Chapter 26Vasily
Vasily
When Ana and I envisioned our escape six years ago, there were no penthouse apartments or sprawling estates.
We knew we would struggle, that we wouldn’t be able to pass off better educations than we had and any fake IDs I managed to score for us were barely going to fly at fast food.
We’d never pass anything that needed background checks.
Ana would probably have to start as a cashier at a bakery before working up to the kitchen, and I’d be lucky if I could do any better than day laboring out of a hardware store parking lot.
I had some cash and Ana had some stuff she could sell.
There’d be enough money to get by for a couple months.
But we’d need jobs before we could sign a lease, and our home would be modest.
The house we get in Denver— an Airbnb Sasha rents for us because we can’t communicate with anyone back home or use our own cards without potentially outing ourselves— is what I imagine we would have had.
It’s small and rickety, with a kitchen that hasn’t been updated in thirty years, linoleum that’s warped and yellowed, and walls that are stained a similar color, from the bygone era of smoking inside the home.
The pipes squeal no matter the shower pressure, and the radiator has to be whacked with a ratchet so frequently that it’s six hours before I’m sending Dima into town to buy a bundle of firewood and an ax.
I’ve never taken down a tree before, but I will figure it out if it means I’m not pausing every five minutes to beat the shit out of the heater.
Dima’s pissed that there are only three bedrooms, one of which is just big enough for a bed, but it’ll be fine for the five of us while we get this to work out.
We just need long enough for Janson and Benedetti to coordinate meetings with Kostya and Tony so they can both be taken down at the same time— there’s legit concern that if we don’t time it right, someone’s going to get spooked— and they’re both already trying to make moves on my empire.
They’re going to schedule their own executions without Janson or Benedetti lifting a finger.
Kseniya proposes that she and Ana bunk together, as will Alex and I, so Dima has the little room to himself. I immediately shoot that down because my wife is sleeping with me, of course, and we’re still squabbling about it when Alex and Ana arrive.
“I’m going to be sleeping right there,” Alex says, already stretching out on the sofa in the living room, “unless there’s anywhere that’s closer to the fire.”
He makes a good point.
“We can run to the store and buy a pile of blankets for Ana and me,” Kseniya says like it’s a foregone conclusion that Ana will bunk with her .
Ana wants to agree to that. I can see it. She’s looking ragged right now, and although she’s changed into clean clothes, she’s been in the car for half a day and her hair is still matted from the fake blood they used.
“The private bathroom is in my room,” I point out. “That shower works really...” I told myself not to lie to her anymore. “Mediocrely, but it is a shower.”
She’s down for mediocre shower.
Kseniya clicks her tongue. “If Alex is sleeping out here, there’s no reason for you to have the master suite.” Which is a strong word for a ten-by-twelve. “Ana and I can sleep there and you can have the other room, alone.”
Everyone nods like this is logical. I refuse to accept logical, so I pull out the big guns.
And by that, I mean I take off my hoodie and toss it over my shoulder.
Ana’s eyes glaze over. She practically salivates. I know what she wants.
She wants that hoodie.
“Come on, let’s go take a shower together. I’ll wash the fake blood out of your hair.”
To Kseniya, she whispers, “I’m sorry, I’m weak,” before she toddles after me.
Ten minutes later, she’s making the extremely aggressive claim of, “I’m not weak, Vasya!”
But she slipped up. She called me Vasya .
I was scared at first when her memories started to come back— but then it hit me that she already knows my worst. She just needs to start remembering the best. She loves me. She just doesn’t remember it, and no explaining from anyone else will be enough.
And she’s claiming to not be weak because I’ve just made my move and let one of my hands stray from the completely chaste washing of her hair to a casual groping of her chest.
“I didn’t say you were weak,” I tell her as I roll the supple flesh over my fingers.
“No, but you need to give me a chance to decide for myself if I forgive you, and you’re not.”
“Because you don’t need to forgive me right now,” I murmur, focusing my coordination on my hands so I don’t mess up her curls as I massage the soap in as well.
It’s the second round, but the water’s still running red.
I’m worried she’s dyed it on accident. Not that I mind, but I don’t want her upset if part of her dark chestnut hair gets a permanent red tint.
But also, my dick got hard the second she took her clothes off, and I’m trying to rest it against her back without stimulating it too much.
