Konstantin Dmitrievich Medvedev was driving from the regional clinic down Central Avenue, having deliberately dismissed his driver. He wanted to be alone, to process the cardiologist’s words about his high blood pressure, to think about the suppliers delaying parts for the service center in Tulak, the equipment needing replacement, and how everything had piled up at once. Though he was used to clearing up messes, ever since he started with a single garage back in ’92.
At the “Aquarelle” shopping center, the light turned red, and Konstantin’s gaze mechanically drifted over the figures between the rows of cars. The usual silhouettes with cardboard signs and plastic cups – people who had long learned to ignore being ignored.
A woman with a baby carrier on her chest was moving from the next car toward his Land Cruiser. At first, Konstantin felt the usual, almost reflexive pity. Thin, disheveled, her bare feet on the scorching asphalt. And then something shifted in his chest, as if someone had punched him hard under the ribs.
Yulya.
He lowered the window, not believing his own eyes, hoping he was mistaken, that it was some other woman with a similar oval face, with the same dark hair, only dirty, tangled, and sticking out in all directions.
— Yulya?
She flinched, raised her head, and the first thing he saw in her eyes was not horror, not relief, but shame. A sharp, animalistic shame of someone caught doing something disgraceful. She instinctively covered her face with her hand, as if trying to disappear, to dissolve into the July haze. This movement, this victim’s gesture, hit Konstantin harder than any words could.
— Dad, don’t, — she whispered, backing away. — Please, just drive away.
— Get in the car.
— I can’t, you don’t understand…
— Yulya, get in the car!
A car honked behind them. Someone impatient, someone running late. Someone for whom this scene was just an obstacle on their way home. Konstantin didn’t turn around. He looked at his daughter’s sunken cheeks, her chapped lips, at Bogdan in the carrier. His grandson lay with his head lolling limply, his cheeks red from the heat.
Yulya got into the back seat, clutching her son to her chest, still clenching a handful of coins. Money, pennies — someone’s random charity. Konstantin raised the window, shutting out the city’s heat and the honking of strangers, turned the air conditioning to full blast, and pulled away.
— Where’s the apartment? — he asked, trying to keep his voice steady, though it treacherously cracked. — Where’s the Tucson? Where’s the money I transferred to your account?
Yulya was silent, looking out the window, and Konstantin could see a tear rolling down her cheek in the mirror. Slowly, tiredly, as if she didn’t even have the strength for a proper cry.
— Maxim took it, — she finally forced out. — And Emma Yakovlevna. They took everything. The car, the apartment, the money. They threw us out, Bogdan and me. They said if I resisted, they’d take the child.
— How did they throw you out? The apartment is registered in your name…
— It was, — she swallowed. — Artur, Maxim’s brother, he works at the State Registry, as a registrar. He slipped me some papers a week after I gave birth. He said it was for Bogdan’s registration, a formality. I could barely stand, Dad, the baby was screaming, I didn’t read them properly… And then it turned out the apartment wasn’t mine anymore. A deed of gift to Maxim. I didn’t sign anything like that, Dad, I swear. My signature was there, but I didn’t put it there.
Konstantin turned onto a side street, stopped at the curb, and turned his whole body toward his daughter. Yulya sat hunched over, clutching her son, looking as if she were expecting a blow. Not a physical one, but the stinging “I told you so” that hurts more than any slap.
— How long have you been living like this?
— Two weeks. Under a bridge. There’s a social worker there, her name is Alsu, she showed me a safe spot.
— Two weeks… — he repeated, and those two words contained everything. Fourteen nights under the open sky, fourteen days with an outstretched hand. His grandson in a carrier, in the middle of the summer heat, among indifferent strangers’ faces.
— Dad, I was afraid to come to you. I thought they were watching. Maxim said he had connections everywhere.
— Don’t cry.
Konstantin covered her hand with his own, feeling the sharp bones of her wrist under his fingers.
— Don’t cry. I know what to do with your husband and his mother.
He dialed a number from memory. An old one, from the nineties, the kind of contact you don’t save in phone books. The call was answered after the third ring.
