THE GATEKEEPER

I make it three steps before he catches me by the throat. He lifts me from my feet, cutting off my breath. "One snap of this delicate neck would end your life," he warns.

I know it's a bluff because he sets me back on my feet and restores my breath before I even see stars.

"You're testing my patience, Valkiriya." In a series of swift moments, he pins my hands back behind my back-the position that makes my arms scream-and secures my wrists with a plastic zip tie. "I like to wrestle with you, but I desire a little more cooperation."

"We don't always get what we desire, do we?" I snark.

"Ah, but this time, I think I will."

I ponder those words as he propels me back to the chair.

I dig my heels in. "No."

The thought of returning to that particular prison makes me balk, but he pushes me back down and tapes my thighs down to the seat.

"You see? You could be lying in a soft bed right now. Instead, you chose to make things hard."

I grit my teeth and glare, but he disappears from my sight. I hear him in the kitchen and when he returns, he brings more ice for my head and a glass of water that he presses to my lips. I drink deeply, thirsty from going all morning without anything to drink.

Maykl stands and holds the ice pack to the new bruise on my head. He doesn't attempt conversation. He doesn't seem angry or vengeful. Simply watchful.

It's not until my eyelids start to droop and a deep relaxation washes over my limbs that I realize I've been drugged.

Maykl

My little warrior, fighting at every turn.

I watched her knock herself out tipping the chair over and nearly broke a leg sprinting up the steps to get to her. Thank God, she doesn't seem too badly injured.

I'll have to think of some other solution for keeping her prisoner. Something relatively comfortable but secure.

The fact that she's naked now is doing screwy thing to my brain, though. I cut her free from the chair. I'm going to have to get a new roll of duct tape if I keep this up much longer. I throw her over my shoulder to carry my Valkyrie into the bedroom and lay her on the bed. She's awake but clearly drugged. Her body is limp, her gaze unfocused and glassy.

"What did you give me?" she mumbles.

"Truth serum." I cut her wrists free and rearrange her into a comfortable position on her side. I forgot to turn my heat up, so I pull the covers around her now and then sit beside her, brushing the cornsilk of her hair from her face. "What is your name?"

"You already know it," she mutters. "I'm Kira Koslova."

Who sent you, Kira? The politsiya?"

Her brows knit. "I sent myself," she mumbles.

"Why?"

She appears to be fighting the drug. She rolls her head to one side and the other.

I stroke her cheek. "Shh. Relax. The truth will set us all free, Kira Koslova. Why are you here?"

"To find my nephew."

"What were you looking for in the desk?"

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"Information."

"Why not ask?"

"I...don't...trust bratva."

As I suspected. "What do you know about the bratva?"

She shakes her head. "Hate...bratva."

"Because of Anya?"

"Yes. And the brava killed my father."

I barely keep the groan from my lips. This revelation physically pains me. All these years I've been haunted by my actions. That I executed a man without knowing a thing about him. That he had two daughters.

I was thirteen years old, and they told me to shoot. I did as I was told. It's no excuse. There's no forgiveness. Ravil has said we wear the tattoos on our skin as reminders of our sin.

That we are not clean. We are marked by the violence, blood, and death that has been wrought in the name of the bratva.

He does not seem to relish the markings on his skin like most bratva leaders. It's more like a weight he requires himself to carry. I've appreciated his take on it because killing never came easily to me.

I don't sleep at night without being haunted by the faces of the men I've ended.

Particularly my first-Grigor Koslov.

Somehow, though, I manage not to show anything to Kira.

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"Who killed your father?" I ask. She didn't accuse me of the execution. But did she come here looking for me?

"I told you: bratva. He owed them money. First, they took my sister. They made her work off his debt and left her pregnant with Mika. Then he angered them again. I don't know how. All I know is that of our two parents, he was the one who cared, and the bratva took him."

I manage to keep my breath steady and even, though inside a restless wind has whipped into a frenzy.

I killed this beautiful woman's father. Left her orphaned. With a sister impregnated by men from my cell.

I don't remember her sister-it must have been before my initiation.

Of course, her father had offered Anya's body up as payment. He'd offered Kira's, too. So, I guess considering that I'm almost glad the bratva didn't accept his offer. I would hate for Kira to have suffered the same way her sister did. Still, she lost a parent at my hands.

"I'm sorry."

"My sister never recovered. She became an addict. I helped raise my nephew, but she took him with her when she moved to America with her bratva boyfriend." "Who was her boyfriend?"

"Aleksi."

"There is no Aleksi here. You have the wrong cell-I told you that before. You didn't believe me?"

"He's dead. Now, so is Anya." Kira flops a hand across her eyes and her lips tremble. "It's my fault. I should have come to find him sooner."

My chest aches with her pain. I want to take it away. To hunt this boy down for her. Unbreak her heart.

"Kira." I lift the hand away from her eyes. "He's not here. I wasn't lying."

She shakes her head. "I don't trust bratva."