Chapter 19 Ruslan
RUSLAN
“You’re kidding me.” Raven sits on the oak cabinet against the wall, lightly swinging her feet. “He was having an affair?”
The word makes my stomach churn as I drum my fingers against the table, nodding slowly.
A few hours after Ivy and I returned here, I called a meeting with the team.
Bradley’s still out of state, so he isn’t able to attend, and Cassian’s late, so Raven, Valentina, and I discuss the new detail revealed by Ivy’s friend.
Ex-friend?
“That’s brutal,” Valentina murmurs, seated across from me. “What a cold way to find out.”
“Maybe Moira really did think she was doing the right thing?” Raven suggests, tilting her head to the side. “As like a sort of protective… ness… thingy.”
“There’s nothing protective about that. If you catch someone doing something once, then you don’t need to catch them multiple times to understand that they’re doing something wrong,” Valentina replies.
“Does that apply to the Russians too?” I cut in quickly. “Or are the rules different?”
Valentina sighs. “Of course they’re different. Family and friends is one thing. Us and the Russians? That’s different.”
“But linked,” Raven points out. “Somehow.”
The door creaks and soft light spills into the dark room as Cassian enters, flashing an apologetic smile. “Sorry. Was bringing Ivy tea.” He passes Raven and pats her knee, then takes a seat on the other side of me. “So, what did I miss?”
“Camden’s passport that you and Ivy found in the house, with a different name?” I rub my jaw, tracing the prickle of facial hair. “He was having an affair.”
“Have we confirmed that?” Cassian asks. “There’s no chance Moira is lying?”
“About a dead man?” Valentina scoffs.
“No, about the woman.” Cassian’s gaze darts between us. “She exists, right?”
I meet his eyes. “You think he was having an affair with her?”
“It’s possible, right?”
“Nope.” Raven pops the P as she speaks. “I mean, it could be possible, but I already used Camden’s finances to track a few ‘business dinners’.” She quotes her fingers in the air. “CCTV shows that he was definitely getting cozy with a young, hot brunette. Not Moira.”
“Do we know who she is?” I need to know. Regardless of whether she’s connected to anything important, knowing who this woman is might give Ivy some peace.
She was painfully silent on the drive home and I couldn’t bring myself to ask her anything in case I disturbed whatever thoughts she was trying to untangle.
It bothered me, though, and it still bothers me.
I’ve spent the past two months trying to help and protect her, but how do I help her with this?
To suffer so much and then learn that her family was falling apart under her nose?
“Nope. No clue. Camden always paid. All I know about her is that she's young and beautiful.”
“Typical,” Valentina mutters. “What is the point in that? If you’re unhappy, just end things. Cheating is beyond scummy.”
“Agreed,” Cassian says, drumming his fingers on the table.
“So we have the Russians and Italians refusing to be at peace, we have Ivy’s assassins still at large and her father’s killer, and the only lead we have that might not be a lead is a woman her father was having an affair with.
” Cassian glances at all of us in turn. “Does that about cover everything?”
“And the plane,” Raven reminds him. “We don’t know who brought down the plane.”
“We don’t know a lot of things,” I murmur, slowly standing. “I know it’s not much, but finding out who she is might lead us somewhere. I don’t know where, but until we get a break in the plane case, we’re stuck.”
“I’ll reach out to my contacts in the cops,” Valentina says, pushing away from the table. “Maybe they’ve found something else out and haven’t shared it yet.”
“Cassian, you can help me track down some info on this woman,” Raven says, sliding off the cabinet. “I also want to run a search on tattoo parlors since Kraven still insists that the tattoos are a set-up.”
With a small plan in place, we exchange goodbyes and I head through the apartment in search of Ivy. I find her up on the balcony, wearing nothing but her jeans and a pink tank top as she stares out over the city. Her eyes are red but there are no more tears lingering on her lashes.
“Ivy?”
She flinches and glances over her shoulder. “Hey.”
“Thought I would find you here.”
Ivy turns back to the city and nods. “It’s kind of peaceful. More peaceful than in here.” She taps her fingers against her breastbone. “Or up here.” She taps her temple and sighs deeply, sounding utterly exhausted.
“I’m sorry about what happened today.”
“Me too.” Her upper lip swells slightly as she runs her tongue along her teeth. “Me too.”
Standing next to her, I gaze out over the city. If I squint just enough, the city becomes a dark pool of water with droplets of color shimmering across the surface from all the lights blooming to life as darkness rolls across the sky.
“I have no idea how I’m going to tell my mother.” Ivy’s pained voice echoes with the hollowness of grief. “When she wakes up, I have to tell her Dad is dead and oh, by the way, he was having an affair and about to divorce you.”
