Chapter 35
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
MILA
I sat nervously in the diner booth and watched as Viktor walked into the place. He scanned the room and, without pause, made his way toward me.
He had barely slid into the booth when the waitress appeared behind him with a coffeepot.
“Coffee?”
He flipped over his cup. “Thanks.”
Neither of us spoke while she poured.
Only when she stepped away did he speak. “How’s your living arrangement going with Selena and her sister?”
I nodded. “Good. I think in the summer Selena wants to move in with her boyfriend, so I’ll probably be looking for a new place.”
He nodded. “Let me know if you need any help.”
“Thanks.”
“How’s school?”
I warmed my hands around my coffee mug. “Busy. I graduate in June.”
“Good.”
Silence hung between us.
Finally he spoke. “I just got back from Russia.”
I felt my breath hitch in my chest. “Did you see him?”
He reached into his coat and pulled out a folded envelope. “He wanted me to give you this.”
He pushed it across the table. It looked official, and it had a Russian logo in the corner.
“What is it?”
“You should look it over. You might have some questions.” His voice was gruff, and he was avoiding my eyes.
I ripped it open and scanned the cover letter. It was written in Russian.
Application for Declaration of Nullity of Marriage.
I reread the title in confusion. Further down, I saw both my legal name and Axel’s.
This can’t be real. This isn’t happening.
Then something cold and dark settled around me.
He wants me gone.
I frowned, still confused, still hoping I was wrong. “Are these divorce papers?” I studied the header of the page. “Is this a Russian law firm?”
My heart was thumping so hard I felt sick.
This had to be a mistake. He’s supposed to come back.
Viktor finally spoke. “Those are papers for marriage annulment on the grounds of concealed identity and abandonment.”
I still didn’t understand. Or maybe I just didn’t want to. “What does that mean?”
He had the grace to look pained. “It’s legally claiming that your marriage was never valid in the eyes of the law because of the reasons cited.”
I folded my hands on the table and stared blindly at the papers.
Never valid in the eyes of the law.
Meaning that my marriage to Axel was never real.
I lifted my gaze to Viktor, my voice flat. “So instead of ending our marriage, we’re all just going to erase it and pretend it didn’t happen?”
Viktor sat there. He didn’t look comfortable, but he didn’t speak.
I blinked at the ceiling as tears threatened to spill. “So that’s how it’s going to be.”
I stared past the ceiling tiles into nothing.
I felt nothing.
Except empty shock.
Axel was erasing me. Like we had never existed.
My voice trembled with tears, but I didn’t care. “It meant something to me, you know? This marriage was real to me.” I touched my chest. “In here.”
My voice broke, and I used the back of my hand to swipe the tears on my cheek.
I exhaled, squared my shoulders and looked Viktor in the eyes. “So what? Does he just want to start over there? Forget this ever happened?”
Viktor stared back at me with a steady gaze.
He didn’t speak, and I just sat there waiting.
I couldn’t take it anymore. “Are you going to speak?”
“You look tough. Are you tough?”
I shrugged in defeat. “I don’t know.”
“You either are or you’re not.”
I thought about my answer. “I survived being kidnapped.”
He gave me a short nod. “Then, yeah, you’re tough.”
“Does that mean you’ll talk to me?” I was desperate for answers. To questions I couldn’t articulate.
He leaned forward with both arms on the table. “Axel is currently in prison.”
I froze, stunned. Fear immediately followed. “In Russia?”
“He asked me to organize the annulment. I returned to Russia last week for him to sign. All that is left for you to do is sign the papers and mail them back to the law firm. Everything is paid for, and they will file.”
Axel had already signed?
I opened the document and flipped to the back page. There was his signature in bold strokes.
“He signed,” I said.
“Axel returned to Russia to bear the cost of his decisions.”
“He’s in trouble?” The nightmare that Axel was in prison was just starting to wash over me. “Because of me?”
“He’s been given the option of an alternative assignment or prison. Neither are nice choices for him.”
My mind raced, tripping over ideas and thoughts. “We have to save him.”
A ghost of a smile crossed his face, reminding me of Axel. “At this point, the only person who can save Axel is himself.”
“There must be something we can do,” I implored. Anguish, fear and something unnamed were churning inside of me.
“You living your best life is the best thing you can do for him right now.”
I refused to accept that. “No.”
“Your freedom is the reason why he’s there.”
