Chapter 10 #2
“That’s different. You can’t assume to know me after such a short time we’ve spent together. You have no idea what I'm capable of. What I would do for the people I love. How far I would go.”
“Any person with someone to fight for would do the same.”
“Yes, but you don’t understand—”
“No, you don’t understand.” He roughly interrupted me, leaving my words on the tip of my tongue. “Being a killer means you have to be defective like me.”
“Defective?” That word, the way he used it, was almost as if he was dirty or unworthy, and I didn’t like it one bit. “You’re not defective.” I stated flatly.
He forced a smile, one that held so many years of untold suffering.
“You know less about me than I do you, kotyonok. You see, I am an illusion. I appear to people, the way I want them to see me. Not how I am.” Dark ruthlessness flashed in his eyes as he moved closer, the shadow carving around the harsh edges of his face.
Something squeezed in my chest tightly, making it a struggle to stop the blush from racing to my face.
I blinked, letting the words sit so perhaps I could understand.
“Are you a psychopath?” Was my rational response.
“Being a psychopath would be easier. They don’t feel.
I, however, do, and quite intensely. All parts of me.
” He chuckled, humorlessly. There was nothing funny about the question.
“Ever since I was little, I had this voice inside my head. Telling me things. Always being there, never leaving my side.”
“Was he scary?”
“You're asking me if I was scared instead of being scared for yourself. Just what kind of enigma are you, Blair?” He tilted his head, his eyes attempting to divulge me whole, like a black hole wanting to devour my soul.
But my mentor had taught me better than to crack under pressure. Hell, he taught me never to take any shit from any other Made Men. Probably the reason I got in over my head.
Sassing him with a straight face, I said, “You’re not the first monster I’ve faced, and certainly not the last.”
“You love attracting monsters.”
“Maybe the monsters just can’t keep away.”
“Maybe you don’t want them to stay away. Maybe what you really desire is to have one of them take you away from this place and make you feel… all the things you’re forbidden to.” His brutal gaze bore into mine, making my nipples harden and thighs slick with harbored tension.
I pressed my legs together, the throbbing point only increasing. “And which monster am I talking to now?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” His voice deepened, reverberating with a thicker intonation as if he wasn’t speaking for himself and there was someone else here with us.
“What’s his name?”
“Dya. His name is Dya.” Konstantin snapped his head to the side abruptly, grunting lowly as he rumbled a few incoherent words almost as if he was fighting himself. “Stop. Don’t try. Not now. I want to meet her now.”
The interaction was new to me, but I carefully observed, wondering if he was okay or needed some help. Reaching my hand out, I placed it over his.
He swayed his head back to me swiftly, making me his sole focus of attention.
His eyes were much more magnetic and alluring, as if to pull me under a spell.
His stance was taller, his chest broadened out and more rigid compared to before.
Attempting to draw my hand away, he kept a fortified, tense grip on it.
Right away at first impressions, even if they had the same bodies, Dya and Konstantin were two different personalities.
“Are you Dya?”
He released a heavy grunt, then darted his tongue over his lower lip as if he was tempted to bite me. More than that, mark me, as if I were some part of his property.
“Then you were the one who beat up those men who were harassing me.”
“I would have killed them if the other fuckers hadn’t arrived.”
“It wouldn’t have been necessary. I’m already traumatized from tonight.”
“That’s where you wouldn’t have a say,” he didn’t sugarcoat. “See, I don’t like when people touch what’s mine. Especially you.”
I didn’t know whether to be flattered or slightly worried, but Dya was trying to be on his best behavior, so I commended him.
“Thank you.”
“Anything for you, zaya.”
Another pet name, huh? To this threatening man, I probably looked like some kitten, but I had more of a bite than he thought.
While in my thoughts, my skin couldn’t help but feel the imprint of his gaze against it. Turning back to him as Dya just watched me, almost predatory, and he slightly copied my movements as if he was fascinated.
“You don’t really say much, do you?”
“It's a habit. Konstantin doesn’t like to let me out of my cage, unadvised. He likes to keep me tamed.
“And you keep him —”
“Tamed?” Annoyance grew in his tone.
“Protected. You keep Konstantin protected.”
