Chapter 16 Dimitri #2
So I push the soup aside (still untouched) and pull another file toward me. More names. More dead ends. More questions without answers.
But Mrs. Kozlov’s words won't leave me alone. They circle in my head like vultures, picking at the carefully constructed lies I’ve been telling myself.
Coward. Running. Weakness.
I force my eyes to focus on the file, on the investigation, on anything that isn’t the uncomfortable truth she just forced me to confront.
But it doesn’t work. Not really. Because now that she’s said it, I can’t unhear it.
And somewhere in this massive, empty house, Vera is awake. Worrying about me. Caring about me despite everything.
The thought makes me want to punch something.
Or walk upstairs and—
No. I slam that thought down hard. That’s exactly what I can't do. What I won’t do.
I pull up another file and force myself to focus and ignore the truth Mrs. Kozlov just shoved in my face.
But the soup sits there on my desk, growing cold. A silent reminder of everything I’m running from.
But Mrs. Kozlov is right about one thing. Avoiding Vera in this house is impossible.
The estate is massive with thirty rooms, three floors, and grounds that stretch for acres. With a full staff, it was easy to maintain distance. She’d be in one wing while I was in another. Our paths would cross occasionally, but briefly, in controlled situations.
Now, with most of the staff gone, we keep fucking running into each other in ways that make the avoidance obvious, awkward, and painful.
Like yesterday morning. I went to the kitchen at dawn for coffee, thinking I’d be alone. Instead, I found her there, already making tea, her hair still messy from sleep, wearing one of those soft cotton nightgowns that somehow makes her look more beautiful than any expensive dress ever could.
We’d both frozen and at each other across the kitchen like we’d been caught doing something wrong.
“Sorry,” she’d whispered, looking like a deer in headlights. “I’ll—I can go—”
“No. Stay. I was just—” I’d gestured vaguely at the coffee maker, my brain refusing to form coherent sentences because she was so close and she looked so soft and I wanted—
We made our drinks in silence. When I reached past her for the sugar, our arms had brushed, and the contact sent electricity through my entire body.
She’d gasped softly and I was frozen, my hand still extended, our faces suddenly too close.
Then I grabbed the sugar, mumbled something about work, and fled like a goddamn coward.
Or this afternoon. I’d been heading to my office when I saw her coming down the hallway from the opposite direction. We’d both slowed, our eyes meeting and holding for a beat too long.
The hallway isn’t narrow. There’s plenty of room for two people to pass comfortably.
But somehow we’d both moved to the same side. Then corrected to the other side. Then stopped completely, standing there like idiots, and the air between us had become so thick with tension I could barely breathe.
“Sorry,” she’d said, moving right.
“No, I—” I’d moved right too, blocking her again.
We both stopped and laughed, a small, strained sound that did nothing to ease the awkwardness.
Then I pressed myself against the wall to let her pass and she had to slide by me in that space, so close I could smell her shampoo
For those few seconds, I’d forgotten how to breathe. I had forgotten every reason I should stay away from her and I wanted nothing more than to reach out and pull her against me and—
She hurried past, her cheeks flushed, and disappeared around the corner before I could do something stupid.
Every encounter is like that. Awkward as fuck and loaded with everything we’re not saying.
She looks at me, and I have to look away before I do something I can’t take back. Like pulling her into my arms and kissing her the way I’ve been wanting to since that night in her room when we almost—
I slam that thought down hard. Not helpful.
I force my attention back to the files, to anything that isn’t the memory of her lips so close to mine, her hand in my hair, the way she’d looked at me like she wanted—
My phone buzzes. A text from Roman.
Still no leads on the bomb components. The supplier trail went cold.
I curse and type back.
Keep looking. There has to be something.
But I’m starting to wonder if there is. If maybe whoever is doing this is too good, too careful, too protected by people I trust.
The thought makes me sick.
It’s two a.m. and I still haven’t slept. Coffee cups litter my desk (evidence of my spiral into obsession). My eyes burn and my head pounds. But I can’t stop. Not when someone is out there, planning the next attack, waiting for another opportunity to—
The door opens.
I look up, expecting Mrs. Kozlov with another punishing lecture and I’m already forming the words to (respectfully) tell her to go away, when they die on my lips when I see who it is.
It’s Vera.
She’s wearing a robe over her nightgown, her hair loose around her shoulders, and her eyes shadowed with the same exhaustion I feel. But there’s something else in her expression too. Determination. Frustration. Worry.