Tears blurred my vision again as the truth of his words washed over me. I knew what he was referring to. I remembered Sergei’s lifeless body at the motel.
He had killed for me. He’d crossed the border, given up his job to save me.
“Do you think our marriage meant anything to him?”
His response was quick. “I know men don’t take the hard paths because they want to.”
“Why do they?”
“Because they have to.”
Because they have to. He knew, that night at the airport, what he was facing. I had thought he was meeting me back in Canada, but he had been trying to tell me that he had to go back.
I need you to treat this like goodbye.
Except there was no part of my being that could bring myself to erase Axel from my life. I had married him and he had become my husband, and now I had lost him.
I couldn’t erase him.
“I’m not signing the annulment. If he wants to end this, he has to do it to my face.” My stubborn tone covered up the heaving, rolling fear in my gut.
He gave me an approving nod. “Keep them. You might need them one day.”
“Is he going to be okay?” I knew I was asking something even Viktor didn’t know, but I would take any scrap of reassurance, any crumb of hope.
Give me something to hang on to.
Anything.
Viktor took his time as he thought about his answer. “I don’t know.”
My tears threatened to break me open, but I hung on by a thread. I swallowed hard. “Please.”
He lifted his eyes to me. “If anyone can survive where he’s going, it’s him, but…”
I waited for him to finish. “But what?”
“But I think you’d better focus on your future. As best as you can.”
End of June
Four months later
My new apartment was filled with laughter and the scent of candles and cake, and while everyone else took photos of us, I stood between Tanya and Selena.
“Mom, enough,” Tanya complained.
Everyone laughed.
“One more,” Gloria insisted. “It’s not every day that my baby girl graduates. This is a rare moment for our family.”
We smiled while her mom took five more photos.
“Enough,” Tanya scolded again, half laughing while trying to grab her mom’s phone out of her hands. “I can’t smile anymore.”
I spoke up. “And now we get to try the cake!”
Everyone immediately chorused their approval.
“Jordan.” I looked over at my friend. “Why don’t you tell us about our graduation cake?”
He grinned at me. “By popular request, this is a white chocolate vanilla bean mousse cake, which is a layer of sponge between the mousse, covered in a vanilla glaze.”
“It looks incredible.”
“How did you even make something like that?”
“This cake belongs on the cover of a magazine.”
Jordan grinned at me. “Want to help me serve?”
I took off my cap and followed him out of the living room and around the corner into my kitchen. I started to take the small plates out of the cupboard while Jordan removed the candles. “What time is our reservation tomorrow?”
“Six thirty.” I opened a drawer. “I think I have a cake server somewhere.”
Jordan didn’t answer. I looked up from my search and caught him standing and looking at my annulment on the fridge.
I paused awkwardly. My friends had been nothing but supportive of my choices, and they’d encouraged me to move forward, but I was stuck.
“I haven’t signed it yet.”
He gave me an understanding little smile. “You take your time.”
I nodded with what I hoped was a reassuring smile.
How could I tell him that all I had was time?
That time had stopped moving the day Axel left, and everything after that was just me moving through the hours without him?
I didn’t know how to erase my husband. I didn’t know how to pretend that the most important person in my world hadn’t existed.
Instead of dumping all of that on poor Jordan, I changed the subject. “Tell me how the latest restaurant plans are going. Who is this new investor that you have?”
November
Five months later
I stood in line at the Canada Post counter that was tucked in the back of the drugstore, sweating inside the thick raincoat that hadn’t been warm enough five minutes ago, when I was outside. I unzipped my jacket in an attempt to cool off.
“I can help who’s next.”
I stepped forward and placed my bag on the counter. “I need to send a letter, registered mail, to Russia.”
“Sure. Can I weigh it?”
I slid the heavy manila envelope across the counter, the same envelope that Viktor had given me to mail the annulment.
Without ceremony, the clerk weighed it and then measured it with a small tape. She typed things into her computer before looking up at me. “Do you want insurance?”
I stared at the formal envelope. Inside was the only piece of Axel I had left.
His signature.
I didn’t want to erase our marriage.
I didn’t want to dissolve him.
I missed him.
I reached across the counter and grabbed the envelope. “I made a mistake.”
She looked confused. “Are you sure? You don’t need insurance, but we do recommend it.”
“I’m sure.” I stuffed my small piece of Axel back in my bag, all the while fighting my tears.
