Chapter 2 #2
“Ilya!” I say, scrambling to my feet. Alarmed, I try to get between them, but neither of the men back down.
It doesn’t make sense. None of this makes sense.
I’m supposed to use whatever means necessary to get close to Ilya.
It wasn’t my fault Ilya came on to me! Adam always talks about how important it is to think on the fly.
He’d told me to use whatever opening Ilya gave me.
But I should have realized he didn’t mean this opening. “It’s fine. It’s fine!”
“You think you’re tough?” Adam growls, balling his hands into fists. “I take down guys like you regularly.”
Ilya lets out a dark laugh. “I doubt that. You’re an ant compared to—”
“Ilya! What a surprise!” somebody suddenly calls out.
Both Ilya and Adam tense and take a few steps back from each other. A blond man in an elegant suit approaches. He’s smaller than both Ilya and Adam, but something about him gets my hackles up.
“Silvano,” Ilya grunts. “Mind your own business.”
Silvano doesn’t react to Ilya’s hostility. “I thought it was you at the bar, but I wasn’t sure.” He turns to face Adam. “Sorry to interrupt. Silvano Cresci.” He hands a business card to Adam. “Can I buy you a drink, sir?”
Adam’s eyes snap to Silvano. Adam assesses him like he smells something foul.
I look between them, trying to figure out what the hell is going on with this new dynamic. Adam looks openly contemptuous now, not even bothering to hide it, and Ilya… He looked sexy before, all salt and pepper hair and beard with a gentle expression on his face. But now? He looks murderous.
It’s all because of me.
I’d been so sure this chance was what I’d been waiting for.
Why am I regretting all of it?
“We’re leaving,” I say hurriedly, taking advantage of Ilya’s distraction to grab Adam’s hand. I tug on it, but I feel like a child trying to convince his parents to go get ice cream.
“Go get your cello,” Adam says, his eyes flicking between Silvano and Ilya.
He has his cop face on.
Fuck.
He’s going to give himself away.
“Adam—” I start.
“I said, go get your cello, Micah,” he snaps at me.
Ilya curls his lip at Adam. “You’re lucky we are in public.” His accent is a lot stronger now.
Silvano laughs and claps Ilya on the shoulder.
“Yes, yes. We are all very big strong men here.” He looks at me, and I shrink away from him.
“Micah, is it? You played beautifully earlier. I’m a little biased, so I don’t think you were the best performance, but do let me know if you plan to come back.
I think Ilya and I would both enjoy hearing you play again. ”
Adam is raging. He doesn’t have to say a word for me to realize that this situation just went from heated to molten, and I’m well and truly frightened for what’s going to happen when we get home.
“He wouldn’t play here again if it was the last place in New Bristol,” Adam says harshly.
He’s ruining everything, and I don’t understand why.
“Now get your fucking cello so we can get out of this place.” Adam sneers at Silvano and Ilya, not even bothering to pretend to be a nice person anymore.
Before Silvano or Ilya can speak, I run to the back room. My heart is racing, and for a moment, I think about running.
If I could get out of New Bristol, I could get out from under Adam’s claws.
I could sell the cello to buy myself a way out of here. The thought makes a lump form in my throat, and I can barely swallow around it. My beautiful cello has gotten me through so much, and the idea of losing it…
But if it’s what I have to do to get out of this, then maybe I need to consider it.
I could start over again, buy a supply of the latest new drug on the market and dole it out as I get back to what’s so familiar it hurts — and hope that this time, I don’t get caught.
I’m too numb to cry, too afraid, but I let out a small, startled sound when a man steps up behind me.
He’s big, bigger even than Ilya had been, and I swallow hard. I think I saw him playing earlier, but I can’t be sure. It’s all sort of hazy now. “I— I’m sorry. I’m getting out of the way—”
“Where’s the cello?” he interrupts me.
My hackles instantly go up, but what am I going to do? I point to the case, and he grunts wordlessly before picking it up.
He handles the instrument with ease, carrying it through the club back to where Adam, Ilya, and Silvano are having a terse conversation.
“Here,” the big man says, setting the cello down in front of Adam with surprising care.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
“Don’t talk to that trash,” Adam snaps at me.
Ilya and the big man both bristle, but Silvano keeps smiling. I don’t know how he can remain so calm when everybody around us is ready to explode with rage.
