Chapter 40
The sound of a backfiring car has me jumping out of my skin. In seconds, I’m off the bed and at the window. The parking lot is quiet in the gray dawn, and the lights of a nearby diner flicker on and off, advertising all-day breakfast.
Turning back to the bed, I look at Kesera’s blond curls, and Nadia’s tiny body huddled on the pull-out bed. They both look so fragile. So easily damaged.
I’m standing with my back to the window when I hear a knock. Dex stands on the landing outside. Opening the door a crack, he gestures with his thumb at the pull-out bed.
“Better wake the kiddo. We’ll head out to get pancakes and bring some back to you in an hour. The two of you stay inside and keep a low profile.” He walks past me to the rumpled bedding that covers my daughter and tickles a foot that’s sticking from beneath the sheets. “Rise and shine, sleepyhead. Pancakes with sausages and syrup wait for no man.”
There’s a groan, and then a little voice pipes up. “I’m not a man.”
“Sausages and pancakes wait for no kid either. Come on. You’ve got five minutes.” Dex strides over to Kesera, who is curled on the bed. “Breakfast order for me to bring back?”
She opens one eye. “Whatever you pick is fine. Can I sleep a bit longer?”
“We leave in ninety minutes at oh-seven-thirty.”
“Kay.” She sits up when Nadia squeals as Dex tickles her. He swings the little girl over his shoulders before setting her on her feet and handing a sweatshirt to her. Nadia stares up at him sleepily.
“Pull that on and brush your teeth, and then we can get going. If we’re on the road by seven-thirty, we’ll be there before nightfall and you can all relax.”
“Is there a TV?” Nadia asks.
“Sure, kiddo. I bet there’s a TV, but only for little girls who brush their teeth and eat their breakfast,” Dex says, taking Nadia by the hand and pushing her into the bathroom before heading to the door. “I’ll wait outside. Send her my way.”
The door slams behind him, and we’re alone in the room for a moment.
Kesera sits up, brushes the hair out of her face, and rubs her eyes. Mornings with a woman are a foreign country. I don’t know what the rules are.
But if we have an hour . . .
My eyes follow Nadia as she skips out of the bathroom and bounces toward the door. “Do you want me to bring back pancakes, Daddy?”
I walk toward her and put my hand gently on her head. “Sure. Whatever you like, you can get for me.”
She beams up at me like me being happy with the same breakfast order holds the secrets to world peace. “That’s great. I’ll get you the best stuff.”
Upon seeing her smile, a tight knot in my chest unfurls and I breathe more easily.
I let the door swing closed and walk back to the bed as Kesera emerges from the covers, somehow even more beautiful when she’s untouched by the day. Instead of meeting my eyes, she crosses the room to a black duffle bag and begins to rifle through it. I walk behind her to put my hands on her shoulders. Freezing, she stops and then stands, her back against me. Her body quivers.
Pulling her closer, I whisper into her hair. “You smell of jasmine and roses. I remember thinking it strange that you smelled of spring flowers when we were surrounded by snow.”
I lift her hair and breathe in the scent of her neck, pressing a line of kisses up to her ear. She sighs and leans her neck against me and looks up. I fall into the green water of her eyes. She stares for a moment, and then her dark lashes lower and she sighs.
“Zolotaya.” I don’t have the right words. “What can I say to make you feel better?”
“You can say that you’ll stay forever and we’ll all live happily ever after.” She chuckles as if she knows it’s a joke.
I pause and wrap my arms around her waist, pulling her body into the shelter of mine. “There’s no one else in the world I would rather be with. But this is bigger than us.”
I want to swing her into my arms and carry her to the bed like a bride, but one arm is still bandaged up. Instead, I lead her gently to the mattress and lie down beside her, watching the soft morning light glinting off the gold of her curls.
“I’m afraid.” She smiles sadly. “Not of what you’ll bring to my door. Of how I’ll feel once you’re gone.”
“I’m here now.”
She puts her hand on my shoulder and stills.
I can’t tell if she’s pulling me closer or pushing me away, so I lay my hand over hers and ask, “Is an hour long enough to show you?”
“Show me what?”