“He doesn’t like to admit it, but… yes. It’s only ever been us. So it’s logical. He can’t do this all on his own. He’s weaker than me.”
“Weaker?”
He took my hand in his and pressed it to the spot above his beating heart. “Yes, weak. Weak here.”
My cheeks simmered with warmth.
“You mean emotionally?”
He nodded.
“But what about you? You must compliment one another in some way. You have what he lacks, and he has what you don’t.”
“It’s not like that. I only needed his body to stay alive. Otherwise, I would have killed the fucker as well.”
“Ha, you’re bluffing. You must have a weakness. Somewhere? Something? At some point?”
“Never. Nothing.” A reflective glint tattered in his eyes. “Well, not until now.” An innuendo was laced underneath his words.
Wait? Was he saying that I—
No. Right?
The notion of love was so far gone in my mind that it didn’t even make sense to fall in love anymore.
“Shut up!” He gritted forcibly, making me rip my hand from his.
“Fuck you, Kon, this is my time. You said enough, now go away. No, this isn’t enough time.
” They started to argue with one another as the features of his face started to contort, his brows knitted together just like a person fighting with another.
Several moments of them going back and forth, spewing insults in Russian, until he ended up facing away from me. His shoulders rigid, breathing heavy as he didn’t speak a word.
Uncertainty gnawed at my core.
Wondering who had won the match between the two?
“Kon?” I called out.
“Yes,” he sighed regretfully. “Sorry about that. That dick still doesn’t know how to behave.”
“Don’t apologize.”
“I should have warned you. No one likes to see something like that.”
“You’re not defective.”
“Didn’t you hear a word I said? Didn’t you see for yourself—”
“Never say you’re defective. You are someone who has a mental illness. Just like millions of people around the world. That doesn't make you a monster or anything like that. Do you know what it's called?” My hands touched his, trying to comfort him.
Kon’s eyes landed on our hands and then my eyes.
“I went to the doctor once to have it checked because one night Dya lashed out.” He began to confess, his lips thinning into a line.
“He went out on a killing spree, murdering whoever got in the way, and I blacked out completely. And that had never happened before. You see, I am the conductor monitoring him, allowing him to take over while he plays in his character. I have rules, guidelines, morals that should never be crossed, and we… had agreed on that. However, at that time I had no control over my body, and it had dire consequences, so I decided to keep others safe. I went to see multiple doctors. They said it was previously known as split personality, but more modern ones called it dissociative identity disorder.”
“Alright, and are you on any meds?” I needed to know more to see how I could help in any way.
“I was in prison. They did their diligence, and I took them, so it helped moderate my change in alter, but it was not always a guarantee.”
“And how did it make you feel?”
His large shoulder dropped as a sigh fled from his lips. “I’m not sure. You’re the first person I’ve actually talked to about this besides the doctors, obviously. But I don’t know. Dya has always been there, and I can’t imagine a life where he’s not. It’s weird, I know—”
I softly shushed him, not wanting him to talk about himself like that. Ever. “No, it’s not weird. Just because your normality is different doesn’t make it bad. It’s who you’re meant to be.”
His deep blue gaze pooled into mine like a swift tide brushing against the shore. Lingering there intently, patiently— letting its presence be known until it could no longer be ignored.
Soft flames of heat flared in my face.
Was there something on my face?
“What?” I said in a low, fluttered voice.
“Where did you come from, Blair Morgan? How are you such a bewitching woman?”
His voice was filled with lingering softness, and somewhere in between his gaze, it made my heart unfold and bloom like a rose.
Not used to this type of flattery, I made a joke. “I always said I was left behind by the aliens.”
“Oh please, don’t tell me you’re a conspiracy theorist.”
“Hey, there is critical evidence proving there is other life besides humanity. Besides, do you really believe we’re out here in the universe?
The God who is all-powerful and knowing would just believe in one race of imperfect beings while there is a whole cosmos out there.
” I shook my head, refusing to believe in a small impossibility.
“There has to be a world filled with magic and awe— one better than this one anyway. Without fighting, arguing, poverty, inequality, and killing. So much killing that we keep tearing ourselves apart. Families apart.” Indignation raged in my words, watching the world crumble and my family too as I had succumbed to the evil I spoke of.
