"Who told you—-"
"Dmitry. Dmitry Adrianov."
And I felt my world start to crumble.
Again.
If this continued, Dmitry would soon overtake my dad's record, and he'd win first place for the number of times he made my life hell.
"H-How do you know him?"
Thomas let out a hollow laugh. "Shouldn't I be the one asking you that?"
"Just tell me." My voice shook. "Please."
"His sister," Thomas said tiredly.
"Paige?"
"That's her real name, but the men I do business with...they listed her name as something else. Told me she used to be the woman of some arms dealer but was let loose when she double-crossed her lover."
"And of course," I said dully, "you didn't bother to check if their story was true." He never did. It was why Thomas kept insisting he hadn't done anything wrong. He had paid in good faith. Purchased lives of people who had hurt other people.
And yet...
His journals said otherwise. In them, his own truth came out to damn him. He had written frequently of how some of the subjects passed on to his "care" didn't seem to match the profiles he was provided. But in the end, he had chosen to be blind, deaf, and dumb to all the clues around him. And because of that—-
"I'm just glad you're alive," Thomas said.
But I'm not.
"When he told me he had avenged his sister's death by killing you—-"
He had.
"I was terrified. I didn't know...I don't know what I'd do—-"
He might not, but I did.
Because now...everything was suddenly clear.
Painfully, devastatingly clear.
"I love you, Dad."
I heard Thomas inhale sharply from the other end of the line.
"I tried to stop loving you after finding out what you've done, but I couldn't. And now I realize...I don't want to."
Thomas started to weep.
"But Daddy...I need you to do something for me."
"Anything—-"
"If you really love me, and you want us to be a family again—-"
And now, I was weeping, too.
"I need you to do one thing."
"Anything, baby girl."
"The last day of your trial's coming up soon—-" Oh God. Tears rushed down my cheeks, and I could barely hear myself over my sobs. "—-and I want you to tell the court you're guilty."
Thomas' furious breath hissed down the line, and the sound ripped my heart open.
"Are you fucking serious—-"
"I just want you to be the Daddy I grew up with," I whispered.
"And you can't have that if I'm not behind bars?" Thomas demanded.
"No," I sobbed out. "I can't."
"I can't fucking believe this—-"
"I love you, and I know Mom still loves you. I want you..." My voice broke. "I want you to be with Mom and me in Heaven. So please, Daddy—-"
"It's too late," Thomas bit out.
"It's never too late," I said fiercely. "And I don't care what others think or say. It's never too late, so please. Please." My fingers tightened around the old-fashioned handset of Keagan's telephone. "Please, Daddy. Do it for me. For Mom. For yourself. I want you b-back in my life—-" Another sob crawled out of my throat. "I love you, Daddy, so please—-"
"It's too fucking late," Thomas gritted out, "and it's time you accepted that."
The phone went dead.
God.
Oh God.
What was it with these men I loved...that they were just so good at killing me over and over again?
Chapter Fifteen
Dmitry and Sasha were seated at the very back of the courtroom, and even with over a dozen rows between them and the front, he knew—-
The moment he walked inside the courtroom, he had known right away.
Tahey.
Since she had never attended any of her father's hearings, her presence came completely unexpected, and for one long moment, all Dmitry was able to do was stare at her.
Tahey.
It had only been a month since he last saw her. Since that day he had walked out on her and had security throw her out. But in that one month, she had lost an alarming amount of weight, and Dmitry had to clench his fists against the urge to get up from his seat so he could take her in his arms—-
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
He had tried his damnedest to forget her. Thrown himself at work. Drowned himself in alcohol. And when none of it worked, he had gotten himself personally involved in some of Strakh Inc.'s covert operations, risking his own bloody neck when he could've simply done the usual and hired mercenaries to do the job.
Sasha had called Dmitry a fool a thousand times over upon finding his older brother back in the emergency room for the third time in a week, and Sasha was also the one who had called the other members for a vote.
According to Sasha, Dmitry in his current frame of mind would jeopardize the entire operation if he was allowed to continue participating in such a manner, and the other men agreed.
The fact that he had been outvoted still rankled a bit, and while the memory had Dmitry pissed for so many days now, everything about it suddenly became insignificant. Just fucking downright shallow, when compared to what his Tahey must be going through right now—-
His lips twisted at the way his mind slipped now and then.
His Tahey.
It was insanity to still think of her in such terms. And where his honor was concerned, such thoughts were yet another form of betrayal to Paige's memory.
Her father was the man who had killed Paige.
Paige, who - after years of abuse in a prison camp ran by terrorists - had finally made her escape, only to be abducted against her will by human traffickers and sold to Thomas as a test subject for his experiments.
Paige was dead, and there was no getting her back, while Thomas...
Thomas would walk away free.
TALL. HANDSOME. Dignified. That was how they always described him, then and now. And once upon a time, when people thought of Thomas Baskerville, they thought him kind. They thought him the man who could save the world.
But it wasn't like that now.
It stopped being like that the moment his hands became red with the blood of
