THE BLOOD OF ONE

16:45

The door handle creaked.

My heart stopped.

Caleb came into the house reluctantly.

I clapped my hands.

“Caleb, you’re home so early, darling! I’m so happy!”

I leaned towards him for a kiss.

Caleb held up his palm.

My lip began to tremble.

Even Caleb, with all his roughness, was not capable of this.

“Nazokat.”

My heart dropped.

Why was he calling me that?

Caleb lifted his eyes.

“I’m leaving you.”

I blinked.

Then once more.

My eyes began to fill with tears, and I blinked quickly, quickly.

“I-I-I-I see.”

My hands began to shake.

Caleb moved a chair closer and offered me some water.

“Thank you. I don’t need it.”

I wanted to stand up.

But Caleb stopped me.

So now I was not even allowed to touch him.

Dear God.

My hands began to shake.

“C-C-Caleb, I-I-I…”

“You are not worthy of me. I intend to be with someone else.”

I wiped my nose.

And pulled myself together a little.

“I see.”

Caleb adjusted himself.

I looked at him one last time before he left.

Caleb was tall.

Strong.

And very beautiful.

But—

he was also cruel.

Cold.

And someone for whom it would cost nothing to destroy everything.

With a single decision.

17:05

I wiped my tears again.

“So… what about the documents?”

Caleb handed me a stack of papers.

My eyes widened.

If he had already managed to prepare the documents, then this was not the first day he had been preparing to leave.

A chill ran over my skin.

So he had smiled at me.

Sat with me at the table.

Laughed.

Enjoyed himself.

While behind my back, he was preparing his way out.

A knife went into my back.

It was twisted there.

And then the body was coldly thrown into the ocean.

I froze.

“Listen…”

Caleb tried to move closer.

I recoiled.

My eyes turned glassy.

Baby, you haven’t asked the most important thing.

What?

Who was he leaving me for?

“Caleb.”

He lifted his eyes.

“What?”

I looked at him.

My brain produced the analysis instantly.

The conclusion was right there on his face.

He was not sorry.

It was simply a decision.

And he had made it.

I smirked.

“Once, I heard someone say: fear the thing you love most. It may destroy you.”

I looked at Caleb again.

He stood calmly.

Straight.

How ironic.

A cold mind.

The ability to calculate several moves ahead.

Calculation.

And always relying only on himself.

Was that not what I had fallen in love with him for?

I took a deep breath.

“All right.”

“Then…”

Caleb turned away.

“By morning, all my things will have been moved.”

I thought about how disrespectful it was to interrupt me.

“Fine.”

Caleb left.

The door closed.

I sat down on the sofa.

Then stood up.

Then walked around the sofa.

Then went around it once more from the other side and reached the refrigerator.

I took the whisky.

I could not think at all.

My eyes were glass.

A robot, not a human being.

Just to keep breathing somehow.

The phone was on speaker.

Nate did not answer.

I took a drink.

Nate still did not answer.

And then I broke open.

I sprayed the drink out of my mouth like a fountain.

And choked on the hysteria.

I could not stop at all.

Goddammit.

I sobbed uncontrollably.

And my heart ached with such force that I wanted to claw my chest open so I could breathe.

Just breathe, Nazokat.

You can do this.

Just breathe.

But it did not help.

Tears and hysteria mixed together.

I began choking on my tears.

And drinking.

And crying.

And drinking.

And then howling again like a wounded animal.

I called Nate again.

He answered.

“Nate, hi.”

I sniffed.

Nate softened.

“What is it, darling?”

“C-Caleb… C-Cale… C-C-Caleb…”

And once again, I choked on my tears.

“Fuck.”

I became furious with myself and threw the phone at the wall.

“Idiot.”

I vomited.

“Idiot. He doesn’t need you, and you’re crying like a fool.”

I fell to the floor.

He doesn’t need you.

The words cut through my soul like a knife.

He doesn’t need you.

Dear God.

I covered my eyes with my palms.

“Not needed, Nazokat.

He doesn’t need you.

You’re an idiot for believing in him.

For being there beside him.

You’re just a fool.”

But then I became even angrier.

By then, I had almost finished the bottle and started on another.

In a rage, I threw the bottle at the wall, and the shards flew back and cut my elbow.

I cried out in pain.

And stamped my foot in fury.

“Got you!”

That was how I took revenge on the bottle.

“Like that?”

I was not afraid of pain.

Then I felt my feet.

Shards had pierced both of them.

Horrific pain.

Pain that reminded me of my childhood.

How many times had they pulled glass out of me?

How many times had it cut into my body?

