With hands shaking so badly I almost drop the syringe, I draw the plastic into my palm and walk to her bed. I give myself the luxury of just half a minute of looking at my sister’s beautiful, serene face. She looks like a child when she sleeps, so carefree. None of the worry lines that wrinkle her brow show now. Her troubled eyes are mercifully shut. I hope she’s the hero in her dreams, and I hope she has so many more like it.
Years and years.
And I hope she never, ever knows what I’m about to do so she can keep those dreams.
A brief memory of our childhood comes to mind, like I’m watching my life flash before my eyes. The two of us before the accident. Best friends. Holding hands as we went trick-or-treating together. She hated chocolate and I hated sticky things, so we’d always trade when we got back. I can still hear the giggles, still feel her hand in mine, still see her bright, vivid smile.
She’ll smile again one day if I have anything to do with it.
“I’m so sorry, Calina,” I whisper, apologizing to the child of our youth who’s still buried deep inside this angry, troubled shell of a woman. I stand at her back so she doesn’t have to see my face, and gently drape the gag around her mouth in case she wakes up screaming. I tie it, crouch down behind her, and take out the needle. My hand shakes so badly I drop the cap to the syringe. I will myself to calm with a deep, shuddering breath, then point the sharp metal at the insertion point. Quickly, I pierce her skin, and close my eyes when I meet my mark. She wakes with a start and lets out a muffled scream against her gag but quickly slumps back into bed.
She didn’t see me. She doesn’t know. Hopefully she’ll remember none of this.
I take my phone out of my bag and send a message.
Go.
I get up quickly and open the windows. Even though I’m prepared for this, it still makes me queasy when I see three masked men slide noiselessly inside. Within seconds her limp body is taken right out into the dark. I shut the windows with trembling hands.
She’s gone. The first part of our plan is complete.
We’ve deactivated security cameras on that side of the building so no footage will exist.
I’m already wearing the clothes she was earlier. Twenty-four years of being an identical twin, and we still wear the same size.
I slide under the bed sheets and close my eyes, but I don’t sleep. I won’t. I want to hear them when they come for me.
The bed smells faintly like Calina, like the white soap and vanilla-scented lotion she uses. The pillows are thin, the mattress hard and uncomfortable. I’d be more comfortable sleeping on the ground, and my conscience pricks me. She’s slept on this bed every night, alone, in this dark room with haunting shadows.
I wait for what seems like hours. My sources said they’d get Calina at eleven, but it’s easily midnight now, I’m guessing. I don’t know for sure. I don’t want to risk looking at the clock.
What if they aren’t coming tonight at all?
What if I’m stuck here, and the people who work here think I’m my sister? Suddenly, I’m not sure what I fear more—the men who are going to take me and likely end my life, or living here instead, as if I am Calina. Being stuck with needles and forced into therapy and having to eat food brought to me on trays.
My stomach churns.
Will they come in through the window, or from the hall?
Glen tried to talk me out of this. When he knew what I was doing, he begged and pleaded to find another way, but there is no other way. I’ve studied the lives of these men. It could be any of them, since she’s stolen from so many groups they all want her blood. But according to the message Glen intercepted, we suspect it’s the Russians who will come first.
Bratva, some call them.
Russian organized crime.
They have a long, sordid, detailed history that trounces through death and destruction, establishing themselves as the ruthless killers they are.
I should have kept a closer eye on her. I should’ve been more careful.
I don’t know what she was thinking. Does she even know what the Bratva are capable of?
I didn’t give her enough credit, though. I didn’t know she was capable of the financial devastation she brought to them.
She was proud of herself. Hell, in some weird and twisted way I’m proud of her. But God, she didn’t know what the aftermath would be.
And it doesn’t help to focus on that now. Now, I need to steel myself. I think of happy thoughts for a little while. Things that make me smile to myself. Memories of what happened before my parents were killed. Before Calina suffered the devastating damage that wrecked her mind. Before everyone left me for dead.