**Chapter 8: The Weight of Winter**
The train screeched through the Alaskan wilderness, its rattling rhythm a grim lullaby. I pressed my palm to the frostbitten window, watching Viktor's silhouette vanish into the gunfire and snow. His blood still streaked my hands, rust-brown and flaking, like the petals of a dead rose.
*He's gone.*
The lie throbbed in my chest, sharp as the Pakhan's blade.
**Three Weeks Later**
The safehouse was a shack perched on the edge of nowhere, its walls papered with maps and vengeance. Viktor's final gifts waited inside: a stack of cash, a forged passport, and a silver locket with a photo of my mother.
*Margaret Delacroix, age 22.* Her smile mirrored mine—wide, reckless, doomed.
I traced Dmitri Volkov's initials etched into the locket's edge. *My father.* A Bratva prince. A ghost.
The first time I vomited, I blamed the stress. The second time, I counted weeks.
*No. Impossible.*
But Viktor's lie had carved itself into reality.
**The Nightmare**
*Viktor's voice, ragged in my ear: "You'll be safer without me."*
*The gunshot. His blood on my lips as I screamed.*
*Monica's laugh, echoing: "You're a pawn. Just like your mother."*
I woke gasping, the shack shuddering in a blizzard's grip. A shadow loomed outside—a man's outline, broad and familiar.
"Viktor?" I whispered, reaching for his knife.
The door burst open.
**The Stranger**
He was Bratva. Spiderweb tattoo on his neck, same as the man I'd stabbed at the boathouse.
"*Printsessa*," he sneered, icicles clinging to his beard. "The Pakhan sends his regards."
I lunged, driving Viktor's blade into his thigh—*no hesitation*—but he backhanded me into the wall. My vision blurred as he yanked the knife free.
"Your *knight* is dead," he spat. "But the Pakhan wants his heir." His gaze dropped to my stomach. "One way or another."
A gunshot rang out.
The Bratva man collapsed, a hole smoking between his eyes.
In the doorway stood a woman in a fur-lined parka, her rifle steady. "You Ashley Volkov?"
"Who's asking?"
She grinned, tossing me a satellite phone. "Someone who's been paid a shitload of money to keep you breathing."
**The Mercenary**
Her name was Sasha. Ex-Special Forces, current pain in the Bratva's ass.
"Viktor hired me as insurance," she said, rifling through the dead man's pockets. "Smart bastard. Knew they'd track you here."
My heart stalled. "Hired? Past tense?"
She handed me a bloodstained envelope. Inside, a single key and a note in Viktor's jagged script:
*Malyshka,*
*If you're reading this, I broke my promise.
The key opens a locker in Juneau. Take it and run.
And Ashley?
Don't name our kid after me.*
**The Truth**
Sasha drove us south at dawn, the aurora borealis rippling overhead. I clutched Viktor's note, tears freezing on my cheeks.
"He's alive," I said, willing it into existence.
"Or he's a ghost with good timing," Sasha shrugged. "Either way, you've got a war to win."
The locker in Juneau held a stack of files—Dmitri's old ledgers, Monica's medical records, proof she'd poisoned my mother. And a deed to a vineyard in Argentina, signed over to *Ashley Volkov*.
*Our kid.* Viktor's words haunted me.
I stared at the ultrasound photo tucked in the files—a relic from Lena's pregnancy, Viktor's handwriting on the back: *I'll do better next time.*
**The Decision**
Sasha lit a cigarette, eyeing the storm clouds. "So? We fleeing or fighting?"
The answer burned in my veins.
"I'm done running."