Chapter 5: The Drive Through the Mist
The rain had settled into a steady, gray drizzle by the time Viktor's town car turned off the state highway and onto the winding two-lane road leading toward West Chester. I sat in the passenger seat, staring out at the blurred shapes of pine trees and weathered wooden fences sliding past the fogged window. Viktor drove himself, his hands resting easily on the leather steering wheel, the sleeves of his black suit pushed up slightly to reveal the dark ink stretching down to his wrists.
Neither of us had spoken a word since leaving the estate gates three hours ago. The tension inside the car felt like static electricity, prickling against my skin every time he glanced at me in the rearview mirror.
"You're not going to take him away from Sarah," I finally broke the silence, my voice barely audible over the hum of the tires against the wet asphalt.
"I'm going to see my son, Evelyn," Viktor replied, his tone chillingly even. "And if Sarah has been hiding him from his legal father with your financial backing, she's going to answer for it just like everyone else in this mess."
"She didn't know who I was running from," I said, turning to face him. "I told her I was a widow escaping an abusive partner. Which wasn't entirely a lie, was it?"
Viktor's jaw tightened. He didn't deny it. He pulled the car off the main road, navigating a narrow gravel lane lined with overgrown oak trees until the sedan crunched to a halt in front of a modest, white-painted farmhouse with a red tin roof. A single yellow porch light glowed through the misty afternoon air.
My heart seized. Through the front window, I could see a small figure with dark curly hair sitting at a low wooden table, holding a blue crayon, coloring inside the lines of a picture book.
"Stay in the car," Viktor commanded, turning off the engine.
"No," I said, reaching for the door handle. "If you go in there with that face, you'll terrify him. Let me go first."
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Viktor looked at me, his hand resting on the center console inches from mine. For the first time since the fireplace confrontation, the hard armor around his eyes cracked, revealing the desperate, hollow grief of a father who had spent a year believing his world had burned to ash.
"We go together," Viktor said, pushing his door open and stepping out into the cold rain.