How many times had they taken it out with tweezers and alcohol?

The pain was hellish, and I kept fainting because I could not endure the procedure.

I sat down and cried.

Then the phone rang.

Caleb.

“I’ll collect the keys tomorrow morning at ten.”

“All right.”

The call ended.

I swallowed and tried to pull myself together.

“Come on, Ruzik.

Ha.

So what?

A guy left you.

Your husband—

Y-y-y-yes.

Yes.

Ahem.

Yes.

So what?

He decided to move on.

Without you.

Because… because… because…”

And once again, I fell to the floor, covered in tears.

“Damn bastard.”

“It was his choice, baby,” Hades tried to comfort me.

My lips were trembling.

My hands.

My whole body.

I got up and looked out of the window.

God.

It is so easy to be suicidal.

One moment—

and there are no more problems.

All right.

Come on, Ruzik.

Now seriously.

You are a mother.

The children need you.

Besides…

And then my phone rang.

“Oh.”

I wiped my tears.

Nate.

I could always count on him.

“Nate, hi, listen…”

And I froze.

Something shifted inside me.

“Nate?”

“Hi.”

“Uh… hi, Nate. Are you all right?”

“Yes… Listen, I’ve decided to get married.”

The phone slipped from my hand.

It simply fell to the floor.

I collapsed after it.

A second later, I began laughing hysterically.

Things like this never come alone.

I knew there would be a chain.

I picked up the phone.

“Colin.”

He smirked.

“Hello, baby.”

“Colin, what are your plans for your life?”

“To marry you.”

“And if I refuse?”

“Then I won’t provide the seventy percent Caleb requested, and the entire business will go to hell.”

I thought about the hotels.

The hospitals.

The private aviation.

Didn’t we have reserves?

There should have been other investments.

For exactly this kind of situation.

“Baby,” Hades said.

“Not now.”

I took another drink.

“Baby, I’m worried,” Hades said.

I called Sam and honestly told him everything.

“Sam.”

“Baby?”

“Caleb left me for his new girlfriend.

Nate is getting married.

Colin will only invest if I become his personal prostitute.”

There was a pause.

“Do you want me to come?”

I thought about how Sam had never let me down.

But the poison had already gone deeper than expected.

Caleb had sworn that I was his life.

Nate had sworn that he would never marry and could not even see other women.

Colin had sworn that he would do anything for my happiness.

But the facts had shown otherwise.

The problem was not simple betrayal.

The betrayals happened after they had crawled beneath my skin.

Into my heart.

Into my family.

And now it had begun to rot from the inside.

“No.”

“What are you going to do?”

“That doesn’t matter.”

“Sam.

Track my condition.

If I completely lose my mind, I’m begging you—do not tell the children.

I want to remain strong in their eyes.

I want them to remember me as beautiful.

As their source of strength.”

Sam began to cry.

It was understandable.

This was not the first time for us.

It was clear that this would end with my mind breaking again.

The only question this time was whether I would come back from it.

And whether my body would carry me through.

The last time,

I separated part of my own energy from myself to save Caleb.

And as far as I remember,

that was my final chance.

My body would not survive one more death.

22:41

I took a shower.

Then I sat down in the dressing room.

I looked over Caleb’s things.

His scent.

I set aside the suits of his that I loved most—

something to remember the good that had existed between us.

I remembered his smile.

The way he used to pester me.

And I thought about how much I loved him.

I went into the kitchen and turned on some jazz.

This was not over yet.

If Colin knew, then everyone knew.

I smirked.

I would not be surprised if Caleb had turned the guys against me and some of them—

I took another drink.

Perhaps even all of them—

would leave.

I took a deep breath.

“How did this happen, Nazokat?

How?

You failed to block three blows at once.”

I smiled and threw my arms back behind my head.

Suddenly, it all seemed so funny.

So incredibly funny.

Yes.

I had missed the blows.

But—

but at least—

I had lived with Nate for almost twelve years.

Tears began to spill from my eyes.

I took another drink.

And God knows, I had loved that man with all my heart.

I had never spared myself.

The tears ran down my face.

I had always been there.

I loved him.

I gave him all of myself.

There was nothing left of me.

I loved him even now.

I had borne his children.

I smiled.

And everything Cobra and I had been through…

God.

What a wonderful life it had been.

Yeees.

I did not regret any of it.

It was a shame Nate had lost his nerve.

Had he not handed me over to Caleb…

But there was nothing to be done about that now.

Caleb.

I burst out laughing.

God.

Was there anything I hadn’t been through with that man?

I smiled.

