All In

Десять

I stand there with my own thoughts as Alexei and he talk. I had only met him once, right when Carson and I first started dating. He had said he had some big job in the city, so that's why he was never home with his family.

"Well, Alexei, pleasure to chat with you. I'll call Volkov in the morning." They shake hands. "And it was wonderful to meet you, Aleksandra."

As soon as he turns away from us, I yank on Alexei's sleeve. "I need to talk to you." A slightly worried look shows on his face, but all he does is turn towards the foyer.

Alexei pulls me towards a hallway lined with closed doors. He opens one to our left, revealing a huge library.

As soon as the door shuts, I start to feel the room spin. I lose my balance and start to fall back into the door, but Alexei is right there to catch me.

"What happened? Are you okay?"

"Carson", I breathe out. "That's Carson's brother."

Alexei stiffens. "Come sit, Aleksandra." He pulls me over to a leather chairs, sits me down, and kneels in front of me.

My vision goes blurry, and I feel my hands grip the arms of the chair.

"Жизнь моя. Take a breath."

I try to do what I'm told, but I'm shaking so bad, it's so hard to do.

"He's going to know", I start blathering. "I need to leave."

"Жизнь моя, listen to me." Alexei's strong hands grip just above my knee, the only thing keeping me on this planet right now; I feel like my mind is going faster than ever. "You are safe here. We will make sure no one ever hurts you again."

"He's going to find me", I bring my hands up to the side of my head, holding it up on my knees. "I have to leave."

I feel Alexei's hand on my wrist. "Aleksandra", Alexei breathes in a firm tone. "You are safe."

The energy being transferred between his body and mine calms me down just enough to stop shaking.

"He's going to tell Carson I'm here."

"We won't let him leave. Hold on, Darling."

Alexei stands up, and I all but start crying when his touch is gone. He takes his phone out of his pocket, hits two buttons, then puts it up to his ear. "Volkov. Come to library", he spits out in Russian. Then he types out a text and hits send.

He comes back down in front of me. "Is it okay if they come in? We have to tell them."

I just nod my head. "If you get overwhelmed, just let me know."

It takes just another moment until Volkov enters the room, followed by the men I know from the table. Alexei stands and hold his hands out for me. We go over to the large meeting table behind the chair I sat in. Everyone sits, and Alexei offers the head of the table up to me, while he stands behind me, gripping the back of the wooden chair.

"Emilio Castro is the brother of her abuser" Alexei starts.

"Does he know who she is? Is the brother involved?"

I play my innocence in knowing Russian, so I just look up at Alexei. "Have you ever heard anything about Emilio from Carson? Would Emilio know who you are?"

I shake my head. "I met him once at a family thing close to three years ago, and from what I knew, he just had a job in the city. Carson never mentioned anything about what Emilio did". Alexei reiterates what I said to Russian.

All of the men start mumbling to each other in Russian, while Volkov and Alexei just seem to stare at each other. "Stop", Volkov's voice booms so much, I shiver. The men go quiet. "Alexei, what do you need us to do?"

"We don't know if the brother is involved, and I cannot create a mess if he is not. For now, we watch Castro."

"We can take him in right now, Sokolov. Why wait?"

"I'm not creating any more of a mess for her than what's already happening. She's gone through enough."

My mind continues to go a mile a minute as they talk, and I have no energy to listen in. I stare down at my hands, thinking of any reason Carson would be involved with Emilio's mafia life.

The men decide they will go about tonight as if nothing happened, and they will do their best to talk to him and get information. It's nice to have this huge support system in this tiny bit of time, I didn't have any of this before now, only May.

They all leave, and Alexei sits down next to me. "Okay, what would you like to do? We can continue with the party, meet other people. Or do you want to go home?"

"You can go back out", I tell him. "I just need a minute to calm down."

"No, no." Alexei shakes his head. "I can stay with you if you need me to."

I give him a small smile. "It's really okay, Alexei."

"Okay, I'll stay near the foyer when you want to come find me."

As Alexei stands, he bends over to me and places a kiss on my forehead. It's soft, and his beard tickles just slightly. He goes to the door, opens it, looks over at me one more time, then shuts the door softly behind him.

I take my alone time to look around the room. Just as a library should, it's filled to the brim with books. Some are in Russian, others in English, all of them bound like they came from the 19th century.

I take one out from a shelf when I recognize one; that my mom would read to me when she was teaching me Russian. Though a children's book, opening it makes me smile to myself.

After reading aw few pages, I think I've calmed myself enough to go find Alexei again. I shove the book back in its place, use the old mirror near the door to make sure I look okay, then go over to the door.

I take a huge deep breath, and leave the library.

The closing door echoes through the little hallway I'm in. I can hear people talk and laugh, but right before I step through the threshold, I feel someone grab my wrist and pull me backwards.

I start to giggle when I think it's Alexei, but my smile runs off as I look into the eyes of the man pinning me against the wall.

"It's lovely to see you again. My brother will be happy to know that I found you."