Chapter 7: d
The porcelain shards glistened on the stone floor like spilled teeth. Vanja stared at them, then at Bahri’s imposing frame in the doorway, her mind scrambling to catch up. The shock was a physical jolt, short-circuiting her carefully constructed calm.
“It’s my father’s company,” he whispered, the words cutting through the stunned silence. He took a step closer, his voice low and urgent. “It’s my family company. Who did you think pays for the weapons?”
She didn’t react to that. This, she knew about. Or had guessed. The pieces—the wealth, the German connection, the quiet authority—clicked into a grim, logical place. Her lack of surprise seemed to register with him, his sharp eyes narrowing fractionally.
“Come,” he said, not asking.
As he turned, the door to the back office opened. Enver Nika stood there, his briefcase in hand, his intelligent gaze sweeping from his son’s tense back to Vanja’s pale face, to the broken cups at her feet. The kindly employer vanished, replaced by a man assessing a volatile situation.
“Bahri,” Enver said, his voice calm but edged with steel. “Where are you going?”
Before Bahri could answer, Vanja found her voice. It came out steadier than she felt. “To drink coffee. Bahri is a friend of a friend. I didn’t know you are his father.” The lie was smooth, a lifeline she grabbed instinctively.
Mr. Nika’s eyes held hers. He didn’t believe it—the coincidence was too perfect, the tension too thick—but he saw the desperate want in her posture, the need to exit this room. After a beat, he gave a curt, professional nod. “I see. Well. See you tomorrow,” he said, his tone dismissing her from the immediate drama.
She managed a tight smile, a pathetic twitch of her lips, and followed Bahri out into the damp Mitrovica afternoon.
His car was a black Jeep, newer and more aggressive than her Mercedes, parked halfway down the cobbled street. He didn’t open the door for her. She climbed in, the vinyl seat cold through her skirt. The engine growled to life, and he pulled into the sluggish traffic crossing the Ibar, the river a dull, metallic grey under the clouded sky.
The silence was a suffocating blanket. She watched the city blur past, the architecture shifting subtly from the Ottoman-era houses of the south side to the harsher, socialist blocks of the north.
“I didn’t know,” she said quietly, her voice barely audible over the engine.
“I can tell,” he replied, his eyes fixed on the road. “But you knew other things.”
She turned to look at his profile, the proud, arrogant line of his nose and jaw. “Not like you think I do.”
He didn’t answer. The Jeep wound through the streets of north Mitrovica, heading not towards Skenderaj center, but to a newer bloc of apartments on the city’s outskirts—her building.
“I’ll take you home,” he said, as they pulled into a parking spot.
“And my car?” she asked, the practical question absurd in the circumstances.
“Someone will take it. Do you have your keys?”
“My house keys, yes, don't worry” she said, patting her coat pocket out of habit. “Always in my pocket. But car keys are in my bag."
“I’m not worried.”
They rode the elevator up in a silence so dense she could hear the hum of the fluorescent lights. On her floor, she led the way to her door, fumbling with the key. She pushed it open and stepped inside, not looking back to see if he followed.
“Come up?” he asked from the threshold, a sarcastic echo of her unspoken invitation.
She rolled her eyes, tossing her coat over a chair. “You’re already in.”
A flicker of something—amusement, maybe—passed over his stern face. He almost laughed. “I now see why Adem does not want to be alone with you.”
Her heart gave a hard, painful thump against her ribs. She didn’t react, moving to the kitchen area to put the kettle on, a useless gesture. Cecilia emerged from the bedroom, meowing a greeting. Vanja scooped her up, burying her face in the cat’s fur for a second, seeking an anchor in the familiar scent.
The apartment was big, nice, modern—a sterile shell. Bahri took it in with a swift, tactical glance, noting the exits, the large window overlooking the bleak courtyard, the conspicuous lack of personal items. He remained standing.
“Coffee?” she asked, her back to him. “Rakija?”
He shook his head. “Sit,” she said, gesturing to the sofa.
To her surprise, he did. He sat on the edge, elbows on his knees, hands clasped. He looked like a soldier on a tense diplomatic mission. Cecilia jumped from her arms and slunk away, sensing the atmosphere.
