“Mr. Kovalev, can you please tell us what happened on the night of December twenty-ninth of last year?” Darren Harris, the lead prosecutor, didn’t waste any time. He jumped right into the questioning.

Victor looked at his father. The older man met his gaze with a steady stare, then finally gave a tiny, almost imperceptible nod. Even now, he clearly didn’t understand Victor’s intentions. He had spent hours receiving instructions and coaching from his father, uncle, and their attorneys. He had a script to follow, and Antoly believed his obedient son would follow it. Looking away from the cold stare of the man who had fathered him, he focused on Mr. Mitchell, who stood perfectly still near the table where he had papers and books stacked, waiting for Victor to speak.

He cleared his throat. “I had spent the evening training for a big fight that was scheduled for New Year’s Eve.” He turned his head and looked at the judge. “I used to professionally box and had a championship match at Madison Square Garden that night.” Looking back at Mr. Mitchell, he said, “But I’d had a concussion a couple of weeks before. That night in December, I was sparring with another fighter. He hit me in the side of the head, and even with the helmet on, I got really dizzy and weak. My trainer, Joe, sent me to his office to rest.”

Mr. Harris walked up to the podium that stood between the two tables. He carried a single sheet of paper. “Why didn’t you go home?”

“I live alone. I was really dizzy and really nauseated. Joe didn’t want me alone. He planned to look in on me later in the night and decide if I needed to go to the hospital.”

Mr. Harris nodded. “Go on, Mr. Kovalev.”

“I barely made it to the back office. I laid down on the couch, and the next thing I knew, I’d been out for about two hours. My head hurt. I was sure I needed to go to the hospital, and I couldn’t figure out why Joe had left me there.”

He paused. At this point, his father would know he had veered off the assigned script. He kept his gaze trained on Mr. Harris, who nodded and asked, “What happened next?”

“I heard a man’s pleading voice. I sat there on the couch and tried to make out the words, but I could barely hear him. Then I heard a gunshot. I went to the window, and by the time I got there, I’d heard two more shots. I looked out the window and saw my father standing in front of three bodies.”

Antoly slapped his hand on the table in front of him. Victor paused, and Mr. Harris nodded at him. “Go on.”

“As I started to leave, I ran into my father and one of his employees, Vyacheslav Markoff.” He testified to the conversation he’d had with his father, and when he got to the part about Antoly putting the barrel of his gun to his forehead, he heard someone in the juror box gasp. In his peripheral vision, he saw his father whisper to his attorney. “He told me that he should kill me right there because my girlfriend had just threatened his empire. But instead of killing me, he would kill her. He said he looked forward to my suffering.”

“Objection!”

Victor glanced at the judge, who looked at the attorney over the rims of his glasses. “Exactly what are you objecting to, Ms. Bynes?”

“Your honor, Antoly Kovalev is not on trial for the attempted murder of Ruth Burnette—”

The judge sighed. Victor watched him war with himself over what he would say next. Finally, quietly, he said, “Sustained.” He looked at Mr. Harris. “Please contain your questions to this particular matter and this particular trial. I feel sure we’ll have an opportunity to hear about this another time.”

“Your honor—”

He waved a hand in the direction of Ms. Bynes. “Strike that last statement. Jury will disregard testimony regarding the attempted murder of Doctor Burnette.”

Victor knew that he had used the element of surprise as the catalyst to get him this far in the questioning. From this point forward, the defense attorneys would stay on their toes and would barely allow him to speak a word. The prosecutor had prepared him for that. Mentally backtracking to this case, he looked at Mr. Harris and waited for the question. “Can you tell us what you saw that night?”

Since he wasn’t sure which of his many interviews Harris had pulled this question from, he thought it best to ask for clarity. “Can you be more specific?”

“From the time you woke up in your trainer’s office until the time you left the gym, what did you see?”

As if someone had dinged a bell above his head, he felt his eyes widen as he nodded. “Initially, I only saw my father, Antoly Kovalev, with two of his lieutenants, Vyacheslav Markoff and Lev Genrich. Joe was gone, and the other boxers were gone. Then my father’s cleanup agent arrived. His name is Mr. Kester. I’ve never known his first name, and I still don’t.”