— Luka Ignatievich. It’s Medvedev. I need a room in the far wing. Quiet, no questions asked.
A chuckle on the other end.
— Kostya, you know, for you, even the presidential suite. How soon will you be here?
— In forty minutes.
The motel on the M6 highway looked like it was stuck somewhere between the Soviet era and an attempt at modern renovation. A faded “Prival” sign, plastic chairs on the veranda, the smell of gasoline and fried onions from the roadside cafe. Luka Ignatievich Shevtsov met them at the entrance. A stocky man in his seventies, with the squint of someone who had seen it all, and a handshake that could crack your knuckles.
— Room twenty-seven, — he handed over a key with a wooden pear-shaped keychain. — It’s quiet there, windows face the courtyard. If you need anything, just knock, I’m always here.
— Luka, — Konstantin lowered his voice. — We’re not here. Understand? No one arrived, you saw no one.
The old man solemnly placed a hand on his heart, closing his eyes with theatrical gravity.
— Sealed lips, Kostya, you know me, I’ll swallow my tongue.
Konstantin nodded and started toward the room, but Luka grabbed his sleeve. His eyes lit up, as they always did before a long story.
— By the way, this reminds me of eighty-nine. I was hiding someone from some people then too… You know. Well, the story was a real doozy. He arrived at night, all covered in…
— Luka! — Konstantin threw up his hands in horror.
— Sealed lips, remember? — the old man pouted, offended, letting go of the sleeve. — I’m not saying who, I’m saying what. That’s a completely different thing.
Yulya, standing behind with Bogdan in her arms, smiled weakly for the first time in two weeks. Just the corner of her lips, almost imperceptible, but Konstantin saw it. And that shadow of a smile was worth all the nerves spent talking to Luka.
The room was small but clean. Two beds, a nightstand with a lamp, a window with yellowed tulle curtains. Konstantin locked the door with both locks, drew the curtains, and sat Yulya down on the bed.
— Now, tell me. Everything. From the very beginning.
And she told him. Haltingly, sometimes pausing to feed Bogdan the formula Konstantin had ordered for delivery. She told him how Maxim changed after the wedding. In public, he remained the model husband; at home, he turned into a controller, demanding an account of every outing, every purchase. How Emma Yakovlevna, a former vice-principal with the habits of a warden, would show up unannounced, rummage through closets under the pretext of helping, call Yulya a spoiled girl, and suggest that her father was making her dependent.
— “Your dad is, of course, a mechanic with money, but what does he know about family?” — she quoted her. — Maxim forbade me from calling you. He said it was destroying our marriage. Then he took my phone, supposedly to protect me from scammers. Every time I tried to contact you, he’d say I was tired, that I needed to rest, that the baby was more important.
Konstantin listened, and a slow, heavy rage built up inside him. He saw the pattern: a classic, well-practiced one. Isolate the victim, cut them off from support, make them completely dependent. And then came the financial control, the documents that Artur slipped to a Yulya exhausted after childbirth: rapid speech, professional terms, “just formalities,” “sign right here.”
— When I tried to leave, — her voice trembled, — Maxim snatched my bag. Artur pushed me, and I fell. They said, “Leave if you want, but Bogdan stays.” Emma Yakovlevna boasted about her connections. Her former students are everywhere: in the police, in child protective services, in the courts.
A knock on the door came so suddenly that Yulya flinched and clutched her son to her chest. A man’s voice, feigning friendliness, with a barely perceptible threat:
— Hey, folks! Open up, let’s talk nicely. My name’s Potap. I’m from Maxim Alekseevich.
Konstantin gestured for Yulya to be silent, went to the door, and opened it just enough to block the view into the room. A man in his mid-thirties stood on the threshold: shaved head, tracksuit, a strained smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
— What do you want?…
— Konstantin Dmitrievich?
— Yes.
Potap tried to peek over his shoulder.
— Look, let’s not be dramatic. Maxim Alekseevich is worried, there’s a child involved. He could file a report that his wife kidnapped their son.