December
One month later
I opened the back door of my apartment, which led directly into my kitchen, and I knew immediately something was wrong.
Bandit wasn’t lying on his bed in the kitchen.
Nor was he at the door, eager to greet me.
“Bandit?” I yelled, wondering if he was sick. I dumped my grocery bags on the counter and immediately moved to the living room to see if he was on the couch.
There, standing in my living room, was Axel.
I blinked, taking all of him in.
His hair was longer, and he looked tanned. And somehow he looked bigger than I remembered.
He stared at me, taking all of me in too.
The only one who seemed chill was Bandit, who lay at his feet and thumped his tail wildly on the floor.
I was frozen, yet somehow my lips still worked. “Axel.”
He pointed to the small Christmas tree sitting in the middle of my coffee table. “You finally got your fluffy tree.”
And I had ugly cried the entire time I had made it. “Yeah.”
He stared at me with the familiar intensity I had missed so much.
I was mesmerized by his beautiful, focused energy. My wildest memories never quite seemed capable of encapsulating how alive he made me feel in real life.
His voice was calm. “It’s been a while.”
“Almost a year.”
“349 days, actually.”
My lips trembled. Who knew the exact number of days they’d spent apart? Was this proof that he’d come back for me?
I was about to launch myself into his arms when I noticed the annulment papers on the coffee table between us.
He had taken the envelope off the fridge and opened it.
“Is that why you’re here?” I swallowed hard. “For your freedom?”
His voice was short, almost logical. “You signed the papers.”
Don’t cry. Don’t cry. Don’t cry.
“They’re all there.”
He nodded slowly. “Why didn’t you mail them?”
“I meant to,” I lied. “I’ve been busy.”
Was he really here just to pick up some paperwork? After a year of no contact?
I had been waiting for this moment, and this was not how I’d imagined our reunion would go. We were just standing there like two strangers.
I defensively crossed my arms. “You want your freedom?”
He answered with a look that told me nothing.
I could feel my face growing warm. My stomach filled with a scorching rage that threatened to burn me up if I didn’t do something. It was such an unbearable feeling I felt compelled to act.
I looked around, unsure if I should throw something, sit down or scream.
But anger took over and acted on its own. I stomped over to the coffee table, grabbed the papers and crunched them in my fist as I held them up to his face. “You want them, you can have them.”
I held the stack of sheets in front of his face and tried to rip them in half.
It was harder than it looked. And I was completely unsuccessful.
Frustrated, I flipped to the back and ripped off the signature page. “See this? I think this is the only page you really want.”
And then I ripped it in half, and then I ripped that in half. And then I ripped those in half. And I kept going until there was nothing left to rip.
With tears in my eyes, I flung the paper confetti at his face.
Except most of it barely took flight. A few scraps landed on his chest, but the majority of them floated down to where Bandit sat looking up at us.
“I waited for you,” I said, my voice raw and broken. “I never stopped waiting.”
He looked at me, and then some emotion crossed over his face. Hope.
Then disbelief.
And then slow understanding.
He moved like lightning, pulling me to him and lifting me into the biggest, most crushing hug of my life.
“Axel,” I wailed. My body knew the truth, but my mind was so damn confused.
“Oh my god, Mila.”
I was openly sobbing now, but I didn’t trust what was going on.
I wouldn’t believe it until I heard him say the words.
“Tell me.” I pulled back my head and put his face in my hands. I begged him. “Tell me.”
“I’m never letting you go,” he said with a ferocity that I’d missed.
“Do you mean it?”
“I came back to get you, not those papers.”
Completely still, I stared into his beautiful gray eyes and realized that the oxygen had come back into my life.
I had survived 349 days of not being able to breathe, and now I was finally coming up for air.
“I knew you’d come.” I laughed and cried at the same time. “But it was really hard.”
He squeezed me tighter and breathed into my neck. “You’re the only reason I’m still alive. Coming back to you was the only thing that kept me going.”
I pulled my head back again and looked into his face. “Are we still married?”
His smile was slow but beautiful. “We’re still married, doll.”
I swallowed hard, and my smile felt tremulous. “And it’s real this time?”
He kissed me long and hard. “It was always real.”
“Say it,” I demanded, looking into his eyes. “Tell me how you feel.”
In his expression I saw joy and deep emotion. “I would do anything, kill anyone and give up everything if it means that I can be with you.”
I whimpered with joy. “I love you so much.”
He kissed me again. “I love you too, doll.