Vanja sat in the armchair opposite, leaving the length of the room between them. She took a breath, cutting to the core of it. “Adem. He sent you here?”
“Yes.” Bahri’s admission was blunt. “We were surprised to see you are working for my father.”
“ Mr. Xhaka recommended it...after I left the school, I was… I understood I should leave Prekaz.”
He nodded slowly, his gaze never leaving her face. “Yeah. You understood correctly.” He stood up abruptly, the movement making her flinch. “I’ll tell Adem it’s all good. A coincidence. You didn’t know.”
“Thank you,” she said, the words hollow. "Take care"
He looked at her then, really looked, taking in the beautiful, strange woman curled in the chair, her golden hair mussed, her green-gold eyes wide with a fatigue deeper than sleep. He gave a single, short nod. “You too.”
And then he was gone. The door clicked shut with a finality that echoed through the empty space. She didn’t move. She listened to the elevator descend. The kettle began a shrill whistle in the kitchen. She let it scream.
Night fell, deep and starless. The apartment, so quiet, felt like a sensory deprivation chamber. She lay in the big bed, Zeko the kitten a tiny, purring weight on her chest, Cecilia a curve at her feet. Sleep, when it came, was not a relief.
She dreamed of dust and sunlight. She was walking down the dirt road into Prekaz i Poshtëm, the air smelling of hay and woodsmoke. Adem was beside her. He wasn’t looking at the hills or the houses; he was looking at her. His severe expression was softened, the lines around his eyes crinkling. He said nothing, but he reached out and pulled her into him, his arms wrapping around her shoulders, strong and sure. It wasn’t a passionate embrace; it was one of profound, uncomplicated belonging. He rested his chin on the top of her head. She could feel the steady beat of his heart through his shirt. Then he leaned back, his hands on her arms, and he smiled. It was the full, open, transformative smile she had only seen him give Adile—the one that lit his green eyes from within and made him look, just for a second, like a man without the weight of a coming war on his shoulders. He was smiling that smile at her.
The joy of it was an acute, physical pain in her dreaming chest.
She woke from it gulping air, tears already hot on her temples, streaming into her hairline. The crushing weight of the waking world slammed back into her. The dark room. The empty silence. The impossible distance. The smile that was not, and could never be, for her.
She was all alone. The knowledge was a cold, sure thing in her gut, more absolute than any historical fact. She was alone in a past that hated her, loved by no one, trusted by no one, a ghost drifting through the last calm before the storm. The sobs came then, wrenching and silent, her body shaking in the vast bed. She cried for the dream, for the man in it, for the future she remembered and the present she was trapped in, for the terrifying, exhilarating fact that she had, against all reason and history, begun to want something she could not have.
The tears eventually exhausted themselves, leaving a hollow, aching quiet. Outside, a dog barked, the sound lonely in the concrete canyon between the blocs. Somewhere to the south, beyond the river, in a house surrounded by fields, a man was awake, too, staring at a ceiling, thinking of weapon shipments and secure routes. He was not thinking of her. He had closed that book.
Vanja turned her face into the pillow, breathing in the scent of clean cotton and her own shampoo. The dream-smile hung in the darkness behind her eyes, a beautiful, cruel phantom. It was a mockery. It was a promise. It was the only thing she had left to hold onto in the long, cold night.
It was the only thing she had left to hold onto in the long, cold night. The dream-smile fractured with the grey dawn, replaced by the relentless pattern of her new life. She translated invoices for tractor hydraulics and combine harvester blades, the sterile German precision a welcome counterpoint to the messy humanity that waited outside the office door.
Two weeks slid by, marked by silent nods from Lulzim and grandmotherly smiles from Razije. Bahri appeared only once more, collecting a sealed envelope from his father’s desk. He looked straight through her, as if she were another piece of office furniture. The message was clear and chilling: she was tolerated, but the thread connecting her to Prekaz was severed. She buried the ache under work, and under planning a small escape.
Dragana’s birthday required a dress. Vanja found herself on a busy Mitrovica street near the Ibar, scanning shop windows for a splash of color. The late afternoon sun was weak, filtering through the haze of coal smoke and exhaust. She was studying a cerulean blue shift in a display when a man’s voice, tinged with a Belgrade accent, cut through the street noise.