“I’m not going to have sex with someone who ruined my life!”
I’m not about to point out that she was seduced by a hoodie that I’ve worn for half a day and probably smells more like the TJMaxx we picked it up at than me.
I’m not going to point out that I haven’t ruined her life either.
I know I haven’t. I know that I made it harder than I should have, and I know that I could have done a better job of protecting her than telling Dima I didn’t want to know what was happening in her life. But I didn’t ruin it .
Nothing I say now will help my cause, so I curl my fingers into her hair, tugging it into my fist, and tip her head to the side so I can lick the long, delicate curve of her shoulder and neck.
A tremor runs straight through her body, bending her spine, grinding it into my shaft, making me groan her name as she whimpers mine.
I slide my hand from her breast down to the apex of her thighs. “Fuck, zvyozdochka, you move like that again, and I’m going to blow my load all over your back.”
“Stop!” she protests, but any true fight dies off when my middle finger wiggles in between her folds to swirl around her clit. She bucks back again, robbing me of my breath momentarily.
“You never mean it when you say that,” I chuckle lowly when I catch myself again.
“I do,” she pouts.
“You don’t.” Not when I scrape her most sensitive spot with my nail and her hand flies back to grab my thigh, to dig into the thick muscle there, to coax me into her. “You want this load in you pussy, don’t you?”
She drops her face to her other hand, the one that’s supporting her against the ancient, heavily-caulked, mildew-stained shower wall, and moans, “No, Vasya, no!” into her hand.
And then she pops one foot up onto her toes to go bow-legged, giving me space to slide my cock into her heat.
“Yes, zvyozdochka, you want me to fill you with my cum so you can grow another baby in your womb.”
I don’t know why that was the wrong thing to say.
I’ve said things like that to her dozens of times before.
I said it to taunt everyone watching our livestream in Flagstaff, foolishly putting my faith in her birth control pills even though she as good as told me she didn’t take them like she was supposed to.
I meant it every single time in Los Angeles because I was drunk on her, and despite my past convictions to keep her as far away from me as possible so I wouldn’t pass my curse on, I couldn’t let her go.
But the way she stiffens and then begins to shake, the way she brushes my hand away and spins in the space I’ve given her, facing me but not, her head hung down, I know I’ve said the wrong thing.
“I didn’t mean that,” I say automatically. I guess at the end of the day, I want her to have another baby, but that’s a lot right now and might be too real for her when I didn’t mean for it to be so serious in the moment.
“I can’t get pregnant again,” she bemoans with so much anguish I want to take it into myself and make it my own.
“Ana,” I sigh, not wanting to hurt her with the reality of the situation. “Are you sure you aren’t already?”
Her bottom lip actually warbles like this would be the most disastrous thing that ever happened to her and not an unexpected blessing at an unfortunate time.
Fuck me.
“No, Vasya.” She finally looks up at me with big, teary eyes before leaning into me so my shoulder will dampen her words. “When I had Artom, things didn’t go right. They had to do an emergency hysterectomy, so I—I can’t have any more kids.”
It’s . . .
It’s a lot.
For a second, all I can do is breathe as I absorb her words.
I’m a father, and I’ve never met my son. That will be rectified when this is all over. I’m going to raise my son.
But I’m never going to wait for a pregnancy test or know the feeling of my entire future getting rewritten by two lines on a piece of plastic. I’ll never hear the heartbeat for the first time. Ana and I won’t debate over whether we want to know the sex of the baby.
I’ll never feel my baby kick inside her belly.
I won’t be able to satisfy her cravings, regardless of what they are. No late-night pickles and ice cream, no raging hormones that can only be satisfied with good cock. No reassurances that she is my goddess as she grows with my child.
No Lamaze class.
I won’t ever truly appreciate the moment my child enters the world. I won’t learn how to hold a baby properly and still be terrified but in a manly way. I won’t wear my baby proudly in one of those baby backpacks. I won’t suffer disaster diapers or cheer on first steps.
I won’t know the feeling of my baby calling me daddy the first time.
For an errant second, I wonder how much this feels like the amnesia Ana has suffered through. Not nearly so extreme, and none of the fear, but I’m sure she’s grieved the loss of milestones she doesn’t know if she’ll ever get back.