— You’re going to leave now, — Konstantin said quietly, but in a way that made the smile on Potap’s face falter slightly. — Or I’ll be the first to file a report. For harassment, for coercion. About how your Maxim Alekseevich threw his wife and infant out onto the street. You think his connections are stronger than mine? Let’s find out.
Potap was silent for a moment, sizing Konstantin up, then shrugged.
— As you wish. But this conversation isn’t over.
He left, and Konstantin closed the door, feeling his heart pound furiously. So much for high blood pressure. So much for the doctor’s recommendation not to get stressed.
An hour later, a text message came from an unknown number. Konstantin read it twice, not believing his own eyes.
“Konstantin Dmitrievich, this is Potap. Don’t delete this. I’ve been working for the Zotovs for three years, and they owe me 200,000 for my services. They screwed me over like a chump. If you want to know what they’re planning, I can help. Let’s meet tomorrow at the Panikakha monument at nine in the morning. Come alone.”
He showed the message to his daughter. Yulya stared at the screen with wide eyes, her expression one of a person whose familiar world was crumbling.
— Potap… — she whispered. — But he… he was always the most loyal, like a guard dog.
Konstantin reread the message, weighing the risks. A trap? Possibly. But 200,000 was 200,000. A wronged man is more dangerous than any enemy.
— The enemy of my enemy, — he said aloud, and the phrase hung in the stuffy air of the room. — Especially if that enemy has been cheated out of money.
The morning was gray, with a city gloom that made the sky feel like it was pressing down on your shoulders. Konstantin arrived at the Mikhail Panikakha monument 15 minutes early, parked his car off to the side, and watched Potap nervously smoke by the granite pedestal, glancing around like a man unsure if he was doing the right thing.
— So you came, — Potap stubbed out his cigarette on the sole of his sneaker and stuffed the butt in his pocket. The habit of a man used to covering his tracks. — Thought you’d be scared.
— I wasn’t scared in the 90s, — Konstantin stopped a few steps away, studying him. — Why start now?
Potap grunted, took out a new cigarette, but didn’t light it. He rolled it in his fingers like worry beads.
— They’re filing a police report tomorrow. Child abduction by the mother sounds crazy, but they have a system. Emma Yakovlevna has already called her people. The local cop is her former student. There’s some old acquaintance of hers at child protective services too.
— And the car? The apartment?
— They’re trying to offload the Tucson through some shark from Krasnoarmeyskaya, quickly, without proper documents. The apartment’s already been mortgaged for a loan, registered to a company called “Zotov Invest.” Artur is the director there, I don’t remember the exact name.
Konstantin listened, and every word fell into place in his mind. They’re rushing, he realized, which means they’re scared. Fear leads to mistakes, and mistakes lead to evidence.
— What do you want in return?
Potap finally lit his cigarette, taking a deep drag.
— They owe me 200,000. For three years of all sorts of… well, you understand. When this is over, help me collect. Officially, through the court, so it’s all legal.
— Deal.
That same night, Konstantin moved Yulya and Bogdan to his cousin’s apartment. Valerka had left for the capital to earn money in the spring, leaving a spare key just in case. The place was quiet: a five-story building deep in a courtyard, neighbors were all pensioners who went to bed with the chickens and didn’t care about other people’s business. Konstantin used one of his mechanic’s cars, weaving through backstreets, changing the route twice. Paranoia, maybe, but after Potap’s visit to the motel, he knew he couldn’t underestimate his opponent.
Pavel Georgievich Zverev showed up the next morning. A lean man with the attentive gaze of someone who had seen too much human depravity to be surprised by it. He immediately laid out a notepad, a pen, and a voice recorder on the kitchen table.
— Yulia Konstantinovna, we are now going to go over everything. Amounts, dates, who said what. Slowly and in detail.
After him came Rashid Isaev, a former officer of the Department for Combating Economic Crimes, now a private auditor with a reputation for being able to trace money even in a cesspool. He nodded to Konstantin like an old acquaintance and immediately took out his laptop.
— Full name, central bank data, approximate amounts. When was the last time you accessed your personal account?