“Excuse me. You look like you know where to find a decent coffee around here.” The Serbian was smooth, friendly.
She turned. He was tall, leaning against a lamppost in a simple black shirt and trousers. Handsome, in a way that was all clean lines and confident ease. Very much so. His hair was dark and cropped short, his eyes a bored, assessing brown. He was from Belgrade; she could hear it in the soft, rounded vowels.
“There’s a place by the bridge,” Vanja said, her own Serbian effortless. Her mind, however, was jolted into a cold, sharp clarity. She knew this archetype. The casual posture, the observant eyes that didn’t quite match the relaxed smile. He was Special Police, or something adjacent. They were here in 1991. For scouting. For intimidation. For the attack that would fail. But others would follow.
“Darko,” he said, offering a hand. His grip was firm, dry.
“Vanja.” The name felt like a betrayal on her lips.
He didn’t let go immediately. “You’re not from here. The accent is right, but… the clothes aren’t.” He flashed a grin, releasing her hand. “Switzerland? Germany?”
“A bit of both.” She hugged her bag closer, a pointless shield. “You’re not from here either.”
“Guilty. Stuck here on rotation. It’s a… quiet city.” The sarcasm was delicate, expertly placed. He looked at her, really looked, and she saw it then—a profound isolation mirroring her own. He was lonely. She could see it in the too-casual slope of his shoulders. She was lonely, too. The realization was a sudden, unbearable pressure in her chest.
“Coffee sounds good,” she heard herself say. She said yes.
In Prekaz, the news arrived without ceremony. Burim was the one who said it, to Adem, while they were cleaning weapons in the low shed behind the house. “Saw that Serbian German girl. Vanja. In Mitrovica. She was having a drink with some goran cop. Looked cozy.” He said it casually, punctuating the sentence with the slick chk-chk of a slide being worked.
Adem’s hands stilled on the cloth he was using to oil a pistol. “What was she doing in Mitrovica alone?” His voice was dangerously flat.
“She works there, doesn’t she? Living her life.” Hamez, seated on a crate nearby, didn’t look up from the magazine he was loading.
“Open for men to talk to her,” Adem murmured, more to himself than them.
Hamez finally glanced over, his face a mask of weary practicality. “She’s young. Single. Why wouldn’t she talk to men?”
Adem placed the pistol down with exaggerated care. “He’s not just a man. He’s Serbian. And he is…” He trailed off, the unspoken word—police, danger, ours—hanging in the oily air.
“I know that,” Hamez said softly. “But how could she know who he is? They met on a street. He noticed her. Many do.” He added, his tone final, “He talked to her. Why wouldn’t she?”
Adem shook his head, a sharp, frustrated motion. He saw it: her laugh, her blonde hair catching the light, aimed at a man whose job was to erase him. His jaw tightened. The cold void he’d cultivated for weeks sprouted a hot, vicious thorn. It was jealousy, raw and undisciplined, and it shamed him.
Vanja drank a glass of surprisingly good Montenegrin wine with Darko in a smoky basement bar that played old Yugoslav rock. He was funny. He was not bad. He spoke of his sister’s kids in Novi Sad, his dislike of the local cuisine, his boredom with patrols. He was doing his duty to his country, he said, without ever defining what that duty was. To her, in her other life, the Jasharis were terrorists. She knew that. But she remembered Adem then. The grim patience in the mechanic’s garage. The shattered knuckles. The smile that never was for her.
“This was nice,” Darko said, signaling for the bill. “I’m away for a few days. Back to Belgrade tomorrow. But next week? Thursday?”
Thursday. The date clicked into place in her mind with the certainty of a fired round. It was the day. The day of the first arrest attempt, the one that would fail because the house would be surrounded by kin. Her stomach hollowed out.
“I… Thursday is bad,” Vanja said, her voice steady only through immense force. “I have plans with a friend. For her birthday.”
Darko made a face, a genuine flicker of disappointment. “Ah, shame. I’m going to Belgrade then. I’ll be back three days later. Saturday?”
Vanja shook her head, a tight, small movement. “It’s fine. Don’t worry. I’ll just go with Dragana.” She managed a smile. “Have a safe trip.”
