Chapter 3 - The Ghost in the East Wing
Two days later, the summons arrived.
I was scrubbing the baseboards in the grand library when head butler Mr. Vance appeared beside me, his face carved from stone.
“Mara. Mr. Volkov requires your presence in the east wing study. Immediately.”
Panic cold-cocked my stomach. I wiped my hands on my apron, my mind racing through every possible mistake I could have made. Had management reviewed the security tapes and found Lila wandering again? Were we about to be fired without our weekly pay?
“Is... is my daughter allowed to wait in the kitchen?” I asked nervously.
“Mr. Volkov specified that the child comes with you,” Vance replied flatly, turning on his heel. “Do not keep him waiting.”
Holding Lila’s small hand tightly, I walked down the familiar, terrifying corridor toward the east wing double doors. The heavy mahogany panels were propped open just an inch.
When we stepped inside, I was stunned.
The dark, gloomy sickroom had been transformed. The heavy blackout drapes were pulled back to let in the filtered afternoon sunlight. A small, low wooden table had been set up near the window, covered in clean white butcher paper, jars of vibrant non-toxic finger paints, and a stack of thick sketch pads.
Damian Volkov was sitting in a high-backed leather armchair behind his mahogany desk. He still looked pale, dressed in a simple black button-down shirt with the top buttons open, but the grey pallor of near-death had receded slightly from his skin.
“Close the door, Mara,” he commanded softly.
I pushed the heavy door shut behind us.
Lila clutched my skirt, hiding half her face, but her eyes immediately locked onto the jars of paint on the table. Her grip on her cloth rabbit loosened slightly.
Damian didn't look at me. His dark, piercing eyes were fixed entirely on my daughter.
“She likes color,” Damian noted, his voice smooth and surprisingly gentle. It wasn't the voice of a ruthless mafia boss; it was the voice of a man who had forgotten how to speak to anything innocent.
“She... yes, sir. She draws on everything if I let her,” I whispered, remaining standing near the entrance.
“Sit down, Mara. Stop hovering,” he ordered, gesturing to the two armchairs positioned near the art table.
Cautiously, I guided Lila toward the table. The moment she saw the jars of blue, yellow, and red paint, her caution vanished. Without a word of permission, she climbed onto the small wooden chair, popped the lid off a jar of bright yellow paint, and dipped her index finger straight into it.
I held my breath, waiting for Damian to snap. If she smeared paint on his expensive mahogany furniture, we would be out on the street within seconds.
Instead, Damian watched her with a strange, hypnotic intensity.
He slowly leaned forward, resting his forearms on the desk, wincing slightly as his chest muscles pulled.
“Do you know why I fired every single nurse who walked through those doors, Mara?” Damian asked quietly, his eyes never leaving Lila’s small, busy hands as she smeared yellow paint across the white paper.
“No, Mr. Volkov,” I answered honestly.
“Because they looked at me like a corpse waiting for a grave,” he said, his tone dripping with bitter self-loathing. “They checked monitors, they whispered behind my back, they pitied me. They made me feel dead before my heart even stopped.”
He paused, looking directly up into my eyes.
“When your daughter walked in here two days ago, she didn't see a syndicate boss. She didn't see a dying man. She just heard something that wasn't working right, and she tried to fix it.”
Lila, sensing the attention, suddenly paused her painting. She turned her head slightly, her pink cochlear processor blinking its tiny LED light. She looked up at Damian, tilted her head, and then—to my absolute horror—reached across the table, grabbed a clean brush, dipped it in blue paint, and walked right over to the formidable mob boss.
Before I could lunge forward to stop her, Lila reached up and carefully painted a bright blue dot right on the center of Damian Volkov’s forehead.
I stopped breathing. My vision swam. We are dead, I thought. He is going to have us thrown out of a helicopter.
Damian went completely rigid.
For three terrifying seconds, the room froze.
Then, slowly, a sound rumbled deep inside Damian’s chest. It started as a low, gravelly vibration and broke upward into a genuine, unfiltered, booming laugh. It was a sound that likely hadn't echoed within the walls of Grayhaven House in a decade.
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He didn't wipe the paint off his forehead. He just looked down at Lila with a warmth in his dark eyes that completely melted the terrifying myth of the Volkov name.
“Well,” Damian murmured, a genuine smile breaking across his sharp features. “I suppose that’s an improvement over the doctors.”