Yulia answered quietly, but her voice was clearer than the day before. She was starting to believe that this wasn’t a dream, that she was really getting help.
— Artur made me sign documents, — she clasped her hands on her knees. — He always rushed me, said they were formalities, that I just had to trust the family. I’m not a lawyer, how was I supposed to know what was written in the fine print?
Rashid looked up from the screen:
— Classic. Works in the State Registry, uses his official position to run schemes for his own people. Registers deals, knows all the loopholes. These guys rarely get caught, they know the system too well from the inside. But when they do, they go down hard. Fraud, document forgery, abuse of power.
By noon, Konstantin’s phone started ringing off the hook. First, his cousin from Kamyshin called, then a third cousin, then some number he didn’t recognize at all. They were all saying the same thing.
— Kostya, have you seen what’s going on online? — his cousin’s voice rang with indignation. — Your Yulka is all over the public pages, they’re saying she’s some kind of scammer!
Svyatoslav Vinogradov, an investigative blogger whom Pavel knew from old cases, sent links to three city public pages on Facebook. The same video was everywhere: Yulia with Bogdan between cars, an outstretched hand, a pitiful sight. And the comments, hundreds of them, written as if from a template: “The rich have gotten completely out of hand,” “Daddy divorced Mom and is now taking revenge through his daughter,” “Staged for clout”…
— This isn’t a spontaneous reaction, — Pavel scrolled through the screen, his face unreadable. — This is a campaign. Bots, paid posts. Someone paid to discredit Yulya in advance.
Konstantin knew who that “someone” was. Emma Yakovlevna. A master of intrigue, who had spent decades honing her ability to turn people against each other in the teaching staff, was playing preemptively. If it came to a custody battle, public opinion would already be against Yulia.
Yulya saw the video and turned so pale that Konstantin was afraid she would faint.
— If people believe this… — she clutched Bogdan to her chest. — They could take him away, Dad. They’ll say I’m a bad mother.
— You were begging for money because you were thrown out onto the street, — Konstantin sat down next to her, taking her by the shoulders. — That’s the truth. And they are twisting it. The truth is on your side, Yulya. We will prove it.
Two days later, a message arrived on Yulia’s new number — the one only Konstantin, Pavel, and Luka knew:
“Think you’re hiding? The money belongs to your husband. If you don’t come back, get ready to lose Bogdan. We have our people in child protective services.”
Pavel saved a screenshot and checked the sender’s number.
— A burner phone, bought under a fake name. Leaked through the carrier, — he stated. — The Zotovs have people everywhere. No matter, this is also evidence.
And then Emma Yakovlevna herself called. The video call caught Konstantin in the kitchen as he was drinking cooled tea and thinking that his blood pressure was acting up again and his pills were almost gone.
His mother-in-law’s face appeared on the screen. Well-groomed, with an expression of sweet severity, the kind vice-principals have when summoning parents to their office. Behind her, Konstantin recognized the living room of the apartment in “Rodnikovaya Dolina.” New curtains, rearranged furniture. They were already settling in.
— Konstantin Dmitrievich, — Emma Yakovlevna’s voice was honey-sweet. — Let’s talk like adults. Yulechka is mentally unstable. You can see it yourself. Postpartum hysteria. It happens. She can’t take care of the child.
Maxim loomed behind her. A thin smile, cold eyes.
— If you don’t bring Yulya back, — he added, — tomorrow there will be a report to the police and child services. And Bogdan will no longer be with that crazy woman.
Konstantin was silent, looking at the screen, memorizing every word, every intonation.
— Emma Yakovlevna, — he finally said. — Remember this conversation.
And he hung up.
Pavel saved the recording. Rashid nodded:
— Everything is documented.
Now they had enough to go on the offensive. Konstantin arranged the meeting at the “Na Tsentralnoy” cafe on the embankment himself, sending Emma Yakovlevna a message carefully crafted in every word. He was tired, didn’t want a scandal, was ready to discuss a compromise. She agreed instantly — she was used to parents capitulating.