He nudged me with his shoulder, his hand holding mine tightly. “Why? What happened?”
I had said too much. Especially to someone like him who was nothing more than a stranger… Yet for the first time in a while, this stranger made me feel normal.
“I…” My throat went dry, my nose scrunching as I froze, wanting to change the topic completely.
“What’s wrong with you, kotyonok?” he asked, his tone serious all of a sudden.
I raised a brow. “What do you mean?”
“You have that look, and that means some shit bothered you.”
“What look?” My pitch cracked.
His eyebrows pulled together, drawing a line in between them as he wrinkled his nose, and his lips formed a thin line.
The facade of a dark, mysterious stranger disappeared, making him look like a big, cute Doberman.
Perhaps a Siberian husky was more politically correct, but regardless, he looked absolutely ridiculous.
“This look,” he gritted out, signaling to himself.
There was that change in personality. Ironically.
A peep of laughter escapes my throat as I bite my lower lip to prevent myself from breaking out in a fit. Denying his claim. “I do not.”
“You do. You tend to do that when you’re annoyed. Happens quite often, if I do say so myself.”
Was he observing me?
Don’t know why, but that prompted a soft happy twitch in my chest. Distracting me from whatever else.
“Well, I am a very expressive person.”
“Mmhm.” He deeply sighed, not believing an ounce of my bluff.
Caving in and telling him because it felt safe enough to confess. “The head nun is on my case, and for the love of everything that’s holy, she refuses to give me a break. I swear, she hates me.”
“No, she doesn’t.”
“Oh, yes, she does. She would love to drag me to hell herself, then give me a compliment.”
“It would be hard to hate someone like you.”
“Why? Because I’m so special.”
His dark, heated gaze held mine. He took out a pack of cigs; his slender fingers grasped one, dangling it from his lips, and lit it.
Inhaling a long drag before filling the space between us with smoke.
Making the space feel tight and small, my heart began racing beneath my ribs. “Something special, indeed.”
A flash of light caressed the shadows of his face as something shot up in the air, and a loud boom followed.
Right on time.
My eyes flashed over, needing to break from his intense yet collected presence.
Focusing on the fireworks, which decorated the night sky in different neon colors and eccentric shapes, one after the other.
The wind carried the oohs and aahs as locals came out from their houses or looked through their fresco windows to admire the show.
I froze in place, trying my best not to let him get beneath my skin. Trying not to even look at him. I couldn’t.
Even sitting next to him made me unsure about myself, which was dangerous. Yet my recklessness loved danger. It was attracted like a moth to a flame.
There was no denying our physical attraction; fuck, I can only imagine the sex would be passionately delirious. We would fuck each other’s brains out, or at least until we would pass out.
Everything too thrilling only led to regret, falling tears, and broken hearts.
But I couldn’t afford that now.
My life wasn’t mine anymore, not only because of my religious obligations but also because I wasn’t only living for me. But for him too.
And if I’d dreamt of being reunited with him one day, then I would spend eternity alone, even if it crushed my silly dreams of love.
“Tonight has never been more beautiful,” his rough accent slipped out.
I recognized he was talking to me and replied subconsciously. Watching the scenery in the heaven above. “Oh, yes, it is.”
A deep ramble eased from his lips as he shook his head. “Not it, you.” Konstantin admitted.
That’s when I made the mistake of looking back, and the world slowed down to fractions of decimals. The mix of midnight blue clashed with earthy green. Entwining us in a duel of craving and aching for the other.
Two souls who, in the midst of tragedy and chaos, collided, just aiming, hoping they would find someone.
Slowly he leaned in, his face inching closer and closer, his musky, clean scent rendering me weak. The air in my lungs dispersed as anxious anticipation burned in my veins.
Was he—
Any thought ceased to be when his lips pressed against my cheek, etching his mortal existence into my skin before backing a centimeter away.
The air became tense, our eyes holding the same untold truth, and for some reason I knew nothing will ever be the same.
I blinked, preparing my mind. “What… was that for?” Surprised, as my voice tried to show little of it.
“For saving my life, again.” He emphasized as the corners of his lips lifted and contorted to a smile. One so rare and true, it made whatever was around us insignificant.
Damn him.
Damn me.
What was I going to do?
Because neither of us would survive this.