CHAPTER TWELVE #3
Holding me tight against his chest, Sergei ambles across the living room and collapses onto the sofa.
He doesn’t speak, he just sits, holding me while rubbing my back and trailing kisses along my shoulder and neck.
I don’t want to leave this moment, I don’t want to leave his embrace, a quiet place in the midst of chaos.
I don’t want to leave the reassuring cadence of his heartbeat and the steady wave of each breath he takes.
But, soon, he takes me by the arms and gently pulls me away.
His hands move over my shoulders and up my neck, gently moving my head from side to side as he examines me.
And I let him, basking in his touch with the roughness of his callouses and the way his massive arms move around me as he gently wipes the tears from under my eyes.
“It was a monster,” I finally exhale.
“Yes,” Sergei replies. “But it’s gone now.”
That’s a fucking understatement.
“Why didn’t you just come in?” I sniff. “Why did you knock?”
“I didn’t want to scare you.”
“Scare me—” I scoff, unable to even finish the sentence. I take a deep breath, trying to compose myself. “What now?”
“Now I call the sheriff.”
He’s so matter-of-fact about the whole thing. Then again…
“You knew Caleb was here.” I knit my brow. “Why didn’t you say anything? Was it because of those texts? What did they say?”
“I knew someone was here before I saw the texts on your phone. Regardless of who he was, I thought it better you were preoccupied with Lutz’s stories. I realize you might disagree.”
I just blink. Was it better for me to believe that a mythical monster was stalking the property rather than a dangerously broken and maladjusted man? At first thought, I think not. But, then again, maybe it was.
Selfishly, I’m glad. This way, there was only Sergei, with no other human within miles to ruin my time with him.
“They’re going to want to talk to you,” he tells me a few minutes later when he gets off the phone. “Just tell them what you saw.”
I hear the sirens before I see the lights, a brigade of sheriff’s SUVs winding up the mountain and coming to a halt at the edge of the yard.
Sergei goes outside to meet them, leaving me on the sofa.
I glance down at my hands, which have finally stopped shaking.
Not long after, a deputy with black hair twisted into a tight bun at the base of her skull makes her way up the steps and knocks on the door.
When I let her in, she introduces herself as Deputy Dorsett and asks me to tell her what I saw, just like Sergei said.
And I do; the prints in the snow, the front door left open, the sounds on the porch, someone trying to open the door, and the figure in the trees.
Then I tell her about Caleb; the break-up, the aggressive texts, what Clay said about feeling like someone was in my house, and then what Katie told me about Caleb in her voicemail.
“He yelled and then kind of fell over,” I explain when I get to what happened outside. “When he let go of me, I ran inside and locked the door.”
“What happened after that?” she asks, jotting down more notes. “Did you go back outside?”
I pause, replaying the events in my head like a movie.
Tell them what you saw.
Should I tell them the rest of what I saw? Did Sergei tell them what he did afterward? The only thing more traumatic than what just happened would be if they cuffed him and took him away when it was that asshole, Caleb, who did this.
And got what he deserved.
I’m about to do just that, but then I hear a different set of words come out of my mouth. “I didn’t open the door again until I knew it was Sergei, until I heard his voice.”
Silence is the ironclad protection that follows such an act of devotion. And he’s the one I want to remain silent with.
Deputy Dorsett finishes her notes and walks into the dining room to make a phone call. I space out for a few minutes until I see her move back into my periphery.
“Your friend was correct.” She strolls back across the living room. “Columbus just confirmed a warrant was issued for Caleb Albrecht after he ambushed his ex-girlfriend and her boyfriend at her home.”
Letting out a long, slow breath, I lean back against the cushion and draw my knees up.
“I’m going to let Deputy Hilson know that we’re done here,” Dorsett continues. “Are you sure you don’t want to get checked out by the paramedics before they leave?”
What she means to say is that they need something to do since they’re not busy with anyone else.
But I shake my head. “No, no, it’s alright.” It’s not, but I’m not in shock and I’m not in any physical pain, so any help I might need won’t be found in the back of an ambulance.
She gives me her card and heads back out into the wintry night, leaving me alone once again.
As soon as she’s gone, I get up and scurry over to the window.
Peering out from behind the curtain, I search the darkness, split by the flashing emergency lights and the lamps on the shed.