“Now, officer… Adam? What precinct are you in?” Silvano asks pointedly.
“I don’t know why you think I’m a cop,” Adam says in clipped tones. “Now leave us the fuck alone, or I’ll call real cops down here.”
That doesn’t sound convincing at all.
Ilya takes a threatening step forward, but Silvano puts his hand on Ilya’s chest. “Understood. We’ll take our leave.” He motions to the big man, who grabs Ilya’s arm and starts dragging him away. Ilya looks over his shoulder at us, expression thunderous, but I avert my eyes.
Silvano shakes his head. “Poor Ilya. I didn’t expect to see him here at all, of course.” He reaches into his breast pocket and takes out another business card, this time offering it to me. “Let me know where you’re playing next, please. I’ll come support you.”
Adam snatches the business card from Silvano’s outstretched hand, ripping it in half and tossing it to the ground. “Listen, lowlife,” Adam starts to growl.
“Adam,” I whisper. “I won’t.”
“No.” Adam doesn’t look at me. “There’s a lot of shit you won’t be doing, Micah. Let’s go.” He grabs my cello, setting it down so he can roll it along the floor, and when he goes through the door, he slams the case against the doorframe.
I choke on a sob, my hand going to my mouth as I wonder how much damage he’s potentially done to my beautiful, beautiful baby.
Adam practically throws my cello into the back seat of his car, and I bite back another protest. “Get in the fucking car, Micah,” he tells me.
I get into the car, pulling my seatbelt on. “Adam, I—”
“Shut the fuck up, Micah,” he snarls. “I don’t want to hear anything from you.
Your mouth is obviously only good for one thing, and that’s not talking.
” He thumps his hand hard against the dashboard, making me flinch, before he starts up the car.
“I can’t…” He laughs, peeling out of the parking lot with all of the arrogance of someone who knows he won’t get into trouble for reckless driving.
“You told me to get close to him!” I wail, feeling like a small child all over again as I hug my arms against my chest. “You told me to get him to trust me. You said to do it no matter what! You gave me a thumbs up when Ilya was coming on to me!”
“You knew I didn’t mean letting him shove his tongue down your throat,” Adam says, slamming his foot on the brake as he narrowly avoids running into another car. “Or did you think you could get around this, get around me? You’re so damn lucky I love you.”
His words strike like lethal blows, and I can’t even absorb them as quickly as they land. Some small part of me whispers that if he really loved me, he wouldn’t treat me like this.
Then again, I brought this on myself.
I always do.
“Why’d you have to try to humiliate me, huh?” he asks, directing a scathing look in my direction even as he merges onto the highway. He pounds his hands against the steering wheel. “Fuck!”
“You told me to do it,” I whisper again, clinging to my seatbelt as tears start to spill down my cheeks.
“Yeah, and you did it by acting like a fucking whore. Do you know how much of a laughingstock this would make me if it got out?” Adam demands. “But it won’t. Because you aren’t going to tell a fucking soul.”
“I won’t. I won’t say anything!” I tell him around a small sob.
I’ve never even said anything about us dating. I know he doesn’t want anyone at work to know he’s gay, let alone that I exist at all.
“Oh, stop crying,” he says with that same disgusted tone he always takes with me when I’m like this, like I’m so pathetic that he can’t even stand to be in the same vicinity as me.
What he’ll do, exactly, I have no idea.
But I know I’m going to regret every choice I’ve ever made by the time the sun comes up.
I rest my head against the car’s window, closing my eyes.
Ilya had looked so pissed off, and I think that if Adam hadn’t been a cop, blows might’ve been exchanged. It doesn’t make sense. Ilya doesn’t know anything about me. Why would he have risked anything over me, someone he’d only just met?
It’s laughable.
Even Adam wouldn’t risk anything for me, and we’ve been together since…
Since he rescued me from the last person who liked to see me suffer.
Since he got me out of my drug dealing charges.
I shudder. I’d take all the beatings in the world if it meant avoiding seeing the source of my nightmares.
I wonder what nightmares someone like Ilya might have. I wonder, too, if he’d been trying to escape them when he’d come to that little bar.
Because if what Adam said is true, he probably has a lot of them.
I wouldn’t have expected a gangster to kiss so gently.
But it’s stupid to think about his kisses.
It’s not like I’m ever going to see him again.