Page 80 of Depraved Royals

“Let’s not hurt each other anymore,” she whispers.

“No way.”

Dani is at the front door, saying goodbye to the obstetrician. She closes the door and limps into the lounge, frowning when she sees Vera crying.

I give Vera a last squeeze and go to Dani.

“She’s got a long way to go,” I say. “It’s been a real rollercoaster, and she doesn’t know how to feel about losing Idina. Neither do I.”

Fyodor puts a hand on my shoulder.

“It’s gonna take time, son.” He smiles fondly at Dani, chucking her under her chin. “But you have the love of a wonderful woman, and that’s a damn good start.”

30

Kal

One week later…

Iwatch the coffins as they descend into the furnace.

It’s a surreal feeling. I expected to be more upset or angry, but now I’m just numb.

Vera has good days and bad. She nearly didn’t make it today, but she’s here, and she’s crying. It’s a sight I haven’t seen in years. I’m holding her hand, and Dani has her arm around Vera’s shoulder.

“It’s okay,” Dani murmurs. “Let it go now.”

“I never thought I’d see this day,” Vera says. “My mother hurt me so much, but I never wished her dead. And Simeon? I always thought there was hope for him. I really did.”

It took a lot of money and effort to track down Simeon’s body and even more to hush it all up. The short version is that Idina left the parking garage and never returned, leaving the broken body of her youngest son alone on the cold concrete. He was found eventually and shipped off to a morgue, where he was marked as a John Doe and left alone, waiting out the statutory ninety-six-hour waiting period. If Fyodor didn’t have hospital orderlies on his payroll, my brother might have been embalmed and sent to a medical school somewhere.

As it was, we got to him in time, and mother and son are being cremated side by side.

There was some debate about what to do with the bodies. Fyodor wanted to bury them in the Pushkin family plot, but I didn’t feel they earned the privilege, so we asked the women to adjudicate. In the end, Marta thought it was most appropriate to hold a respectful cremation ceremony and then leave it to Vera to decide what to do with the ashes.

Fyodor, Marta, and Mel are standing behind me, Fyodor’s hand on my shoulder. I’m taking strength from him. He has it to spare.

“You’ll be Pakhan, my son,” he says. “Ironic. Everything Idina wanted was right there in front of her.”

I shake my head. “You’re wrong, Fyodor. I spent years promising to do whatever would make her happy, but it was futile. She wanted to make everyone else feel her pain, and nothing would have been enough. She was a toxic, twisted mess, but she didn’t dare face up to it.”

“It wasn’t her fault,” Marta says. “Idina needed help. I told her this many years ago, and she never forgave me for it. But you couldn’t have done more than you did, Kal. You broke the chain, and you should be proud.”

The coffins have disappeared, and there’s no more to be said. We drift out into the chapel courtyard and through the archway that leads to the graveyard.

The Pushkin plot isn’t only for funerals. It’s a small orchard with a collection of well-tended apple trees.

Fyodor bends down and pulls up some weeds by their roots, tossing them aside.

“They choke the growth of the saplings,” he says. “We plant them to celebrate new life. The tree for yourmalyshkais right here.”

A slender young apple tree leans against the wall, its roots carefully packed in plastic.

Dani prepares the sapling. I pick up a shovel and start digging.

“Can I do it?” Vera is reaching for the shovel.

“Of course.”