“All the things I don’t have the words for.”
A strand of bronze-and-gold hair lies across her mouth, catching the sunlight. I brush it away and trace the shape of her pout with my fingers before I lean down, pressing my lips to the side of her mouth, her chin, the fragile skin of her eyelids. I have never kissed anyone so slowly. I bury my fingers in her hair, just breathing her in before I move my mouth against hers, sliding my tongue between her lips. She wraps her arms around me, tracing my muscles through the soft cotton of my shirt.
Her lips are so soft. Her hair is a cloud of sunshine. I’m inhaling her as if she’s as necessary as air.
She pulls back, her hand cupping my cheek as she smiles at me. Her eyes look like spring leaves in this light. They change color like the woods.
“It’s real, you know,” I say, turning my face into her hand and pressing a kiss to her palm. “Everything you remembered is real.”
“I know,” she breathes, her fingers tracing the line of my cheekbones and feathering across my brow.
There’s more to say, but I don’t have the words for it. The feelings are bigger than anything I can form into speech in English or in Russian, so I just stare at her, trying to memorize every line of her face, the creases around her eyes from her smile, the fullness of her mouth.
She looks at me with as much wonder as I feel.
I kiss her and she slides her hands under my shirt and against my skin, scoring my pecs with sharp fingernails until her hands dive beneath my waistband and cup me softly. She watches me silently as she slides her hands around me. We stare at one another for a moment before she slips lower under the covers, her mouth level with my cock as she gently sucks the tip between her lips.
“Fuck. Jesus fuck.” My eyes roll back in my head as her mouth envelops me and her hands beat a rhythm at the base of my cock. It’s such bliss that I want to lie back and soak it up, but the minutes are slipping away from us like sand in an hourglass.
“No, baby,” I grit out, and she pulls up the sheet, her eyes wide.
God, the sight of her looking up at me, her curls tumbling around my hips and her mouth full of my cock. I can see the smile in her eyes, and I laugh and shake my head.
“No. Not like this. I’ve waited so long for you.” I pull her up, kissing her deeply and rolling her onto her back. “I want...”
She widens her legs, nothing on under her long t-shirt, and wraps me in the cradle of her hips. “I’m ready,” she whispers.
I reach down and thread my fingers through hers, pressing her into the mattress as I hold my body above her and feel the heat between her legs.
“Fuck,” I say. “Sucking me made you so wet.”
“Wanting you made me this wet.” She smiles up at me.
“Yesterday morning in the woods. I’m sorry I didn’t use protection. I wouldn’t put you in danger like that.” My smile is wry. I don’t need to spell out all the other ways that just knowing me will ruin her life. “Zolotaya. I promise. I’ve never taken chances like this with anyone else.”
I look down at her, searching her eyes for the answer to a question I didn’t quite ask, but she bites her lip and nods. I slide into her so gently, so slowly, feeling every cell where we join as I look in her eyes. We’re so close it’s almost painful, so I tear my eyes away and bury my face in her neck as I groan against her skin.
“Only you, zolotaya. It’s only ever been you.” Feeling her heat against my bare cock, I repeat the words like a prayer as I rock into her body. “Only you. Only you. Only you.”
She gives a breathy sigh each time I bottom out inside her, her legs wrapping tighter around me, arms wound around my neck, her hair a golden cloud against my face, fingers twined around mine.
“Vadim,” she whispers, “I need to see you.”
Leaning back, I look down. She’s gazing up at me, her eyes glimmering with unshed tears.
“Did I hurt you?” I hold still, wanting to tear into her body but too terrified to hurt her more than I already have.
“I promise I’m happy.”
I wish this could go on forever. That the door wouldn’t open in minutes.
I shut my eyes and lean down to kiss her, joining with her everywhere. My skin slides against hers, our bodies slick with sweat as I press her hands into the mattress. I grasp her fingers and with each kiss and movement of my lips on hers, with each rocking motion of our bodies, I tell her about the tides of emotion I don’t have the words for.
She pulses around me as I let go of all the things that can’t be and the things I wish I could have had. I pour them into the heat of her body and her wide-open heart. She’s everything I want. Everything I can’t afford to keep.