Konstantin came alone, dressed in an old shirt, without a watch. He wanted to look like a defeated old man who had no fight left in him. Emma Yakovlevna met him with false sympathy, taking his hands in her warm palms.
— Konstantin Dmitrievich, I understand how hard this is for you. Yulechka has always been a difficult child.
Maxim sat next to her with the smile of a real estate agent closing a profitable deal. Konstantin lowered his head, rubbing his temples. He was playing a role, just as he had played one in the nineties in front of raiders who thought he was broken.
— I want everything to go back to how it was. The apartment, the car, the money, Yulya.
Emma Yakovlevna laughed condescendingly.
— What apartment, Konstantin Dmitrievich? That’s family property now. Yulya is married, after all.
— And the money?
— So what? — Maxim shrugged. — The money is shared. I’m her husband. I spent it on the family.
Konstantin’s phone was in his shirt pocket, recording every word. Emma Yakovlevna was just uttering another key phrase:
— The apartment and the car are a matter of family law. And if Yulya wants the child, let her…
Suddenly, the phone loudly announced in a mechanical voice: “Attention! Device memory is full. Please delete unnecessary files.”
Emma Yakovlevna froze. Maxim tensed up. Konstantin calmly took out the phone, looked at the screen, shook his head, and put it back.
— A reminder. For my blood pressure pills. Sclerosis, Emma Yakovlevna, what can you do, it’s age.
She relaxed…
— Oh, I understand you so well. I always have something reminding me too.
And she continued talking. And Pavel, sitting two tables away with a backup recorder, was recording every word.
Artur’s late-night visit happened three days later. Apparently, the Zotovs decided to increase the pressure. Konstantin heard the sound of a motorcycle in the courtyard, then footsteps toward the entrance. But before Artur reached the intercom, chanson music blasted from the speaker on his handlebars, echoing through the entire courtyard.
The neighbor’s mutt, Barbos, howled in tune. The old lady from the second floor threw open her window:
— What’s this concert at one in the morning?! I’m calling the police!
Artur darted to his motorcycle, turning off the music, and dropped his helmet. It rolled under someone’s Priora. While he was retrieving it, swearing under his breath, lights came on in three more apartments. Finally, he reached the intercom.
— Yulya, it’s Artur. Let’s sort this out like family.
Konstantin gestured for everyone to be quiet. Rashid turned on the voice recorder.
— If you make a scene, Yulya will lose, — Artur’s voice sounded muffled through the speaker. — Maxim will file a report. We have our people in child protective services.
— Go away, — Konstantin said into the intercom without opening the door.
— Konstantin Dmitrievich, don’t make things difficult. I work at the State Registry. Do you know how much can be, well… adjusted in documents? Your deed of gift, for example, no one will ever find it if we reach a friendly agreement.
— Go away, Artur. Before the neighbors call the police.
Artur spat on the asphalt, turned, and walked toward his motorcycle. Slowly, defiantly, but under the watchful eyes of the awakened pensioners leaning out of their windows, memorizing his face.
Rashid turned off the recorder and looked at Konstantin. His expression was that of a man who had just received a gift he hadn’t even asked for.
— He just confessed to a crime in office in front of witnesses, — he said quietly, putting the recorder in his inner jacket pocket. — The whole courtyard is awake and memorizing his face. The old lady from the second floor, I bet, is already calling the local cop.
Yulya sat on the couch, hugging a now-awake Bogdan. Her hands were still trembling — that fine, almost imperceptible tremor that betrays a person living in constant fear. But something new had appeared in her eyes. Not fear, but anger. The healthy kind of anger that helps people get back on their feet and move forward when everything around seems hopeless.
— Dad, — she raised her head, and her voice sounded firmer than it had in all the previous days. — I want to fight. I just don’t know how.
Konstantin sat down next to her, placed a hand on her shoulder, feeling the sharp bones beneath his fingers. His daughter had lost so much weight that her shirt hung on her like a sack.
— You don’t need to know everything, — he said. — You just need to endure and be honest. We’ll do the rest.
Pavel nodded from his corner, where he was reviewing some documents on a tablet.
