy. I don’t think I’d ever hugged anyone as hard as I hugged him that night. Over a simple scarf. It just felt like so much more at that moment. It felt good to know that someone cared about me.
When I open the bathroom door, I stop dead, my heart in my throat to find someone lurking at the bedroom entrance. I almost scream but recognize it’s Lev when he moves into the little bit of light coming in from the streetlamp.
Lev puts his finger to his lips and gestures for me to follow him into the hallway.
I go, and he pulls the bedroom door closed behind us.
“I told you one night,” he says. “He should sleep in his room.”
His hair’s wet, and he smells soapy. “That’s not his room. This isn’t his house. Did you just shower?”
He takes my arm, walks me into the second bedroom, and closes the door. The only light here is that from the moon coming through the split between the curtain panels.
“Where did you shower?” I ask.
“At the club.”
“You went to Delirium? Why?”
“Because I have to play nice with Vasily until I get things sorted.”
“Is that smart? Or safe?”
He studies me, considering, and it’s that moment he takes before he answers me that makes me anxious. “It’s fine. What are you doing with that?”
I look down. “Oh. I was washing it.” I look around, then go to the radiator and stretch the scarf out over it to let it dry.
When I turn back to him, he’s still watching me, and there’s something both intense and distracted in his eyes. It’s unnerving.
“What is it? Did something happen?”
He runs his hand through his still wet hair and comes to me. He takes my hand and walks backward to the bed. There, he cups the back of my head and kisses me. It’s a gentle kiss, not hurried, not even erotic or at least not frantic with need.
I kiss him back, liking this, liking the warmth of him, the taste of him, the safety of him. I press myself against him and let him hold me. I like his arms around me. I think he can keep us safe. Maybe it’s stupid—one man against the Russian mob—but I think he means what he said. That he’ll kill anyone who tries to hurt Josh or me.
Or die trying.
A chill seeps into my veins, and I shudder.
“Shh.”
I guess I’m crying again because he’s holding me to him, not kissing me anymore, but his hands are moving, and he’s stripping off my clothes. He’s slow, patient, and methodical, and soon, I’m standing naked. He takes my hands and steps backward.
He’s still fully clothed, and when I try to move to strip him, he shakes his head.
“I want to look at you now,” he says.
Instinctively, I want to pull away, to hide myself, but he won’t let me go. Instead, keeping hold of one hand, he reaches to switch on the lamp beside the bed.
“Lev—”
“Quiet.” He has both of my hands again, and this time, he holds me at arm’s length and sits on the edge of the low bed.
I feel exposed. This is different than the other times I’ve been naked with him. This is him looking at me, and it’s somehow more intimate than when he’s inside me.
“Look at me.”
I don’t. I can’t.
“Look at me, Katya.”
Katya. I like when he calls me that. He’s tender when he calls me that.
I look at him, feeling my face flush. He must see it too because he smiles a little and there’s that dimple. I like when he smiles.
But then he shifts his hand up to my forearm and, with eyes still on mine, he feels the bumpy, burned skin with his thumb.
“Tell me about this.”
Fuck.
I swallow, trying to contain the emotion that I force down every time I remember what happened. Remember anything that went on in that house. I keep those memories secured in boxes. It’s where I like them. Where I can keep an eye on them but keep them safely locked away.
“Tell me, Katya.”
A tear slides down my cheek. He doesn’t move to wipe it away and won’t let go of me so I can do it either.
“It was to punish Joshua, I think. And me, I guess, but more him.”
More tears and Lev doesn’t move. His expression doesn’t change.
“I think Mr. George hated him the most. He always made him watch.”
Lev’s thumb stops moving, and his hands tighten on me.
“I don’t think he cared one way or another about me. I could have been anyone.” I pause, remembering. “Mrs. George did this. Joshua only heard it happening. Mr. George was bigger than him. He’d tie Josh up, restrain him somehow, and force him to watch. He wasn’t home when she did this, and she wasn’t strong enough to make Joshua do anything. I think he would have killed her if she hadn’t locked him in his room first.” The words come like a flood now. I don’t even know why or from where. I didn’t realize I remembered all the details like the clicking until the flame took, the sound of paper burning. Fingertips singed. The smell.
God. The smell.
“She found the hole we’d made in the wall in Josh’s room where we kept a diary of sorts. Everything they did to us scratched on any piece of paper we could get our hands on. We were going to expose them one day. She took them all, though, and locked him in his room, and we went downstairs to the kitchen. She turned on the burner.”
Lev’s eyes narrow, harden.
“She made me burn them one by one. I remember the tips of my fingers burning and the smell of it. It’s weird what you remember, isn’t it?”
He doesn’t answer.
“You know what she used to do? They were religious, the Georges. We went to church every Sunday. She had this cross around her neck. It was a hideous thing, old and big. And when she’d watch him hurt us, she’d clutch it in both her hands, and she’d pray.” I feel the rage in my voice when I tell this part. “She’d fucking pray as she watched her husband—”
I stop myself, give a shake of my head.
Lev is watching me. I see rage in his eyes too. Not pity. Thank goodness it’s not pity. His grip on me is harder. I wonder if he’s aware.
