Ruthless Creatures

After Kage ensures that Nat is fine, he finally tells Nat the whole story. 

David is still alive—he fled and disappeared after stealing $100 million from Max. Kage initially came to Lake Tahoe to retrieve the money; his original mission was to interrogate Nat for information. 

The painful news makes Nat remember jumping off the highest platform at the swimming pool when she was 10. Instead of doing a cannonball, she landed flat in the water and sank to the bottom until Sloane pulled her out.

Kage explains David’s role in the Bratva. David was the organization’s top accountant—a brilliant man who made the Bratva lots of money through offshore accounts, global real estate, and the stock market. No one noticed that he was also skimming money for himself. 

Wanting out of the organization, David testified against Max in exchange for immunity and protection. David then abandoned his wife and children and entered the Witness Security Program (WITSEC), moving to Lake Tahoe, where he met Nat. Kage shows Nat pictures of David and his family. The Bratva has contacts in the federal government, so as soon as they figured out where David was hiding, he had to run.

Nat is angry. She curses at Kage and orders him to leave. He tells her that he loves her and kisses her. She pulls out a gun and points it at his head. After Kage falls to his knees, Nat relents and tells him to get up. 

Kage gets rid of Viktor’s body. When he returns, Nat’s house is a mess, and she’s not there.

Nat goes to the safe deposit box, rereads David’s letter, and realizes that the line about finding David in her paintings is a clue. Nat remembers that David thought it was clever in the movie Traffic (2000) when an imprisoned drug kingpin tells his wife to look at their paintings—she finds numbers to offshore bank accounts hidden in them.

At home, Nat examines the paintings and their frames. In a painting of one of David’s favorite outdoor spots, she finds the word “Panama.” Before getting on a plane, she tells her parents to stay with friends and leaves Mojo with Sloane.

Nat goes to Panama’s Villa Camilla Hotel, where she and David intended to have their honeymoon. There’s no message for Nat, but there’s a message for Helena Ayala—the wife character from Traffic. The message is an address—a palatial estate with stone fountains and a peacock on a picturesque island. When Nat knocks, David opens the large oak doors. Nat falls to her knees.

Kage tracks Nat using the GPS on the phone that he gave her. He has two goals: reuniting with Nat and killing Max.

After a contentious confrontation, David provides his side of the story. The Bratva recruited him out of college. He reported directly to Max, who made him marry a woman named Claudia to solidify the Bratva’s alliance with an Italian mafia family. Claudia cheated on David; Claudia’s bodyguard is probably the biological father of their kids.

David didn’t want to be an accomplice to violence, so he became a government witness. His WITSEC handler told him to flee Lake Tahoe and moved him to Alaska. Then, he absconded to Panama. He couldn’t endanger Nat by directly contacting her, so he wrote her the letter. He bought the estate by liquidating cryptocurrency that he bought with Max’s money.

Nat tells David about Kage, who came to Lake Tahoe to torture and kill her. She claims that Kage made her fall in love with him to manipulate her. Suddenly, Kage appears and swears that he genuinely loves her.

Abiding by Nat’s request, Kage doesn’t harm David. The Bratva didn’t know that David was in Lake Tahoe until last year, so David must be lying about why he suddenly vanished five years earlier. David doesn’t argue. He promises to return Max’s money, but Kage doesn’t want it: All he wants is Nat. David’s new wife appears—David only waited a year before he married again—but Nat doesn’t feel hurt. Before leaving with Kage, Nat says that David’s kids look just like him.

Upset, Nat doesn’t speak to Kage. He takes her to his 82nd-floor apartment on Park Avenue (an upscale, expensive part of New York City). The space occupies the entire floor, and it comes with a private elevator. He kisses her and smells her hair. Still cantankerous, she starts talking to him again. He shows her a room, which he has turned into her art studio. She wants to call her parents, so he gives her privacy.

In exchange for Kage reopening the ports, the Italian mafia had Max killed in the prison lunchroom. However, when Kage’s Italian mafia contact, Massimo, wants more concessions, Kage refuses. After a formal vote, Kage becomes the official head of the Bratva in the United States.

Nat tells her parents that they’re safe to come home. Next, she calls Sloane and recaps what happened with David and Kage. Sloane thinks that Kage is good for Nat. Sloane, meanwhile, has again moved on to a new guy.

Nat falls asleep in her studio, and Kage carries her to the bedroom. She wants him to hold her, and both want to have sex with each other. She tells him that she’s his.

Several men come to the apartment to pay homage to Kage as the new Bratva leader. Stavros wants to kidnap Sloane to force her to be with him, but Kage doesn’t let him. Kage reveals that the La Cantina shooting was due to Sloane: A member of the Irish mafia sexually assaulted her and insulted Stavros and his crew. The Irish mafia wanted compensation, but Kage refused, so violence ensued. Sensing that Nat is lonely, Kage is flying Sloane and Mojo to New York City for company.

Nat asks Kage about reversing his vasectomy so that they can have children. Kage has already looked into it: In the top drawer in his office is a pamphlet about the procedure. He then has her reach into his pocket, where there’s a 10-carat ring. He asks her to marry him. She replies, “Green.”

Sloane flies with Mojo to New York City on a private jet. She has a lot of luggage and finds her driver attractive. Then, when they park in a skyscraper garage, there are gunshots. Sloane hides in the car, but Declan, a man with arrestingly blue eyes, grabs her. He plans to take her to Boston to meet his boss. Declan doesn’t have a high opinion of Sloane. He doesn’t see how she could start a war.