That night, in the silent apartment, the decision crystalized. The knowledge was a live wire in her hands. She could let history play its course—a course where Adem survived this attempt. But the risk, the chaos… the chance of a stray bullet. The memory of his imagined smile blazed behind her eyes. She couldn’t gamble with it.
She picked up the phone, dialing the number for the Nika household. It rang four times.
“Hello?” A young woman’s voice. The sister, Elinda.
“Hello, may I speak with Bahri, please?”
“Who is this?” The question was sharp, protective.
“Oh, sorry. It’s Vanja. I work for your father. There were some documents I forgot to give him for tomorrow, and he’s in Germany. It’s a bit urgent.”
A pause. She could hear muffled conversation. Then Elinda’s voice returned, cooler. “Bahri says he will come to your building in an hour.”
The line went dead.
He was precisely on time. He stood in her hallway, his expression one of impatience and deep suspicion. She opened her door with a bright, false smile for any watching neighbors.
“The documents are upstairs,” she said, her voice loud and clear. “Can you come?”
He nodded once, stepping inside. The door shut, sealing them in the quiet. He didn’t move further into the room. “Well?”
Vanja’s performative ease vanished. She met his gaze, her own utterly serious. “In a week from now,” she said, each word deliberate, “Serbian police will come to Prekaz. To arrest Adem. And Hamez. Shaban, too.”
Bahri stilled. The air in the room seemed to freeze and thicken. “How do you know that?” The question was a low breath, devoid of his usual arrogance, replaced by pure operational focus.
She shook her head, a sharp, final motion. “I met someone. It doesn’t matter. But make sure people are there. Many people. That they come, and don’t let them.”
He studied her face, searching for a lie, a trap. He found only a fierce, terrified certainty. He gave a single, curt nod. No further questions. No thanks.
He turned and was gone, the door closing softly behind him. His heavy footsteps faded down the hall. Moments later, from her window, she saw the black Jeep tear out of the parking lot, its headlights slicing through the Balkan darkness, heading south towards Prekaz.
Moments later, from her window, she saw the black Jeep tear out of the parking lot, its headlights slicing through the Balkan darkness, heading south towards Prekaz. The silence it left behind was total. She stood there until the red taillights vanished, the chill from the glass seeping into her forehead. A profound tremor started deep in her hands, a cellular shaking she couldn’t stop.
She had just altered a thread. The consequences were a void, formless and terrifying.
The consequences were a void, formless and terrifying. She slept in fitful bursts, her mind replaying Bahri’s rigid nod, the Jeep’s furious departure. By morning, the tremor had settled into a cold, leaden certainty in her bones. She had thrown a stone into a dark pond. The ripples were now beyond her sight.
At the office, Razije commented on her pallor. “You look like you fought a djinn all night and lost,” the older woman clucked, pushing a second cup of coffee towards her.
“Just a headache,” Vanja mumbled, the lie ash in her mouth.
The hours dragged. The German verbs bled together on the page. Every time the door chimed, her pulse spiked. It was never Bahri. It was never him. By late afternoon, the silence from Prekaz felt louder than any explosion. She packed her bag at five, her movements slow, mechanical.
In Prekaz, the news had landed like a mortar round in the quiet yard. Bahri delivered it tersely, pulling Adem aside near the woodpile. “The Serbian girl. Vanja. She gave a warning. Police are coming. In a week.” He kept his voice low, a bare murmur beneath the rustle of the poplar leaves. "They will try to arrest you all."
Adem’s expression didn’t change, but his eyes went very still. He absorbed the information, factoring it, testing its weight. “How does she know?”
“She didn’t say. She met someone. A Serbian. From Belgrade, she said.” Bahri watched his leader’s face, saw the minute tightening around his mouth. “She didn’t give details. Just the warning.”
A long silence stretched between them, filled with the distant clang of a hammer from the garage. Adem stared at the hardened mud at his feet, his mind racing through scenarios, contingencies, but always circling back to her. To the impossible fact of her warning. This was not the act of a spy, or a tourist. This was something else. A line, brazenly crossed in his favor.
He looked up, his green eyes sharp. “I need to talk to her.”
Bahri nodded, as if he’d expected this. “Tomorrow. I’ll send Cazim with her. To our new warehouse. Be there. Talk.”
Adem gave a single, definitive nod. The decision was made.