Whatever.

I regretted nothing.

I had loved those men.

And I always would.

Colin.

I laughed and fell to the floor, completely drunk by then.

“Oh, Colin.

Aren’t you clever.”

God.

He was the last person I would ever have suspected of something like this.

So kind.

Always supporting charity.

Always standing up for children.

Animals.

The elderly.

God.

Colin had been the most patient of them all.

He had always comforted me after my wars with Caleb.

I laughed.

After my wars with Caleb.

God, what a fool I was.

Why had I ever become involved with Caleb?

You fought so much.

You were always at war.

He could never stop trying to prove that he was better than you.

Was that love?

I took another drink.

“How would I know?

Am I an expert on love?”

Once again, I felt sad and found it funny at the same time.

How precisely Colin had played his hand.

One move—

and he had crowned himself.

“Baby, either you become my wife—

or bye-bye.”

I broke into uncontrollable laughter, choking on my own hysteria.

Just like that.

But never mind.

It had been wonderful with Colin too.

God.

I would have married him if it had not been for all of this.

He was strong.

Damn intelligent.

And he had loved me very much.

Well…

supposedly.

At least, that was how it had seemed before.

08:05

I tried to sober up by morning.

The enormous terrace.

No food on the table.

No children.

Even the animals had been taken away.

Nate, Colin and Caleb sat around me.

I swallowed.

“Come on, Nazokat.

What happened has happened.

These men are here to take what they can get.

They do not care about you.

They do not care about your mission either.

They are here for their share.

Caleb is demanding seventy percent.

Nate wants fifty-fifty.

Colin is here to play.”

All my men were here.

Grief was written plainly across their faces.

I looked more closely.

I supposed they had spent the entire night and morning crying.

And surely none of them had slept.

I wondered silently whether I could still count on them too.

Or whether people like me—

naive, almost extinct creatures—

no longer existed anywhere else.

“Miss.”

Sebastian brought me some juice.

I smiled.

“Thank you.”

Drink while you can still afford it, Hades said, breaking into bitter tears.

I swallowed.

And tried not to die right there.

“So…”

“C-c…”

“Ahem.”

I cleared my throat.

“Caleb.”

I could not bring myself to look him in the eyes.

“Seventy percent is not a realistic figure.

Otherwise, by tomorrow, we will quite literally be out on the street.

There simply will not be enough money left to maintain the nurseries.”

Caleb insisted on seventy percent.

“Your nurseries.”

He corrected himself.

“Our nurseries.”

I understood that he was striking exactly where it hurt.

He was striking at the word our because he understood that we had built this together.

It had been ours.

He wanted to stain the very bond between us.

I stammered.

And tears began pouring down my face.

I sat a little straighter.

And exhaled.

It is all right.

You are allowed to have emotions.

It is all right, Nazokat.

“Caleb, we cannot give you seventy percent.

If the total amount matters that much to you, then let us give you forty now and pay the rest as we expand.

Otherwise, both you and we will lose money.

You cannot own a percentage of a dead business, darling.”

I corrected myself immediately.

“Habit.

I’m sorry.”

Caleb swore and left the terrace in irritation.

“N-n-n-Nate.”

“Natey.”

“Nate.”

“Ahem.”

“Nate.”

My hands were trembling, and I had no idea how I was supposed to look at a reality in which someone like Nate could sink so low as to ruin his own children.

“If Caleb agrees to take forty for now—

and I give you fifty—

we will collapse the same day with only ten percent left.”

Nate nodded.

“Twenty-five?”

I tried to smile.

“O-o-okay.”

Colin settled back in his chair with a self-satisfied little smile.

“So.

Forty plus twenty-five.

Sixty-five percent is gone.

But thirty-five remains.

Which means I do not have to become your prostitute, Colin.

Goodbye.”

He stood up and whispered to me:

“You will regret this.”

Then he walked out.

I looked at my men.

“Here are the facts, boys.

Things are bad.

The ship is sinking.

Anyone who wants the celebration to continue—

I cannot promise you anything.

The facts are plain.

All three pillars I relied upon have collapsed.

There is no one left for me to lean on except you.

There is no money.

The estate will have to be the first thing we sell.

Even the additional reserves will not be enough.

Everything that can be sold will have to be sold.

And we will have to move very quickly to more modest food and a more modest way of life.”

Five of them stood up and left.

It felt as though someone had cut off five of my fingers.

“Well.

Now the circle has grown even smaller.”

Those who remained drew their knives.

So did I.

A thin but precise cut marked the beginning of a ritual we all understood.

The blood of one is the blood of every one.