“Now, that’s reasonable,” Mike says. “I’m going to tell you how this works, because you’ve inspired me. We’re flying to London for refueling. You and Sasha don’t get off the plane in Britain. We fly to Saint Petersburg, and you will be my guest at the estate I’ve built where you killed Anya. Guessing you don’t have your passport with you, but that’s fine; the Russian government will welcome you temporarily. You will help my son transition. If you provide me that help, and behave yourself, evidence will be produced by my people here that clears Kyle and Julia of their crimes. You go home then, and you get your family back, Iris.” His smile is an awful thing, a final twist of the knife.

“But my son…”

He pauses, watching her, and she realizes he has waited nearly two years to savor this moment. “Not all your family. Not the one you stole from me. Not the one you murdered a young woman to get. Sasha was never truly yours. He never could be.”

“Mom, Mom!” Iris hears Grant on the other side of the door, his voice fading.

“The nurse here will give him a sedative. You will tell him that it’s all going to be OK. Or your husband and daughter…”

“It’s going to be all right, Grant,” she says. Mom voice on, like a switch has been flicked. Reassuring, calm.

“Sasha. You will call him Sasha from now on. That’s his name.”

“It’s going to be all right—Grant,” and then Iris turns and fires two bullets wild into the cockpit, hitting random instrumentation, and there are sparks, then screams from the pilot and the nurse. Iris feels Mike lumber into her, wrapping his arm around her throat from behind and tackling her. They crash into the airplane’s deck, Mike screaming in rage and Iris closing both her hands around the gun so he can’t pull it away from her. Not making the mistake Anya made.

“Grant!” she screams. “Run!” The door to the plane is still open.

Mike lifts and slams Iris into the plane’s deck again. She feels the carpet scrape her face. Yelling behind her, Grant’s voice loud again. Mike slams her into the deck again. She feels her nose break.

“Run!” she screams.

Grant, screaming, now atop Mike, somehow with a bloodied steak knife in his hand, slashing at Mike’s shoulder. Mike shrugs him off. “Sasha, no!”

Then Grant, kneeling before them both, dropping the knife, pulling the gun from his mother’s hands, raising it toward his father’s face, fumbling for a grip on it. “Let my mom go! Now!”

“Grant,” she screams. “Don’t! Don’t!”

“Sasha…” Mike begins.

The gun fires.

71

Afterword of A Death in Winding Creek by Elena Garcia