Mr. Harris raised his eyebrow. “Can you explain what a cleanup agent is?”

Victor thought back to the tall, thin man with the cropped blond hair and empty, gray eyes. “His primary job for my father is to dispose of dead bodies and clean crime scenes, making sure no evidence remained that could be used to convict him.”

“Objection!”

The judge looked at Victor. “I’m going to assume that you have more than just this.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Very well. Overruled.”

“Your honor—”

“You know better, Ms. Bynes. Overruled.” He gestured at Mr. Harris while he made a note on the book in front of him. “Continue.”

“So, Mr. Kester arrived in the gym. How do you know why he was there?”

Feeling his stomach turn at the hours he spent in the company of Mr. Kester that night, he said quietly, “Because my father ordered me to assist Mr. Kester that night.”

“Your honor! Hearsay!”

“Ms. Bynes. Sit down and close your mouth. The court will hear what the witness has to say. Prosecutor? Proceed.”

“Thank you, your honor.” Harris cleared his throat. “Assist with what?”

“While my father dispatched men to kill Ruth Burnette, I was ordered to help Mr. Kester dispose of the three men my father had ordered killed earlier that night. Their dead bodies were in the alley behind the gym.” He looked directly at his father when he spoke the next words. No one murmured. No one shifted in their seats. Dead silence greeted him as he met his father’s cold gaze. “The choice he gave me was to help Kester or give him four bodies to clean up instead of three.”

Immediately, a sudden commotion broke out in the courtroom as people reacted to that statement. Antoly surged to his feet and screamed at Victor in Russian. “You are dead to me!” As his attorneys held him back and compelled him back into his seat, Victor looked at Mr. Harris and waited for the next question. “Dead! You hear me?”

When the door opened, Ruth looked up from writing in her notebook and watched Victor come into the room. He looked tired, his face drawn, his mouth grim. He’d taken off his jacket and loosened his tie. She could see the dirt and bloodstains on his white shirt and wondered if he’d kept his jacket on during his testimony. When he saw her sitting at the table, his eyes widened in shock.

“You look surprised to see me,” she said.

He pulled the chair next to her out from under the table and turned it around, sitting down and kicking his feet out in front of him. She closed the notebook and capped her pen. “I am surprised,” he said, scooting down in the chair and leaning his head back until it touched the table. “When you didn’t go into the courtroom with me, I thought you might go ahead and leave.”

She pressed her lips together and nodded. “I thought about it. I have lived on this high alert for so many months, and then that ambush happened on the way to the courthouse. All I could think was that Boris was going to get me if I was with you.”

“You’re probably right.” He rolled his head to look at her and took her hand in his. His scarred and swollen knuckles marked his years in the boxing ring. Bringing his hands to her lips, she kissed his knuckles and pressed them to her cheek.

“So, while you’ve been out there, baring your neck, I’ve been in here thinking about it and praying about it. And I’ve come to a conclusion.”

“What would that be?” His voice had taken on a tired, husky edge.

With a deep breath, she closed her eyes and did a quick inner check, making sure she really meant what she intended to say. “I don’t think that matters to me.” As she opened her eyes, she could see the intensity of his stare.

“Ruth, I knew what my family was when I asked you out. I had no business putting you and Esther at risk that way. I selfishly ignored that.” He let go of her hand and straightened in the chair, scrubbing his face in his hands. “Now look at us,” he said, gesturing at the room. “Your sister is murdered. You’re on the run, and I even destroyed any chance of you returning to your pastor boyfriend and that little Florida town. It’s all my fault.”

Ruth cocked her head to look at him, trying to study him from every angle possible. For the last several hours, she had pondered questions deep in her heart. Could she separate him from Antoly? From Boris? From the crimes of his family? In the end, she knew she could. The Holy Spirit lived inside of him, and He created the wall that set Victor apart, that sanctified him. With the power of Almighty God behind him, he would overcome his upbringing. His strength and courage while working undercover for the last six months impressed her in ways she didn’t know could impress her. She felt proud of him as if she had a right to claim pride where Victor was concerned.

