But this isn’t the kitchen at Red’s.
“The cellar,” Charlie says.
I take in the single round table. It’s small. Two chairs set across from each other. Several more chairs along the wall. A set of handcuffs dangles off the rung of one of the chairs at the wall. Deep red stains the grain of the wooden back and seat.
“If you walk in there, you may not walk out.”
“You have a contact inside?” I ask again, still looking at the shot of the cellar. Memorizing my limited options.
“Yes. But this is more than risky. They own the damn building.”
“We got Scarlett out of that house and that was riskier. My men will be nearby.”
“The cellar exit is sealed,” Matthaeus says, turning the laptop around to point out a photo of the exterior of the building. “Closest exit is the front door.”
“You can’t be thinking to do this,” Charlie says.
“What’s the alternative?” I ask him and he’s quiet. He knows there isn’t one. Petrov needs to die. Period.
“What do you need inside?” he asks.
“You can’t go to the cellar,” Mara says before I can answer. She’s standing barefoot on the edge of the living room, her hair like a white cloud around her, hands at her sides, eyes locked on me. “You won’t come out if you do.”
13
Mara
Dante and Matthaeus both look up at me at the same time. I pull the sleeves of Dante’s sweater down and tuck my hands inside.
“You should go back to bed,” Dante says, getting to his feet.
“I mean it. I know what happens in the cellar.”
“How do you know?”
“I’ve been there. Once. Only for a few minutes.” That was enough.
“Why were you there?”
I shift my gaze to my bare feet. It’s why I’m cold. The floors are so cold here.
“Mara?”
I look back up at him. “There was a soldier once. Samuel. He was…nicer to me than he should have been, I guess.”
Dante and Matthaeus are both watching, and I am aware of the man on the phone or computer that I can’t see.
“He was my friend. Someone saw us holding hands once. It wasn’t anything, he was just...” I shake my head, force the tears back and swallow the lump in my throat. It’s a memory, that lump, with too much emotion balled up inside it. It’s one of the ones that makes it hard to breathe. “He was going to leave. He was going back home. But they didn’t let him go. Petrov had me tell him which hand he held mine with then made me watch when they sawed it off.” I will never forget that night. I look away. “Sometimes, I swear I can still hear that saw work through the bone over his screams.”
“Jesus Christ,” Matthaeus mutters and I give a small shake of my head to clear it.
“They took me out of there after that. I think they killed him then. I never saw him again. This was his,” I say, pulling the sleeve up and showing them a delicate gold bracelet. “He gave it to me and when Petrov found out, he decided to let me keep it. He wasn’t going to at first but then changed his mind. He said it was so I could remember our friendship. But really, it was so I remember what happens to my friends.”
Dante’s jaw is locked so tight I wonder if his teeth will crack. He walks toward me, takes my hand, and pushes the sleeve farther. He touches the thin gold chain.
“Take it off,” he says.
I shake my head.
He looks at me and I remember what he said last night. About the boy Dante being gone. This man now in his place. This man who would destroy my demons.
“The bracelet makes me remember him. Not what they did to him. And I want to remember him.”
He studies me for a long minute then finally nods. I wonder if he’s aware he’s still holding my hand.
“Do you remember Charlie?”
Matthaeus turns the phone around and I look at the face on the screen. The man is older than them, middle-aged, I guess. And he has a patch of gray in his hair. He’s smiling.
“Hello, Mara. It’s good to see you.”
I blink once, twice. Study the man, then shift my gaze up to Dante. I shake my head.
“It’s okay,” he says, and Matthaeus gets up, taking the laptop and the phone into another room.
“I’m hungry,” I tell Dante.
He nods, leads me to the table where I sit down in the same chair as last night. I wince when I do and touch my hip.
Dante doesn’t miss it. “Let me see it.”
“It’s fine. I just have to be more careful.”
“It’s not fine. It’s infected. If the ointment isn’t enough, we’ll need to get you something stronger.”
“You really can’t go to the cellar,” I say, changing topic.
“We’ll discuss the cellar after I get a look at the brand.”