Page 3 of Ruthless Sin
I want to look away. I don’t let myself.
My hands are shaking. I hate that they’re shaking. I can’t make them stop. The shirt at my side is soaked through in a way it wasn’t twenty minutes ago, warmth spreading into my waistband, and I keep talking.
“Stop,” I say. “Fucking stop. I’ll tell you whatever you want.”
“Then tell me who you work for.”
The cover holds. The cover has to hold. If it breaks, everyone who matters to me becomes a name he can use.
“No one.” My voice doesn’t sound like mine. “I’m independent. I buy shipping contracts. That’s all.”
“Shipping.” He tilts his head. “And Dmitri’s daughter just decided to trust a Canadian businessman with Bratva intelligence?”
“Jesus Christ.”
“Tell me your real name.”
“Martin Leclerc.”
The blade goes to her throat.
“Your. Real. Name.”
Yelena’s eyes find mine.
No fear in them.
Resolve.
She starts humming.
Quiet, under her breath, a melody I know. I heard it weeks ago in a safehouse, late, both of us half-drunk on bad vodka. She sang it low, eyes closed. Told me about her sister afterward.
Milochka.
I used to sing this to her when she couldn’t sleep.
She’s humming it now.
In this room.
With a blade at her throat.
“What are you doing,” Alexei says.
She doesn’t stop.
“Zamolchi.” Shut up.
She hums louder.
Yelena. No. Yelena, please.
He pulls the knife back and drives it into her throat in one motion.
She stops humming.
Her breath catches, wet and small, and then comes back shallow, bubbling at her throat.
