Deceitful Vows (Marital Privileges #2)

35. Andrik

35

ANDRIK

“ W hat happened?”

My father lifts his hanging head, but my answer comes from Dr. Makarand, who is standing at Zakhar’s bedside, looking glum. “My guess is hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. It is when the muscle cells in the heart’s lower chambers thicken, causing an abnormal heart rhythm.”

His response blindsides me. Not because of what he says, but how he started his reply. “Guess? I’m paying you one hundred thousand dollars a week to guess the cause of an almost five-year-old having a heart attack!”

My father signals for me to calm down. I’m too worked up from my fight with Zoya to listen. I have a heap of adrenaline to disperse, and no one to take it out on but the man standing in front of me.

“How much will it take for you not to guess?” I don’t give him a chance to respond. “Two hundred thousand a week? Three?” He looks cocky until I say, “A bullet?”

I step up to him, my chest heaving with anger. I’m not solely devastated for what this could mean for Zakhar. I hate that I had to leave Zoya in a vulnerable state.

She should come first, but shit like this is forcing her into the background.

“Will that give you enough incentive to stop fooling around and do your fucking job!”

Dr. Makarand has bigger balls than I give him credit for. “From the whispers I’ve heard, I’m not the one stalling proceedings.”

I crack him in the face, splitting his nose, before my father pulls me away from him.

“Enough!” my father shouts when I shrug out of his hold with my fists at the ready.

Once again, bullets are cleaner. They’re less fun, however, and won’t dispel half the frustration heating my blood. Zoya’s pain when she begged for me to pick her had me ready to pack it all in. It convinced me for once and all that vengeance is for the weak, and that I don’t need to hurt the people I care about to find the men responsible for my years of misery. Then Anouskha got word to my lead club hostess that Zakhar had gone into cardiac arrest, and my plan was flipped on its head for the umpteenth time in the past several weeks.

My father slows my steps to Dr. Makarand by muttering, “If you want to take down every man who blames your inability to step back from that girl for the delay in Zakhar’s recovery, you may as well start with me.” He steps up to me as if my gun isn’t as heavy as my guilt. “They’ve reshaped their rules for you, but you are so hell-bent on bringing them to heel that you’re seconds from snapping them.” He thrusts his hand at Zakhar’s bed. “From snapping him.” For the first time in years, tears gloss his eyes. “Is that what you want? Do you want to kill him before he’s even had a chance to live?”

“No!” I shout, speaking the truth. “But I don’t want to give them everything, either. They will have all the control. Every fucking thing I’ve worked for will be governed by them.”

Zakhar needs a new heart. The federation will give him one, but only after I’ve kneeled at their feet and kissed the family-crested rubies on their pinkie finger rings.

I hate being puppeteered, and the dislike is the sole cause of my next sentence—and perhaps my wish to ensure a feisty blonde knows I will always pick her first. “You wouldn’t expect me to offer the same for Mikhail, so why the fuck are you asking for so much this time? You have sons across the country. Children younger than Zakhar, but?—”

“I only have one grandson,” he interrupts, cutting me off.

I shake my head, wordlessly discrediting his lie. He has grandsons. They may be illegitimate since they were conceived and birthed out of wedlock, but that doesn’t dismiss their lineage.

The brisk shake of my head weakens when my father murmurs, “One grandson in direct succession for the throne.”

I step back, certain I’m misunderstanding him.

According to the federation, our country’s rulers have been predetermined for centuries. For the twenty-first century, it was always going to be my grandfather, my father, me, and then my son. Every detail was meticulously planned—even our births were planned with a twenty-five-year gap. It made the evolution from political underdog to chief commander that much easier.

The lower house in your mid-to-late twenties. Upper house by your fifties. Then on to the top job no later than seventy-five. Their plan meant all bases of politics were covered by the one family.

I threw a spanner in the works when I refused to fall into line. I didn’t marry at twenty-four and produce an heir by twenty-five. I fought the system and assumed I had won.

I’m a fucking idiot.

“That’s not possible.” I shake my head like the similarity of Zakhar’s features are because he is my half-brother like Mikhail, not my son. “I’ve never had unprotected sex. I took any used condoms with me. I?—”

“Had your wisdom teeth removed under general anesthetic just shy of your twenty-nineth birthday,” my father murmurs, his voice ashamed. “Thirty was the official cutoff to produce the next president of our great country.”

With the roar of a defeated man, I remove my gun from its holster, slam my father against the wall of Zakhar’s room, and then pinch his temple with its barrel.

I can’t breathe through the anger engulfing me.

I can’t think.

I’m so fucking angry it takes everything I have to stop my finger from pushing back on the trigger firm enough to lodge a bullet into his skull.

And he doubles the battle. “This is the rightful order. This is how it’s meant to be.”

“This is my fucking life! There’s no order. No plan. I don’t want my life dictated to me.”

He must have a death wish. “That choice was taken out of your hands the instant you were conceived.” His words rattle along with his teeth when I inch back the trigger until it is almost fully compressed. “The sooner you learn that, the less painful it will be for your son.”