I wait.
I watch.
I hope for something to happen.
Then she blinks and I gasp with relief.
Her eyes flutter and her head rolls lazily to the side, turning toward me. Her voice is unnervingly quiet. “I…I think something’s…wrong.” Her eyes roll back before jolting back into focus, but the focus is only there for a few moments at a time as she fights a terrifying sleep that threatens to steal her from me.
“Anya,” my voice trembles, “you can’t do this now. We’re almost there. We’ve almost made it.”
My breath catches in my lungs and my eyes threaten to shed tears that have no business being shed—we’re almost there.
We were almost there.
“It’s close,” Anya whispers. She shuts her eyes and blinks out a lonely teardrop that rolls slowly down her cheek. She looks at me with a fierce determination when she opens her blue eyes again. “It’s only another mile, maybe two,” she gasps. “Cut the cord. Take him. And run.”
Cut the cord.
Take him.
And run.
Take him and run.
“No, baby, no. I’m not leaving you here.”
“I think you have to. Please. Go. If they catch you…they’ll take him. They’ll take him and…kill you…and they’ll raise him as their own. Don’t give them that. Don’t let our baby have that fate. Please. Go. I can’t go with you.”
“You can’t go with me? You have to. Anya, you have to.” Agitation reaches my tone. “We’re so close, so goddamn close!”
“I’m…losing a lot of blood, Ezra. Don’t waste time.”
“Baby, no, don’t say that.” My eyes are pulled away, trailing down her gown as I see the crimson life force pour from her, staining her gown, tainting it with gore, soaking the fabric, and spreading endlessly.
I meet her eyes again and her forehead wrinkles as her brow furrows. “I love you, Ezra. You did everything you could.”
My face scrunches in anger and my heart thumps wildly. “Don’t fucking tell me goodbye!”
She smiles at me, though I scream at her. “Mine?”
I shake my head furiously, emotion building pressure behind my eyes. “No. Don’t.”
Her eyes beg me. “Please…”
How can I deny her?
My head drops and I look at the tiny baby boy in my arms. Only his face is visible peeking out through the blanket, his skin streaked with blood. His screaming has slowed to squeaks and brief shouts of protest against the cold. Just as I look at him, he starts to blink his eyes open. I wish I could see the color of them, but we only have the residual lighting from the headlights of the overturned car and the bit of moonlight shining from up above. Still, it’s as though I can see his entire life there in his tiny baby eyes.
Anya is bleeding.
She’s not okay.
She can’t run with me and I can’t carry her.
Fuck. I can’t carry her.
Overwhelming sadness shakes me from deep within my chest and I sob. I sob over Anya as she fades away from me.
“Yours,” I choke out the word. “Always.”
She gives me a sad smile and her tears fall with mine. “No regrets, Ezra.”
I lose myself.
Bending over her, with the baby in my arms, I cry. I cry like I’ve never cried before.
I cry until Anya is quiet.
Until I feel the essence of her fade.
Until she shuts her eyes and turns her head away.
Until she’s still.
A disturbing silence wraps around me like a snake, gripping me in its hold. The snow continues to fall in large, soft flakes that drift leisurely to the ground and it’s calm, quiet…as if the whole world has stopped.
Because it has.
But then I hear it…the helicopter nearing.
There’s a snap inside my chest, right over my heart, and it shocks me into action. I can’t save Anya, but I can save her baby. Our baby. I can still end this. I can still come back and seek retribution against the four families for what they’ve done to us.
I set the baby on the ground beside Anya and run to the driver’s side door of the car. Kostya is lying awkwardly on the roof, unmoving. I don’t know whether he’s dead or alive, but there’s no time for me to wonder. I feel a stab of regret in my gut that I might be leaving him to die, knowing I’ll never get the chance to thank him.
I reach around him to the center console where I remember seeing him put his gun, a knife, and a stun gun. I pop it open and the items I’m searching for fall out onto the roof beside Kostya. I grab the knife.
The sound of the helicopter is drawing nearer. I spot the black backpack we brought with cash and Kostya’s credit card lodged in the passenger seat. I stretch, reaching farther across the console as the baby starts to cry, his protests echoing loudly into the night. I grab the strap of the bag and yank until it falls free.
I take the backpack and the knife and hurry back to Anya’s side. I swallow hard, steeling myself before I use the knife to slice into the thick umbilical cord. I cut the tether and it’s like slicing through my own fucking soul and leaving half of it behind.
I don’t want to look at her.
I’m afraid that if I look it her, I won’t be able to leave. I’ll stay here and wait to be found and killed. They’ll take the baby and he’ll become the future Mikhailov Head of House.
I can’t let that happen.
I toss the knife inside the backpack, sling it snugly over both shoulders, and slip my hands beneath the baby, repositioning the blanket to ensure he’s covered well and protected from the cold.
I start to push to my feet, but I feel rooted to the spot.
How can I leave her?
How can I leave my blue-eyed girl behind?
She’s asleep, unconscious…no awareness of whether I’m here or gone. Blood continues to spread across her gown, a slowly creeping darkness telling the tragedy of the life she was forced to live, reminding me that I’m powerless to help her. But I don’t know if I can pull hard enough, fast enough, to yank myself free of the hold she has on me. My breath hitches and I let myself sob, let myself have one last look at her.
My blue-eyed girl.
I bend over her, pressing a kiss to her lips that are somehow still soft and warm.
They did this to her.
They did this to us.