Chapter 19
Anya
Ivan is standing guard outside of my door when I wake up the following morning. The rest of the day with Nikolai had passed in a blur. He had shown me all around his home, taking special care to point out all the places that were off limits to me for the time being. His home is so large that my legs were aching by the end of the tour. I had fallen asleep inside of his arms last night, and I can’t deny that I was fully expecting for him to still be there when I woke up the next morning.
I wanted him to be here when I woke up.
Instead, my fully fatigued body woke up to a cold bed and an absent captor. I stayed in the luxurious shower for longer than I can even begin to guess. Despite the lack of personal effects, it is clear that he spends the majority of his time in his room. His bathroom alone could serve as a private spa. The shower has a large bench and the option to convert it into a steam room, which felt great on my skin after all of the travel. There were expensive products with labels I couldn”t read, and tried them all.
I was almost tempted to steal some of his clothes out of the drawer, but decided against it at the very last minute. I can’t imagine what sort of message that might send to him. Is it a message that I’m ready to send? I don’t know if I’m ready to have that conversation with myself yet… or else I’m going to be forced to revisit the Stockholm syndrome topic all over again. I don’t think I’m ready for that either.
Instead, I choose a pair of lavender silk pajama shorts and camisole that were left for me, as well as a floor length robe. The house is more than warm enough, and at least I know that in this outfit,when I move or bend over for whatever reason, my ass will be completely covered. I find a pair of soft, fluffy socks that reach my shins and put them on.
He might think that he’s being subtle with the shifts in the clothing that is available to me since we’ve slept together, but he’s not. Little by little, he’s allowing me to wear stuff just slightly less slutty. I’m a little bit more covered, a little bit more comfortable. Perhaps it’s the Stockholm syndrome that I am now fully convinced I am developing for him, but I am grateful for the clothes. Even more grateful for the fluffy pair of gray slippers that keep my feet warm as I leave the room in search of food. I was fairly certain that I could find my way down to the formal dining room on my own, but with Ivan there I figure he can show me the way.
“What time is it?” I ask him simply, and Ivan checks the watch on his wrist.
“Half past ten,” he answers simply.
“I don’t suppose that there is still a hot breakfast waiting for me? Coffee? Tea? Anything with caffeine… oh, and ibuprofen? That would be ideal… can you make that happen for me?”
It’s probably asking for way too much, but there was nothing in the cabinets in the bathroom in Nikolai’s room and I’m not stupid enough to think that is an accident. It is insanely easy to blur the lines between prisoner and whatever else I am to him. If I were only his prisoner, he could easily have put me in a room and given me nothing but scraps, he could have hurt me, he could have taken his temper out on me for whatever my father has done to him. Instead, we are whatever we are.
It’s only the little reminders of what I actually am to him that bring me back to the present. No medications in the bathroom, nothing but spoons available to me at meals, the total control over what I wear and where I am and am not allowed to go. If I tried to walk out of the front door, I am certain that Ivan has express instructions to subdue me. At least if he had left me in Vegas, I could have had access to the library there—perhaps that was something that was not included on the tour that he gave me yesterday. Perhaps that was something my legs were too tired to travel to.
“Mr. Volkovich shall attend to any muscle aches or pains when he returns home,” Ivan said tonelessly as we head down the hallway.
“What?” I stop walking when his words finally register. “You’re saying that he isn’t here at all?!”
“Da, he says to keep you here until he returns.”
“Why bother bringing me here if he’s just going to leave!?” I hold up my hand to stop Ivan from answering. “Don’t answer that, it was a rhetorical question.”
I start walking again, well ahead of my escort. He trails behind me silently as I process what this means. He did say that he had business to attend to when we got here. I just have no idea what sort of business that could possibly mean. Knowing him, it’s definitely something dangerous. Why does that bother me?
“What is he off doing?” I ask suddenly, spinning on my heel and looking at Ivan accusatorily.
His already thin lips press firmly together as he shakes his head.
“You can’t tell me anything?” I already know that he can’t from the look that he’s giving me. “Well, that’s just perfect then, isn’t it? He probably does this sort of thing a lot, doesn’t he?”
Ivan probably goes with him. That much I’m certain of. So that means whatever he is off doing right now, he’s doing it without his right-hand man. I have to assume that it will pose a significant risk to him, even if he does have others with him to watch his back.
“Well. Fine. Whatever. He can go and do whatever.” I hate that I wish he had told me he was leaving… or at least gave some indication of when he would be back. “Is he supposed to be back before dinner?”
Ivan simply looks at me.
Right now, his loyalty is annoying.
“You know,” I say while putting my hands on my hips. “There is the possibility that you are going to be stuck with me, and me stuck with you for a damned long time and this is not the best way to start our relationship, Ivan.”
If Nikolai hadn’t kidnapped me, and I was still back home, there was a very good chance that I would be meeting my friends for coffee right about now, and spending the entire afternoon talking about their dates and upcoming weekend plans. We would waste the day doing nothing, and I had always assumed that this was a benefit of being born to wealthy parents. Because I didn”t need the money, I was able to donate my time on dig sites or spend my hours floating around from one research department to another. I may not agree with my father”s actions, despite my limited knowledge of them, but I did live well off of his money. Look where it”s gotten me now.
