Page 201 of Sexting the Pakhan

My voice comes out flat. “Karina. What was the name?”

She answers in a whisper.

“Someone called Lenkov.”

28

RUSLAN

I wakebecause something is wrong.

Not a sound at first. The absence of one.

A house this small has its own breathing. Floorboards settle. Pipes complain. Children murmur in sleep. The wind presses at the glass in thin, irregular fingers. When one part of that stops making sense, I wake.

I open my eyes to darkness and the ache in my leg.

The room is cold. The door is half-open.

I sit up, reach for the gun on the chair, and go still when I see a shape in the living room.

A man.

Tall. Broad. Familiar.

“Stepan,” I say.

He turns at once. “Ruslan.”

I push myself up, ignore the pain in my thigh, and limp out into the living room. He closes the distance fast, and for one brief second it’s simple: my oldest man, found again, alive, here.

We grip each other’s shoulders, then pull into a rough embrace.

“You look like shit,” he mutters.

“I was shot.”

“I heard.”

I let him go and study his face in the low light. Tired. Drawn. Real. Too real for the hour and the cottage and the quiet.

“How did you find me?” I ask.

He opens his mouth.

Then I hear it. A small sound from the bedroom. Not a voice. A scrape.

I turn immediately and look toward the girls’ room.

The door is open wider now. Too wide.

I move before either of us speaks. Fast as I can. My leg protests, but adrenaline has already taken over. I hit the doorway and scan the beds.

Nadia is there, tangled in blankets, asleep on her stomach.

Mila is gone.

The window above the little chest is open. Cold air moves the curtain.