Chapter 17 #2
Yefrem arches a brow, saying animatedly, “It was a three-million-dollar Stradivarius.”
Their argument has the comfortable rhythm of something they’ve had many times before, and I end up laughing despite the violent images their words conjure. The normal moment of two friends bickering about past adventures makes the reality of their criminal lives seem almost mundane.
“Did you get the violin?” I ask.
“Of course, we got the violin,” Leonid says, “And nearly died in the process, but yes, we got the violin.”
I giggle in spite of myself because of the way he says it. “What happened to it?”
“I sold it to a private collector in Monaco,” says Yefrem. “We used the proceeds to buy safer transportation and better equipment.”
“And medical attention,” Leonid adds. “So much medical attention.”
“You were shot,” I say with a small gasp of horror.
“Grazed,” Yefrem corrects dismissively. “Barely worth mentioning.”
“Through-and-through bullet wound in the shoulder, plus shrapnel from the explosion, plus hypothermia from the rooftop escape,” Leonid lists systematically. “But yes, barely worth mentioning for you, since you had a scrape on your forehead.” There’s heavy irony in the last part.
The casual discussion of serious injuries disturbs me more than the abstract violence we’ve talked about before. These aren’t hypothetical dangers but real wounds on real bodies, and consequences of the choices they make every day.
“How do you live like this?” The question escapes before I can stop it.
“Like what?” Yefrem turns to look at me directly.
“Knowing that every job could be the one that gets you killed? Never being safe and never being able to let your guard down completely.”
“How do you live any other way?” asks Leonid with a half-shrug. “Life is dangerous whether you acknowledge it or not. At least we’re honest about the risks.”
“But normal people don’t get shot at. They don’t have to worry about explosions or rooftop escapes or?—”
“Normal people get hit by drunk drivers, develop cancer, and have heart attacks at forty,” Yefrem interrupts. “They die in plane crashes and house fires and random accidents every day.”
“The only difference is that we know who our enemies are.” Leonid speaks with conviction.
The philosophy is both logical and deeply unsettling.
I want to argue that there’s a meaningful distinction between random misfortune and actively courting danger, but something in Yefrem’s expression stops me.
He’s not trying to convince me his lifestyle is safe or smart.
He’s simply explaining how he’s learned to accept its risks.
“Besides,” Leonid adds, “Someone has to do the work we do. Someone has to exist in the spaces between legal and illegal and handle the problems that official channels can’t or won’t address.”
“What kind of problems?”
“The kind that require flexibility and discretion,” says Yefrem. “The kind that government agencies create through bureaucracy and politics.”
I think about Marcus Lang, corruption within federal law enforcement, and the blurred lines between criminal and victim in their world. Maybe Leonid has a point. Maybe someone does need to operate in those gray areas, even if the personal cost is enormous.
We stop for the night at a roadside motel that’s seen better decades. It’s the kind of place that rents by the hour, takes cash, and doesn’t ask questions, with thin walls and questionable plumbing but beds that are clean enough and doors that lock securely.
Leonid takes the room next to ours, close enough to respond to trouble but far enough away to provide privacy. The arrangement feels deliberate, and I wonder how much of our relationship is obvious to someone who’s known Yefrem for years.
“Are you having second thoughts?” asks Yefrem once we’re alone in our cramped but reasonably clean room.
I sit on the edge of the bed and consider the question honestly. “About coming with you? No. About everything else? Constantly.”
He joins me on the bed, close enough that our knees touch. “Everything else like what?”
“Like what I’m becoming. What I’ve already become.
” I turn to face him fully. “Two weeks ago, I was someone who returned extra change to cashiers and felt guilty about jaywalking. Now I’m an accessory to murder, fleeing federal investigation, and traveling with armed criminals to meet with corrupt officials. ”
“You’re surviving. There’s no shame in that.”
“Isn’t there?” I study his face, noting the way shadows from the single lamp make his features appear sharper and more dangerous. “At what point does survival become complicity? When do I stop being a victim and start being a criminal?”
He’s quiet for a long moment, considering my question with the seriousness it deserves. “I don’t know. That’s something you’ll have to decide for yourself.”
The honesty is refreshing even if it’s not comforting. “What would you do? In my position?”
“I’d do exactly what you’re doing. I’d make the best choices available from a set of terrible options and try not to lose myself in the process.”
“How do you not lose yourself? How do you maintain any sense of who you are when everything around you is violence and deception?”
He reaches up and touches my face with gentle fingers. “By holding onto the things that matter. By protecting the people who make life worth living.”
The way he looks at me when he says it makes my heart race not just with desire, though that’s certainly present, but something deeper and more complicated.
Something that feels dangerously close to love in spite of only knowing him a short time.
There’s a level of honesty between us in this compacted time frame that strips away pretense and reveals true, raw emotion.
“Yefrem.” His name comes out as a whisper.
“I know.” He leans closer, eliminating the space between us. “I know it’s complicated. I know it’s dangerous. I know it’s probably a mistake.”
“Then why?—”
He silences me with a kiss that’s different from last night’s desperate passion. This is slower and sensitive, carrying emotions that neither of us is ready to voice out loud. When we break apart, we’re both breathing hard.
“Because some things are worth the risk,” he finishes.
I want to argue, to list all the reasons why getting emotionally involved with a Russian crime boss is the worst possible decision I could make. Instead, I kiss him back, pouring all my conflicted feelings into the connection between us.
We undress each other slowly this time, taking time to explore and appreciate what we’re sharing. His hands map my body with reverent care, and I trace the scars on his skin with gentle fingers, each mark telling a story of survival and resilience.
When he moves over me, I look into his eyes and see everything I’m feeling reflected there. Desire, yes, but also tenderness and something deeper that scares me more than federal agents or rival criminals ever could.
“I’m falling in love with you,” I whisper against his ear as he joins us together.
He stills for a moment, and I think I’ve made a terrible mistake. Then he presses his forehead against mine and speaks in a voice rough with emotion.
“I’m already there.”
The admission breaks something open in my chest, and I hold him closer as we move together with gentle urgency. This isn’t just physical connection but the recognition of something profound and terrifying and absolutely irreversible.
Afterward, we lie tangled in the cheap motel sheets, and I try to process what we’ve just acknowledged. I’m in love with a man whose hands are stained with blood, whose notebook contains enough criminal evidence to destroy lives and considers killing a necessary business practice.
The woman I used to be would be horrified. The woman I’m becoming accepts it as the price of survival in a world I never chose to enter. “What happens now?” I ask, my head pillowed on his chest.
“We meet with Moretti and try to find a way out of this mess that doesn’t involve prison or graves.”
“And after that?”
He’s quiet for so long that I think he’s fallen asleep. Then he speaks, his voice carrying more vulnerability than I’ve ever heard from him. “After that, if we’re lucky, we figure out how to build something real together that isn’t just about survival or circumstances.”
“Is that possible in your world?”
“I don’t know, but I want to find out.”
I close my eyes and listen to his heartbeat, steady and strong beneath my ear. Tomorrow we’ll enter Washington DC, a city full of people who want us dead or imprisoned, but tonight, I’m in love with a dangerous man who loves me in return, and for now, that feels like enough.
Even if it terrifies me more than anything else I’ve faced so far.