Chapter 3 - THE MAN WHO LIED TO SAVE HER
Victor stared at his brother.
“You deliberately sent Mother after another child?”
“No.”
Nikolai’s answer came quickly.
“I sent her after a paper trail.”
Hannah held the photograph tighter.
“What does that mean?”
“The Vermont baby existed. She had nothing to do with us. I altered the transfer number so Mother’s investigators believed Catherine’s child had gone north.”
“You used another infant as a decoy.”
“I used paperwork as a decoy.”
Nikolai’s jaw tightened.
“No one approached that family. No one harmed them.”
Victor looked disgusted.
“You expect gratitude?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Nikolai turned toward Hannah.
“I expect you to hate the part of me that went to Mercy House in the first place.”
For the first time, Hannah believed him.
Not because his story made him innocent.
It didn’t.
Because he wasn’t asking to be forgiven.
Richard rubbed his forehead.
“Catherine never trusted him.”
“She shouldn’t have.”
Victor looked at the watch.
“Why did Elena?”
Nikolai gave a tired laugh.
“She didn’t.”
A voice came from Hannah’s phone.
“I absolutely did not.”
They had almost forgotten Elena remained on the call.
Victor took the phone from Hannah.
“Where are you?”
Elena ignored the question.
“Nikolai didn’t become useful until much later.”
His eyes hardened.
“Useful?”
“He helped me disappear.”
Victor’s fingers tightened around the phone.
Richard looked away.
Hannah felt the air change.
Victor spoke carefully.
“You told me Nikolai put another woman in your car.”
“He did.”
Nikolai said, “Victor—”
“Quiet.”
Elena continued.
“The woman was already dead.”
Nobody spoke.
“She was an unidentified patient who had died after being brought to a private clinic connected to one of your father’s companies. No family. No identification. Sofia intended to have the body disposed of quietly.”
Victor looked sickened.
“And you used her.”
“Yes.”
The answer carried no pride.
“I have regretted it every day.”
“You made me bury her.”
“I know.”
“You stood somewhere while I buried a stranger under your name.”
Elena’s voice cracked.
“Yes.”
Victor closed his eyes.
Hannah had never seen him wounded.
Not physically.
Not like this.
Elena whispered, “If I had contacted you, Sofia would have known I survived.”
“My mother?”
“She had people around you.”
“Who?”
“I didn’t know which ones.”
Victor immediately looked toward the hall.
Anton was outside.
Nikolai noticed.
“It wasn’t Anton.”
“You’re sure?”
“I’m the one who checked him.”
Victor almost smiled.
“That comforts me less than you think.”
Hannah touched his sleeve.
A small gesture.
Victor looked down at her hand.
Something in his face softened.
Only for a second.
Richard noticed.
Hannah did too.
She removed her hand.
“We still don’t know what Catherine refused to stay silent about.”
Martin Shaw answered from the doorway.
“Yes, you do.”
Hannah stood.
Victor’s posture changed instantly.
Martin raised both hands.
“I’m unarmed.”
Victor looked at him.
“That has never stopped stupidity.”
Martin stepped inside cautiously.
He looked exhausted.
His shirt was wrinkled.
There was dried blood on one cuff.
Hannah noticed.
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Whose blood?”
Martin hesitated.
“Someone who tried to take something from my office.”
Victor’s eyes narrowed.
“The ledger?”
“Half of it.”
Martin placed an old brown envelope on the table.
The crescent symbol was stamped across the front.
Hannah recognized it.
The envelope from his office.
“You came to my apartment for this?”
“I came for the key.”
“You terrified me.”
“I know.”
“You could have explained.”
“With Nikolai watching me?”
Nikolai frowned.
“I wasn’t watching you.”
Martin looked at him.
“Your mother was.”
That silenced everyone.
Martin turned toward Hannah.
“I knew Elena’s handkerchief contained a key. I didn’t know which copy. Elena told me if Victor ever used it on someone, I was supposed to recover it before Sofia learned it had surfaced.”
Hannah stared.
“So you grabbed my injured wrist?”
Martin looked ashamed.
“Yes.”
“That was your protective strategy?”
“No.”
“What was it?”
“Panic.”
That answer, annoyingly, sounded true.
Victor folded his arms.
“The chair.”
Martin blinked.
“What about it?”
“Did you move it?”
“No.”
“Who did?”
Martin almost laughed.
“The busboy.”
Everyone stared.
“He mopped beneath table fourteen and forgot to slide the chair back.”
Hannah frowned.
“You’re telling me all of this happened because a nineteen-year-old forgot a chair?”
Martin nodded.
“The fall was an accident.”
Victor glanced at Hannah.
She understood the reversal immediately.
No one had arranged their meeting.
No one had pushed her toward Victor.
Chance had simply dragged a buried secret into daylight.
Martin placed the envelope down.
“What happened afterward was not an accident.”
Inside were seventeen photocopied pages.
Names.
Dates.
Payments.
Infant transfer numbers.
Hannah felt sick.
“What is this?”
“The second list.”
Victor read the first page.
“These are women from Mercy House.”
Martin nodded.
“Women whose children were transferred to private families.”
“Adoptions?”
“Some.”
The word hung there.
Hannah understood what he wasn’t saying.
“And the others?”
Martin’s eyes lowered.
“Women were pressured.”
Richard whispered something Hannah had never heard him say in anger.
Victor kept reading.
“Who paid?”
“That’s what Elena discovered.”
Martin pointed to the right column.
Initials appeared beside each payment.
Judges.
Business owners.
Doctors.
Police officials.
Men and women who had once held enormous influence in Boston.
The amounts were staggering.
Hannah looked at Nikolai.
“You knew?”
“Not all of it.”
“How much?”
“Enough to hate myself.”
Victor reached the final copied page.
Then stopped.
One name appeared beside six infant transfers.
SOFIA MALENKOV.
Hannah looked toward Victor.
“That’s your mother.”
“I can read.”
But his voice had changed.
Martin shook his head.
“No. Look underneath.”
A second signature appeared beneath Sofia’s.
Victor’s face went blank.
Nikolai whispered, “Victor…”
Hannah leaned closer.
The handwriting was elegant.
Familiar from foundation plaques throughout the old building.
The signature belonged to Victor and Nikolai’s father.
MIKHAIL MALENKOV.
Victor’s father had built the criminal organization Victor inherited.
He had also apparently built something far worse.
Hannah turned the page.
There was one additional notation.
TRANSFER 18 — LANE INFANT — CANCELLED.
Beside it:
E.M. INTERFERED.
Then another handwritten line.
IF E.M. CONTINUES, REMOVE HER.
Victor stared at the initials.
Elena Malenkov.
Hannah looked at the phone.
“Elena.”
No answer.
“Elena?”
Victor checked the screen.
The call had disconnected.
Nikolai swore under his breath.
Martin turned toward the window.
Richard suddenly spoke.
“There’s something else.”
Hannah looked at him.
He was staring at the second list.
“Catherine told me there were never seventeen successful transfers.”
Martin frowned.
“What?”
Richard pointed at the page.
“She said there were sixteen.”
“Then why are there seventeen names?”
Richard swallowed.
“Because one child came back.”
Victor looked at him.
“Which child?”
Richard’s eyes moved slowly toward Hannah.
“I don’t know.”
Then Martin lifted the final sheet toward the light.
A faded line of type appeared beneath the photocopy shadow.
RETURNED TO MERCY HOUSE — IDENTITY CHANGED.
May you like
And underneath it was a name none of them expected.
SOFIA MALENKOV.