Bracing against the railing, I slot my hands together and angle my body toward her. “Do you have to tell her?”
She nods. “On one hand, maybe she already knows and it won’t be a shock.
On the other, if I don’t tell her and she finds out, then I’ll be just as shitty as Moira.
God.” Her head hangs low and she presses her thumb and forefinger to her eyes.
“How did things get this fucked? I mean… What the hell happened?”
My heart throbs. I wish I had answers for her. I want to reassure her, but nothing will be able to ease her pain. Only time will truly soothe her.
That doesn’t stop me from trying, though.
“Sometimes, life deals a bad hand,” I say softly.
“But we can do our best to work through those cards. Look at you. You survived the plane crash. You pulled through the kidnapping and you walked away from the house explosion. Yes, it’s shitty, but you’ve survived.
You’re not the same woman you were, and this with your father is just the next bad hand. And we’ll deal with it.”
“Do you think it’s linked?” She lifts her head and fixes her dark eyes onto me.
“My father’s affair and that picture of him with Kraven?
I thought he was just a banker, but he was photographed with the Mafia.
I thought he was a loyal father and it turns out he’s a cheater.
Do you think there’s any kind of connection there? ”
“I haven’t ruled it out. Men in this world have done worse for less,” I reply gently.
“So you think there is one?”
“No, I’m saying there’s a possibility of one. I can’t see one, but that doesn’t mean there isn’t one. You and your father, your mother, the plane and the affair… we have the pieces right now. Something connects them.”
“Fuck…” Ivy puffs out her cheeks and groans. “Two months ago, my life was so simple. Almost boring.”
“Do you miss it?”
She shakes her head. “I thought I did when I was with Moira, but she…” Ivy presses her lips together. “It hurts, don’t get me wrong. But when Moira was telling me all those things, it felt so… small. Like I’ve been through so much that her lying to me doesn’t hurt as much as I feel like it should.”
“Perspective is everything. Your values have changed.”
“Maybe. I hated her in the moment, but now…” Ivy faces me fully. “I think something broke inside me.”
Leaning up from the railing, I step closer. “How so?”
“In here.” She presses her hand to her chest. “Everything comes hot and fast and then it’s just gone. Like I’m empty and numb. Something broke, and I can’t feel things properly anymore.”
“Ivy, you’re in shock. You’re protecting yourself from bad news, and that’s normal. Plus…”I smirk, trying to lighten the mood. “Your knock to the head would have had the opposite effect. Just try to focus on the good like your–”
In a sudden surge of movement, Ivy throws herself forward and clutches at my shirt with both hands, then drags me down for a kiss. Her lips are warm and soft, her cheek sticky with salt from her tears and her grip betraying everything desperate about her in that moment.
I can’t blame her.
But this isn’t right.
“Ivy!” Despite the hunger that surges inside me like the roar of a beast, I grasp her shoulders and push her back until the kiss breaks.
“What?” Her eyes flash with anger. “You only wanna touch me when I’m stuck in bed?”
“No, that’s not—”
“Are you not attracted to me?”
“I am.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
“Ivy…” How do I tell her? How do I find the words to explain that my growing feelings for her scare me? That they run deeper than a physical attraction to her beauty?
I’m utterly attached to her strength and her little smile when she thinks no one’s looking, her tender heart when she made it her mission to make Cassian feel better, her thoughtfulness that floods her mind as she tries to make everyone happy.
She’s soft, despite her pain, and every time she looks at me, I feel an urge to stand a little straighter, smile a little wider and be a little better.
I can’t tell her any of that, though.
“Well?” She glares at me, her grip unwavering on my shirt.
“I’m not going to be a pity fuck for you that you’ll regret in the morning because you’re feeling low,” I say. “I’m worth more than that. We both are.”
Her lips part, but rather than letting go, she steps closer to me until all I can breathe in is her soft, cotton scent.
“I know. I don’t want a pity fuck. I want you to fuck me exactly how you want to because out of this whole, entire mess, the only good thing I have left is you.
Don’t you see? I don’t want you to grant me a pity fuck like I’m some sad little girl.
I know you like me. I see you watching me, and I like you too.
Everything you’ve done for me, even now being by my side…
you can’t tell me you don’t feel that this is so much more. ”
Her chest heaves as she talks, and when she steps forward once more, I relax my grip.
“I want to feel good. I want you to fuck me like the man you are. I want to turn my brain off and melt into something that only exists between us. And I know I won’t regret a thing in the morning. So fuck me, Ruslan. Fuck me and make me forget everything.”
If I were a stronger man, I’d need more persuading.
I’m not a strong man, not when she’s right in front of me with wide eyes, pouty lips, and a sinful demand.
“Fine,” I reply. “But remember you asked for this.”