Sergei stands with his back to the wood planks, another deputy squared up in front of him.
But I can’t tell from his stoic expression what’s going on.
Per usual…
However, the longer I watch, the more apparent it becomes that my worries won’t come to fruition.
The deputy reaches up and gives Sergei a nudge in the arm and then turns around with a wide grin, as though he’s laughing at a joke.
The corner of Sergei’s mouth curls slightly and he follows the deputy toward the boulders at the edge of the yard.
They wait as a stockier, muscular man with short black hair emerges from the boulders, hiking back up the hill attached to safety ropes. Even in the dim light, I can’t help but notice that he looks familiar.
Is that…Alex Barrera?
When he gets to the top and turns around, I see an emblem emblazoned on the back of his jacket with the words, SEARCH AND RESCUE. Soon, another man pops over the rocks behind him, also dressed in the same jacket and affixed to safety ropes. And when the light hits his face, I blink in disbelief.
Colson?
Once he reaches the top, he unclasps the ropes hooked around his waist and legs and joins Alex, Sergei, and the deputy.
Now it looks like they all know each other.
Then again, why wouldn’t they? I grew up in a small town; everyone knows everyone, they’re in everyone else’s business, there are no conflicts of interest, and if you’re nice, you get invited to the family cookout at the lake.
I bet this was the big excitement tonight in Gunnison.
Confident that Sergei isn’t about to be placed in custody, I decide I can’t watch anymore and turn from the window.
I need to calm down, so I trudge back to the bedroom to lie down.
As soon as I crawl across the blankets, perfectly smoothed over the mattress, I collapse on the pillows and exhale the weight of the Alpine night.
The bed is firm and familiar, like I’ve always slept here, a cozy cave on the mountainside in the middle of a snow globe.
I focus on my breathing and the reflection of the flashing lights on the bedroom wall.
I never knew those red and blue strobes could be so comforting.
Usually, they strike fear when I see them in the rearview mirror and think I’m about to be issued an outrageous speeding ticket.
Finally, my eyes get heavier and heavier as I start to drift in and out of sleep.
I don’t know how long it’s been, but when I awaken, I realize that the lights are gone.
There’s a series of rumbles outside as vehicles drive over the gravel and packed snow.
Everyone must be leaving. Soon enough, I hear the front door open and shut, and then Sergei’s heavy footfalls as he comes down the hallway.
A flutter sweeps through my stomach when I hear the click of the latch and I can’t help but smile in the darkness. I’ve just been attacked by some red-pilled psycho in the woods and my nerves are fried, but I still manage to get hot and bothered when Sergei Mikhailov walks through the door.
I’m facing away, but I know what he’s doing; the same thing he does whenever he walks in this room.
He comes to a halt at the foot of the bed and stops.
I know he’s looking, evaluating, and then deciding.
But he shouldn’t—not anymore. Moments later, the comforter swishes against his pants and I feel his weight on the mattress as it sinks down at my feet.
I roll over as he arrives at my shoulder, a daunting shadow in the dim light.
He plants one elbow next to me and bows his head until his nose nearly brushes mine.
“Printsessa…”
As if on instinct, I reach up, drape my arms over his shoulders, and gently take hold of the knot at the crown of his head.
With my other hand, I hook my finger in the band and start slowly unwinding it from his hair.
Careful to avoid knots, my hand hovers over his thick blonde hair until I pull the band free and his mess of wild waves falls over his shoulder and onto my chest.
“Is that better?” I murmur, running my nails over his scalp, releasing the tension settled on his shoulders.
He nods back softly, but remains silent, his iridescent eyes burning like embers. I could gaze into them, all day, every day. Now, I can’t imagine evading his stare like I did over Brett and Colson’s table. But, still, one question lingers on the tip of my tongue.
“What did you tell them?”
Sergei’s eyes shift to the window, and then after a few seconds, back to me.
“I saw you, I saw him, and I aimed,” he replies. “One shot. The blood showed them where to find his body.”
It’s the only thing I need to hear, because we both know the rest. I can debate right and wrong later, but tonight there is no justice except for which the forest doles out.
Now I see what Brett meant when she told me what happened to Bowen, when his story ended, and the laws of the forest could not be circumvented.