We find the dining room and brunch is brought to me. Everything that I could ever want. Coffee and a selection of teas to pair with the kettle of boiling water. Pastries and some sort of clotted cream or cottage cheese, I don’t know what it is but I don’t touch it. I eyeball the soft-boiled egg in its little holder.
I”ve lost all interest in food now that I”m sitting here with it available. I make a cup of coffee for myself, but I don”t eat much. My mind is too preoccupied with other things, but I manage to consume nearly an entire pot of coffee by myself while I”m sitting there lost in thought.
I keep drifting back to Nikolai. Where he is, if he’s still alive. This is his territory, his homeland, so it stands to reason that he is perfectly fine and doesn’t need my help in any fashion, but that doesn’t mean I don’t think about him. Even more, I wonder if he is thinking about me. Does he think that I’m here breaking into his little playroom to trash it? I should. That thought appeals to me a great deal. I shouldn’t be thinking about him at all. I should be plotting my escape. He and my father can duke it out, and leave me out of it.
I laugh to myself at the thought. I can just imagine how Nikolai might handle it if I were to say something like that to him. To remove me from the situation. As if he would listen. It is an insane notion. Just because we fucked a couple of times, he’s supposed to suddenly care what happens to me? I’m sure that he has a dozen women on standby here in Moscow to keep his bed warm each and every day of the week.
It would have been nice to be out and about in Moscow though. There are a great number of things that I would like to see. It isn’t the easiest place to travel to with the flight restrictions tending to come and go, but I have always wanted to visit.
After brunch, I tell myself that I am not going to think about Nikolai again. I will not spend my entire day worrying about the man who kidnapped me. It doesn’t matter how good the sex is, I need to keep my head on straight. The time to myself will do me good. I should have smuggled my book here from the loft.
He”s barred me from his offices and the heated indoor pool, much to my chagrin. I asked about the actual sauna I saw, and he also turned it down. It”s too cold to explore the expansive grounds, and I”m not dressed appropriately for the weather. Instead, I grab another mug of coffee and begin wandering the halls. I set a goal for myself to name every painting I see, even if theyare very different from the actual names.
The styles and dates of creation appear to be separated by hallway. As I lose myself in the artwork of the place, time loses all meaning. The crown moldings alone must have taken countless hours to carve, let alone all of the details in the rich woodwork frames of the paintings. The entire house that isn”t Nikolai”s wing is gaudy and overstated, and I adore it.
Quickly I come to realize that I really like it here. The warm wooden walls, all of the accents and the suits of armor that adorn the end of almost every hallway that I come to. Massive stuffed bears and paintings, it seems like a surprise is waiting around every corner and the deeper I explore into the home, the older things seem. It almost feels like I’m walking backward in time as I open doors and peer inside. Most of them have collections of well-kept furniture covered in heavy white cloths, but I’m interested none the less. I can’t even imagine how much time it would take to fully explore every item in this place. How many generations of Volkovich’s had lived here? Had Nikolai even ever been in every one of these rooms?
It’s okay that he left me here. I suppose if he never comes back, Ivan would be the one to step up next and he would likely just dispense of me anyway. Right? Perhaps he is meeting with my father right this very minute. I wonder what my father would say. Would he barter for me? Would he try to get me back? I have to imagine that he will, just for the sake of his own pride. Allowing his daughter to be kidnapped by his apparent nemesis would not be a good look for a man in his position.
Yet, my mind keeps drifting back to the last time I saw him. We met for lunch at a restaurant that he used to love. Just a little cafe that made sandwiches the way he likes with good, strong, brewed tea. Some blend that they made on the location. That is one thing that he was always passionate about, and I would always tease him that it was his inner Brit coming out. He never understood my love of coffee.
The last time that we met, he had ordered coffee though, and when I had attempted to tease him about it, he said that he always drank coffee. He was different… and at the time I had just assumed that he must have been under a lot of stress. He had given me ledgers to balance like he had always done, some of his minor holdings to make me feel important but when he had left, he had called me by a nickname that I had never heard before. I wrote it off as him just being a jerk who doesn’t really care, but what if it was something else? He was paranoid, on his phone, and even less talkative than normal. Perhaps I should have asked him more questions, pressed for more information or something.
I tried to ask him if he had been seeing his doctors recently, but he hadn’t wanted to answer my questions. Even attempting to ask if he was still taking his medication was met with opposition. I hadn’t thought much of it, he didn’t like whenever I tried to ‘mother’ him. I didn’t think I was, but my father was always so insistent that he was the adult and parent, and that I shouldn’t think about stuff like that. He had it handled. He always had it handled. At least that was what he said.
Why did I always just accept that as fact?
Maybe I should have pushed more, insisted that he needed to let me in, and made sure that he was actually taken care of.
Now I have to live with the knowledge that possibly the last conversation I ever had with him I had rushed through because I wanted to get it over with. I had gotten so annoyed with him for being short with me, and I felt dejected. Perhaps I should have put forth more effort, made more attempts to close the gap between us, or understand him better. Who knows if I will have that chance now?