Fuck, he loved that.
“I think…” Viktoria said, her words still light and breathless. “That my brothers want to talk sometime tonight.”
Nope.
Pav barked out a laugh, and in a blink, had Viktoria cradled in his arms before he headed for the hotel bedroom. “They can fucking wait.”
She grinned up at him, pleased and sly. “Okay.”
• • •
Pav stayed close to Viktoria’s back as she drifted farther into the damp, dark room. Walls made of cement, and a floor with cracks deep enough for a rat to live inside, this was not a comfortable cell.
It never would be.
And yet, it was where Vadim found himself. Back at the Compound—a place he’d always called home and made sure everyone knew it belonged to him. Here he was, in the very same chambers that Pav had once stayed in, to care for the men Vadim had put here for various reasons.
Chained, like they had been.
Broken, like they had been.
Terrified … like they had been, too.
Finally, Pav figured Vadim was starting to understand the hell he had put everyone else through in his life. Viktoria edged closer to where her father rested in the corner of the cell, and though she tried to hide it, he could see the way her hands trembled before she stuffed them into her jacket.
He stayed close and yet gave her space.
It’s what she needed.
“Konstantin says the Compound is temporary, Vadim,” Viktoria whispered.
If he heard her, he didn’t acknowledge it. His head didn’t move, and his opened, wide eyes staring blankly at the wall didn’t flicker with movement, either. Pav was able to get regular updates about Vadim and his time here—what of it was left, anyway—and from what he knew, Vadim rarely spoke or stepped out of line.
He just … was.
Dead man walking.
“I chose this for you, if you didn’t know,” Viktoria continued, her fingers coming up to flick a few strands of her blonde hair over her shoulder. “I didn’t want him to kill you, although that’s what he wanted. That’s what everyone wanted for you.”
She wasn’t lying.
It had been a battle.
Somehow, this woman won.
He hoped she kept winning, and that she let him come along for the ride, too. She was amazing. Vicious and strong and beautiful. He was going to spend the rest of his life chasing after her, as long as she let him do it.
“I didn’t want them to kill you because that would have been easy,” Viktoria told her unmoving father, but there was no way he wasn’t hearing her. “Death would have been a gift, and what I really needed was for you to understand and know the pain and fear you caused me, and everyone else.”
Viktoria inched closer, and then crouched down. For the first time, Vadim’s gaze drifted her way. Those dead eyes of his locked on her, and the two of them stared at one another for a long time. Pav might have gone closer just to … be there and make sure the man didn’t try anything.
He didn’t need to.
Vadim couldn’t move far from the wall, and Viktoria had enough space between the two of them. Besides, this was about her, not him. She needed to do this, and he was just here to let her do exactly that.
Nothing else.
“I showed you mercy by asking Konstantin to spare your life,” Viktoria said, brushing her fingers over her jacket to remove any dust that might have been clinging to the fabric from their walk down the dirty hallways. “But you’ll live the rest of your life cold, alone, and without. They won’t beat you—they won’t even look at you. Because you don’t deserve that either, Vadim. You don’t deserve anything, and that’s exactly what I’ve given you now.”
“Poetic, really,” Pav said, more to himself than her.
Because she was right. Everyone had been so quick to deny Viktoria when she’d asked that she be the one to decide Vadim’s punishment. Death was the one thing everyone else wanted, but no, she had something … better.
The vicious ones always did.
She still laughed a bit.
Yeah.
Damn.
He loved her.
So much.
“You deserve to die,” Viktoria said, standing straight but never looking away from her father. “And you will die, eventually, but I get to decide that. You will live the rest of your days wondering when I will decide your time is up. You’ll never know, and you will be so alone and broken and isolated in this dark, cold place—or wherever Konstantin sends you next—that the only thing you’ll wish for is death. Except you’ll have to beg me, Daddy, you’ll have to beg me to let them kill you. Until you gain the courage to do that … well, you can wait while you wonder if today is finally the day I decided you should die.”
She laughed again. “It’s kind of appropriate, if you think about it. You were so quick to teach us that we would have to wait for pain. You taught us that we should love the fear because you were fear … we all correlated fear to a man we were supposed to love. So, it’s your turn, now. Learn to love your fear, Vadim. It’s what you deserve.”
Viktoria stopped at the doorway as she left, tossing a laugh over her shoulder as she added a line to her father that burned even Pavel. “And I was lying, Daddy. You thought we would let you live after everything? Never. Enjoy your place in hell.”
Vadim jerked away from the wall at that statement. They had all known the truth—this would be nothing more than hope to Vadim. This place, and permanent seclusion, to pay for his sins like the monster he was. It would never have worked. It only would have given him hope,