“He wasn’t my boyfriend,” she replied. His eyebrow raised, but he didn’t reply. She thought of Pastor Ben Carmichael and how much she admired him. “He was a good friend when I needed a good friend. He helped me a lot. He would have loved for me to return his feelings, but I just couldn’t. I was too heartbroken over losing you to even consider ever loving another man again.”

He stared at her, his eyes boring into hers. After several long moments, he said, “And now?”

Hot tears suddenly burned her eyes. “And now you’ve said we can’t be together because Boris is going to be after you.” She reached for his hand, gripping it to express her urgency. “I don’t care. He blames me, too. He knows if you hadn’t ever fallen in love with me, that you’d have just maintained the even keel you were on. I’d rather be hiding and looking over my shoulder with you than without you.”

“I don’t think you understand what you’re saying,” Victor said urgently.

“For six months, I was completely on my own. Major was my only defense. And today, running down the streets of New York, with bullets pinging the cars all around us, I felt safer than I ever had because you had a hold of my hand.”

“How can you say this? When you know who I am? You know where I’m from.”

“I know who redeemed you, too.” She stood up and lifted her palms, bringing her arms out on either side. “You get the same fresh start I got when I accepted Christ. You are a new creation, and the old you is dead. Don’t you remember that part?”

Standing, he pulled her close, wrapping his arms around her. “Nothing about it will be easy,” he said, his voice harsh.

“In Christ, we can do all things,” Ruth said, smiling up at him.

“Back when I first started this job," Marshal Dean Tucker said, hours after Victor concluded his testimony and endured the rigors of cross-examination, “distance was our greatest weapon. I could relocate someone from New York to Liberty, Kentucky, where no one knew them, and no one would likely cross their paths. Those were simpler times.” He took a sip out of the blue coffee cup emblazoned with a gold Federal Marshal logo. “Right now, I’m battling 24-hour international media coverage and facial recognition software. I have gangs that are as well-equipped as some small countries with basically limitless online resources if you have someone who knows how to tap into them.” He paused and met Victor’s eyes. “Someone like your cousin Marco.”

Ruth watched Victor’s face. He grew very serious, very grim. She looked back at Marshal Tucker. “So, what can we do?”

“I see two choices before us.” He pulled two file folders from his leather portfolio but kept them closed. Putting his finger on top of one, he said, “You can go to a tropical island somewhere where the Kovalev trial never touched. We’ll set you up renting surfboards to tourists or something equally benign and safe, and you two can raise tanned children who become master sandcastle builders but who won’t know a laptop from a coconut.”

Despite the seriousness of the conversation, Ruth chuckled. Victor nodded toward the folders. “And door number two?”

Instead of answering directly, Marshal Tucker said, “Doctor Burnette, you’ve expressed a desire to return to your medical residency. We can do so, and we’ll get your school transcripts and all that fixed so that you can, but one of the problems with that field is, again, the media and the publicity you’ll require. Hospitals will want to post pictures. Articles you write will have pictures. You save a kid from a snakebite, and someone will take a picture, and so forth.”

He took another sip of coffee and placed a finger on the second file folder. “You can say no, but I would recommend elective cosmetic surgery that would alter your appearance enough to fool digital facial recognition. For both of you. Then you two should be free to live your lives without fear.”

Ruth thought about what that type of surgery would mean, the trauma for her body, the pain she’d have to endure. All were temporary things from which she could heal. It would also give her a sense of security and allow her to get back to work in the profession she loved. She looked at Victor, who squeezed her hand in support and nodded. “Okay,” she agreed. Taking a deep breath, she said, “I’ll do it.”

“We’ll both do it,” Victor said.

Marshal Tucker nodded. He looked at his vibrating phone. “I’ll get arrangements made. In the meantime, the judge is ready to marry you now. Mazeltov. Let’s go.”