— Yulia Konstantinovna, your task now is to rest and recover. Bogdan needs a healthy mother, not an exhausted one. Everything else is our job.
The next morning, Potap called with news that completely changed the game. His voice sounded excited, with the undertone of a man who could finally get revenge on those who had wronged him.
— Konstantin Dmitrievich, you won’t believe this! The Zotovs’ next-door neighbor, a pensioner named Nina Vasilievna, has a social media blog called “Nina Vasilievna’s Flowers.” On that very day, she was filming her geraniums on the balcony with her phone. And she caught everything on camera. Absolutely everything.
— What exactly is “everything”?
— How Artur pushes Yulya and Bogdan out of the apartment. How Maxim snatches her bag. How she falls to her knees and cries. And how Emma Yakovlevna stands in the doorway and screams, “Get out of here, you ungrateful wretch!”..
Konstantin was silent for a few seconds, processing what he’d heard. Then he asked:
— Is she willing to give us the recording?
— She says she’d be happy to. She never liked the Zotovs. Arrogant, she says, and they play loud music at night.
Pavel went to see Nina Vasilievna personally. She lived in the next building entrance of the same block, in an apartment filled with pots of violets and geraniums, with lace doilies on every horizontal surface and a smell of soil and fertilizer that seemed to have soaked into the very walls.
— Oh, as soon as I saw it, I knew something was wrong, — she began to lament, scurrying to the sideboard for her phone. — Such a disgrace! A young girl with a baby… And they’re pushing her! And I thought to myself: why did I record this? I just wanted to show my flowers to my followers. I have 327 of them, by the way! See, it came in handy.
The video was 47 seconds long. The quality wasn’t perfect — it was filmed from a third-floor balcony, after all — but the faces were clearly distinguishable, and the voices were audible. It was more than enough.
Konstantin moved Yulya and Bogdan to a new safe house. An apartment in a secure complex on the other side of town, belonging to an old friend who spent winters in the South and was happy to help. A place with no connection to Konstantin’s address, with a concierge downstairs, electronic card access, cameras on every floor, and a heavy metal door at the entrance.
For the first time in a long time, Yulya was able to sleep properly. Not the fitful, anxious sleep that had plagued her under the bridge and at the motel, but the deep, restorative sleep of someone who finally feels safe. Bogdan drank his milk until he was full, his cheeks turned rosy, and he started to smile the way babies do when the world around them becomes kind and predictable.
— I don’t want Bogdan to grow up with people like that, — Yulya said one evening, rocking her son by the window as the city sun set. — Never, no matter what happens.
And Konstantin understood: she was no longer a victim. She had become a mother fighting for her child.
Pavel sent the invitation for mediation to Maxim in a neutral tone: no accusations, just “family settlement in the best interests of the child.” The wording was precise, down to the last comma. Nothing to arouse suspicion, nothing to reveal their true intent.
Maxim agreed instantly. He was confident of victory after the viral video and his mother’s connections; he thought the old man with a bad heart had finally given up and was ready to buy his way out. He walked into Pavel’s office with the confident stride of a real estate agent closing a profitable deal. Expensive suit, polished shoes, the smile of a man accustomed to getting what he wants. The scent of his cologne filled the small office.
Maxim sat down, crossing his legs, looked around with the air of an owner, and got straight to the point:
— Let’s skip the drama, gentlemen. Yulya comes back, Bogdan comes back, and we’ll forget this misunderstanding. I’m even willing not to demand compensation for emotional distress.
Konstantin sat motionless, his hands folded on the table, and looked at his son-in-law with the same gaze he had once used on raiders in the nineties. Calm, appraising, without a hint of fear.
— Where is Yulia’s car? The Hyundai Tucson. It’s a family car.
Maxim shrugged with the air of someone explaining the obvious:
— We’re married, everything is shared.
— The apartment in “Rodnikovaya Dolina” is also family property. Yulya is my wife, I have every right.
— The money you withdrew from her account? One million two hundred thousand.
— So what? — Maxim spread his hands and smiled the kind of smile he probably gave clients signing unfavorable contracts. — I’m her husband. The money is shared. I spent it on the family, that’s normal.