“You should be asleep,” I say tiredly.
She frowns. “So should you.” She doesn’t leave. Instead, she walks further into my office, her eyes tracking over the chaos I’ve created. There are papers everywhere with photos spread across every surface. The evidence of my obsession laid bare.
“Go to bed, Vera,” I respond, not liking that she’s seeing the physical state of my mind.
“No.” She crosses her arms. “Not until you do.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine.” Her voice sharpens and she glares at me. “You’re killing yourself. I know you haven’t slept in days. You haven’t eaten, yes I know that. Mrs. Kozlov says you’re not even touching the food she brings you. This isn’t healthy, Dimitri.”
“I said I’m fine.” I turn back to the files, a silent dismissal. “Now go to bed. You need rest. For the baby.”
She laughs harshly. “Don’t use the baby as an excuse to avoid this conversation. You’re avoiding me”
My jaw clenches, irritated she’s caught on. “I’m not avoiding—”
“Yes, you are.” She moves closer to my desk, and I can see the anger building in her eyes. “You’ve been avoiding me for three days. Ever since that night in the library when we talked about Alexei. When things got—” She stops and swallows, suddenly looking unsure. “Complicated.”
I stay silent. Admitting that things got complicated would mean acknowledging why I’m avoiding her and it means confronting feelings I’m not ready to face.
“This is literally insane,” she continues, gesturing at the chaos around us. “You can’t keep doing this. You’re working yourself to death.”
“Why do you care?” I ask harshly, not wanting to hear of all the ways I’m fucking up.
Her eyes flash. “Because someone has to! You’re going to collapse, and then where does that leave us? Who protects us then?”
Us. That loaded word again.
I laugh, but there’s no humor in it. “There is no ‘us,’ Vera. You’re here because of a treaty. Because your family—”
“I’m not responsible for what they did,” she cuts me off, her voice rising, her cheeks turning pink with irritation. “I didn’t pull the trigger. I didn’t plant those bombs. And I’m tired of you punishing me for it. I’m sick of you treating me like—like I’m the enemy when I’m—”
“When you’re what?” I push back from my desk, standing. “When you’re my wife? My responsibility? Another person I have to protect while someone out there is actively trying to kill us both?”
“When I’m trying to help you!” She snaps as she steps closer, closing the distance between us. “When I’m worried about you. When I care about—” She stops, like the words are stuck in her throat.
“Care about what?” I demand, suddenly in her space without meaning to be. “Say it. Care about what?”
Her breath hitches. We’re so close that I can see the gold flecks in her brown eyes and smell her shampoo, vanilla and flowers. We’re close enough that if I just—
“You,” she whispers. “I care about you. And I know I shouldn’t. I know it’s wrong, but I can’t—I can’t watch you destroy yourself like this.”
My whole body is humming at her admission. The right thing to do is to pull back before this becomes something neither of us can take back.
But she’s looking at me with those beautiful brown eyes, and she just admitted she cares about me, and I’m so tired of fighting this and pretending I don’t feel it too.
“You can’t keep shutting me out,” she says, quieter now. “I’m not going anywhere. Like it or not, we’re in this together. So you can either let me help you, or you can keep pushing me away until—”
“It’s safer.” I cut her off roughly. “If I keep distance between us. It’s safer for both of us.”
“Why?” She takes another step closer. “Why is it safer?”
Because if I let you in, I won’t be able to let you go. Because every time I’m near you, I lose a little more control. Because I’m falling for you, and if I admit that, everything changes.
But I can’t say any of that so I just shake my head. “It just is.”
She scowls. “That’s not an answer.”
I shrug. “It’s the only answer you’re getting.”
Her eyes narrow. “You’re impossible, you know that? Stubborn and impossible and—”
I don’t know who moves first. Maybe we both do. Maybe the distance between us has been shrinking this whole time, gravity pulling us together despite every logical reason we should stay apart.
But suddenly there’s no space left and her hand is fisted in my shirt and my hand is in her hair and our mouths are crashing together with a desperation that steals the breath from my lungs.
This isn’t like the almost-kiss in her bedroom. This isn’t tentative or questioning. This is need and frustration and three days of avoidance exploding into something we can’t control.
She gasps against my mouth, and I swallow the sound, kissing her harder, deeper. My other hand finds her waist, pulling her flush against me. She’s soft and warm and perfect, and I’ve been starving for this without even realizing it.