The next day, Vanja was summoned to Enver Nika’s office mid-morning. He was all business. “An investor from Tirana is visiting our new storage facility. Your German will be useful for the technical specifications. Cazim will drive you. He’s waiting outside.”
Cazim was a quiet man in his forties, with a thin moustache and watchful eyes. He drove a boxy, unmarked white van. He didn’t speak except to confirm the address. They drove away from the river, into an industrial zone of potholed roads and decaying factories, stopping before a long, low building of weathered red brick. “Inside,” Cazim said, cutting the engine. “I wait here.”
The warehouse door was a heavy slab of metal, slightly ajar. Vanja pushed it open, the hollow groan echoing in the vast, dim space. It smelled of dust, cold concrete, and old engine oil. High windows filtered dirty light onto the empty floor.
He was standing in the center of that empty floor, his back to the door.
Her breath hitched. She recognized the set of his shoulders, the dark hair against his collar, instantly. A hot spike of betrayal lanced through her fear. This was a setup. The investor was a lie.
“The hell are you doing here?” The Serbian words erupted from her, sharp and wounded.
Adem turned. The weak light from the high windows caught the planes of his face, his beard, the intense green of his eyes. He saw her, dressed for a business meeting in a tailored cream blouse and a dark skirt, her hair swept back. He saw the elegant facade, and beneath it, the shadows like bruises under her eyes, the tension in her held frame. Beautiful, and utterly tired.
“We need to talk,” he said, his voice echoing slightly in the cavernous space.
“Like hell we do.” She took a step back towards the door. “Leave me alone.”
“No.” He didn’t move, but the word was a wall.
“Please.” Her voice fractured on the syllable. The tears, never far these days, welled hot and immediate. She was so sick of crying in front of this man. “Please, Adem. Let me forget you.”
It was that, the raw, unguarded plea, that broke his rigid control. His composure, always so disciplined, splintered. “Forget me?” He took a step forward, his voice a low rumble. “Why would I want that?”
Then he closed the distance between them. He didn’t ask. He just took her face in his hands and kissed her.
It was not gentle. It was a claim, a question, and an answer all fused into one desperate, searing press of his mouth on hers. It tasted of coffee and unresolved anger and weeks of silent, furious wanting.
Vanja stiffened. Then her hand flew up, cracking against his cheek with a sound that was terribly loud in the empty warehouse. He didn’t flinch. He didn’t let go.
A heartbeat later, she was kissing him back. Her fingers, still stinging from the slap, tangled in the coarse wool of his jacket, pulling him closer. The kiss deepened, turning frantic, hungry. It was all tongue and heat and the faint, metallic taste of her own tears. It was the dream-smile made flesh, a collision that dissolved thought, history, and consequence into pure, roaring sensation.
They broke apart, both breathing ragged, foreheads resting together. His thumbs stroked her damp cheeks.
“Fuck,” he breathed, the word a raw exhale against her lips.
She let out a strangled sound, half-laugh, half-sob, and punched his arm weakly. “Asshole.”
He caught her fist, brought it to his mouth, and pressed a slow, deliberate kiss to her bruised knuckles. The intimacy of the gesture stole what little breath she had left.
“Come,” he said, his voice rough. “My car is outside. We need to talk.”
“I thought we just did,” she managed, the old tease a fragile, automatic defense.
He shook his head, a real smile, small and serious, touching his eyes for the first time. He led her out a side door into a neglected alley. His car was there, a new Lada Niva, hunter green and boxy, more discreet than a Jeep.
“Where are we going?” she asked as he held the passenger door open for her.
“To a safe house,” he said openly, slipping into the driver’s seat. “Don’t worry. It’s just us.”
She laughed, the sound still shaky. “That’s exactly why I worry.”
He didn’t answer. He started the engine and navigated out of the industrial maze. As he turned onto the main road heading west, out of Mitrovica, his right hand left the gearshift and came to rest, solid and warm, on her thigh. His palm covered the fine wool of her skirt completely. It wasn’t an invitation. It was a statement.
She didn’t move it. She watched his profile as he drove, the focus in his eyes, the possessive weight of his hand burning through the fabric. The road unfolded ahead, leading away from the city, into the gentle, waiting hills.