Pavel intervened, looking at Maxim the way a former investigator looks at another overconfident type, knowing how quickly they break.
— Is there written consent from Yulia for these transactions? A power of attorney? Any document at all?
— What consent? — Maxim smirked as if he’d heard a stupid joke. — We’re a family. Families don’t need paperwork.
Then Konstantin took out his phone and played the recording of the conversation at the cafe. Emma Yakovlevna’s voice filled the office. Condescending, self-assured, with the intonations she had used for decades when speaking to the parents of unruly students.
“What apartment, Konstantin Dmitrievich? That’s family property now…”
“He used the money for the family, that’s normal…”
Maxim froze. The smile vanished from his face. Rashid entered with a thick folder, bristling with tabs of different colors, and placed it on the table in front of Maxim.
— The scheme of transfers from Yulia’s account to accounts associated with LLC “Emma Consult,” a company registered to Maxim’s mother. Amounts, dates, recipients, transaction numbers. Everything is documented, everything is provable.
— Yulia did not have access to her phone or bank card during this period, — Pavel added, tapping his finger on the folder. — There are witnesses. There are threatening messages demanding her compliance.
Maxim tried to seize the initiative, leaning forward.
— Listen, I’ll take Bogdan through child services! My mother has connections there, you have no idea who you’re dealing with! One call, and…
— Another threat.
Pavel nodded at the voice recorder, its red light blinking on the edge of the table.
— It’s being recorded. Please continue.
Then, the video from Nina Vasilievna was laid on the table. Pavel turned the laptop screen toward Maxim, pressed play, and leaned back in his chair.
47 seconds of silence in the office, only the voices from the screen. Artur pushes Yulya, Maxim snatches the bag. Emma Yakovlevna screams, “Ungrateful wretch!” Yulya falls to her knees with Bogdan in her arms, the baby is crying.
Maxim turned so pale that the freckles on the bridge of his nose became more distinct, and shadows appeared under his eyes.
Konstantin placed another folder on the table.
— Testimony from Alsu Ivina, the social worker who found Yulya under the bridge. Bogdan’s medical records after his rescue: dehydration, heat rash, underweight, the initial stage of malnutrition. And a statement to the prosecutor’s office about the actions of Artur Zotov, the State Registry registrar, who admitted on tape to “adjusting documents.”
— Let’s make a deal! — Maxim began to speak quickly, nervously, licking his dry lips. — Two million in compensation, and I walk away. Divorce, waiver of claims — whatever you want. We’ll forget it like a bad dream.
Konstantin looked at him. At this boy in an expensive suit who had married Yulya from the very beginning with his eyes not on her, but on his father-in-law’s apartment and auto service centers. And he felt nothing but calm satisfaction.
— From this moment on, you have nothing, — he said evenly, without raising his voice. — Not the car, not the apartment, not the money, not Bogdan. And tell your mother: her former students won’t help. Times have changed.
Maxim stood up, knocking over his chair. His face was blotchy with red patches.
— You’ll regret this! You’ll all regret this!
— You’re the one who will regret it, — Konstantin said to his back as he rushed for the door. — You already do. You just haven’t realized it yet.
Pavel turned off the voice recorder and allowed himself a barely perceptible smile. The first one Konstantin had seen from him.
— The official complaint has been filed. The report on Artur, too. Now we wait…
They didn’t have to wait long. The car was seized within a week. The buyer, upon learning of the legal dispute and the letter from the lawyer, backed out of the deal, and the middleman vanished. The apartment was investigated: Yulia’s signature on the deed of gift turned out to be forged. Artur had “adjusted” it a little too well, and a handwriting expert established this without difficulty. The bank that had accepted the apartment as collateral began its own investigation. The tax office took an interest in LLC “Emma Consult” after Rashid provided the complete transfer scheme with comments. Artur was suspended from his job at the State Registry pending the investigation.
One day, he showed up at Pavel’s office. Pale, haggard, with trembling hands and the look of a man who realized he was trapped.
— They’re going to put me in jail… It was all Maxim’s mother’s idea, I was just following orders. I can give testimony, I’ll tell everything!
— This conversation is over, — Pavel replied. — The exit is that way.
Svyatoslav Vinogradov published a timeline of events with the video from Nina Vasilievna, Alsu’s testimony, and the recording of Emma Yakovlevna’s admissions. The video got 500,000 views in 24 hours. The people who had previously written “The rich have gotten completely out of hand” and “Staged for clout” were now apologizing in the comments. The false narrative collapsed, burying the Zotovs’ reputation under it.
Emma Yakovlevna, accustomed to being feared and respected, found that her neighbors crossed the street to avoid her, and former colleagues from school stopped greeting her. The former vice-principal, the terror of students and parents, had become an outcast, and that was perhaps the worst punishment of all for her.
Maxim was fired from the real estate agency. A realtor without a reputation is useless to anyone, especially one whose face is featured in viral videos with the caption “Scammer.” Partners distanced themselves, acquaintances stopped answering his calls.
A few months later, Yulya returned to her apartment. The court fully and unconditionally restored her property rights. The car was also returned. Some of the money was recovered, the rest was being collected through bailiffs. She started working remotely as an accountant: first for her father’s auto service centers, then she found other clients. A modest income, but her own, earned by her own labor.
Bogdan grew up healthy. Round cheeks, a ringing laugh. He took his first steps in the very apartment they had tried to steal, holding onto his mother’s finger and smiling a toothless grin. Yulya no longer lowered her head when people looked at her. The divorce was finalized quickly — Maxim didn’t resist, he had other things to worry about. She went back to her maiden name — Medvedeva.
A Sunday evening, six months later. Konstantin was home alone. Yulya and Bogdan had gone to visit a friend from university — the one she hadn’t seen for two years because of Maxim’s prohibitions. He ordered a pizza through an app, turned the TV to a soccer channel, and waited, not really paying attention to the game.
Forty minutes later, the doorbell rang. Konstantin opened it. On the doorstep stood a delivery driver in a yellow company jacket, with a thermal bag over his shoulder and a smartphone in his hand. Thin, unshaven, with the look of a man for whom everything had gone wrong and would never be right again.
Maxim.
For a few seconds, they stared at each other in silence. Maxim had recognized the address too late: the app only showed the street and apartment number, the customer’s name was “K. Medvedev.” His face turned gray, like asphalt after rain…
Konstantin calmly took the pizza box, feeling its warmth through the cardboard. He took a five-hundred-ruble note from his pocket.
— Keep the change.
Maxim stood motionless, unable to leave or say anything. His hands trembled so much that the smartphone almost fell from his fingers.
Konstantin added, as he was closing the door:
— Here, buy yourself a conscience. Though it probably won’t be enough.
The door closed. He sat down to eat. The pizza was still hot.
Later, he told Yulia about this encounter. Simply, without drama, as one might talk about something insignificant. She was silent for a moment, looking out the window at the evening city, then said quietly:
— I don’t feel sorry for him.
And that was the honest truth.
Emma Yakovlevna sold her apartment to pay the fines and compensations. The very apartment she had been so proud of, where she had hosted guests and held tea parties for “the right people.” She moved in with her sister in Kamyshin. The former vice-principal, the terror of students and parents, now lived in a one-room apartment overlooking an industrial zone and worked as a language tutor for a couple of hundred rubles an hour.
Artur received a suspended sentence for fraud and document forgery. The judge took his cooperation with the investigation into account, but his career was over for good. He got a job as a security guard at the very “Aquarelle” shopping center that Yulya had once walked past with an outstretched hand, and where he now passed by that same traffic light every day.
Potap Barankin got his 200,000 through the court and left town. They say he opened a tire shop somewhere in another city and even got married. Pavel helped with the lawsuit, just as Konstantin had promised.
And Bogdan grew up, knowing nothing of what had happened. A happy child with round cheeks and a ringing laugh. And that, Konstantin thought, watching his grandson take his first unsteady steps across the room, was the greatest victory of all.
