“Yes,” he says, looking down at the ring again, and something in his whole face changes. “We weren’t planning it. But she deserves certainty. So, I gave her a ring.” He tilts one shoulder in a half-shrug that fails miserably at being casual. “It’s good to do the right thing, you know?”
God. Of course, he’s that person. Responsible, honourable, doing the right thing because it’s right, and not because anyone’s watching.
I fix my attention on the bottle in my hands, as if it can tell me how to be normal. “Congratulations, sir.”
“Thank you.” His thumb strokes over the metal absently. “She’s very angry with me most days,” he adds, a tiny smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “But she’s strong. Stronger than me.” He taps two fingers against his temple. “Keeps my head straight.” Of course, he would pick someone who can handle him mentally.
Something inside clicks into place whether I want it to or not. It’s reality shoving itself between me and whatever fantasy my subconscious was trying to manifest. He’s happy, building a life, and none of it has anything to do with me. “You must be excited,” I say, handing the bottle back. “New chapter and all that.”
“Da,” he breathes, a little puff of warmth in the frozen air. “New life.” Straight is the unspoken word my brain supplies. Very, very straight. He doesn’t need to say that part. The ring, the baby, and the fond smile do it for him. This should help and pour cold water over whatever quiet, steady thing’s been blooming in me since the first time he smiled at me.
If anything, it makes it worse.
It confirms everything I already knew about him and adds something I hadn't accounted for. He’s going to be a good dad. The kind who shows up, who gives a shit, and will leave this frozen rock in one piece because someone is waiting for him at home. “Does your fiancée mind you being stationed here?” I ask, more to make my own voice sound normal than because I need the information.
“She minds everything,” he says, but his tone is affectionate, not resentful in any way. “The cold. The distance. The fact that I sometimes forget to sleep when I work.” He shakes his head. “But she knows this is necessary for now. When I go home, I go home. Not like some men who keep one foot here, one foot there.” He has no idea he’s describing exactly the kind of fractured, never-belonging life I’ve grown used to.
For a second, it’s harder to breathe, but I swallow it down. “She sounds incredible,” I say.
“She is,” he replies simply. I’m happy for him. Really. He deserves good things. Safe things. A family. He’s not mine; he was never going to be.
That’s fine.
Fine.
I can control where my attention and my thoughts go; I’ve been doing it for years. I’ve known I like blokes since before I knew what the word for it was. Before the locker-room panic, and the fact that I was paying as much attention to the lads asthe girls. You hear stories about men sidelined and careers suffocated because they weren’t the right kind of soldier.
The safe kind.
I’ve worked too hard for the rank on my chest, the competence, and the tiny piece of respect I’ve carved out in a system that eats people alive. I’m not about to blow it all by getting sloppy over the wrong person.
Especially not over my superior officer on a foreign base in Russia, of all places. I repeat it in my head like a mantra — he’s engaged, straight, his fiancée is due in eight weeks, and he’s going to be someone’s dad.
This crush is a dead thing walking.
“Again?” he says, standing, offering me his hand. Something misaligns the moment our hands meet; it’s a brief failure of discipline. He hauls me up with an ease that says I weigh less than my kit.
No. Shut it down.
I let go as quickly as I can without making it weird. “Ready when you are, sir.”
We’re just shifting back into position when someone calls out from across the field. “Zakirov!” Both our heads turn automatically.
And there he is.
Ari moves quickly across the snow towards us. He’s not wearing a hat, which is completely insane. His long blond hair is pushed back, and his cheeks are bitten red by the cold. He’s in standard winter combat gear but somehow manages to look like he’s turned up to ruin someone’s life rather than do whatever logistical job his file says he does. He has the kind of face you’d call handsome right up until he turns his attention on you. Then it’s just dangerous.
He says something to Niko in rapid-fire Russian that sounds like a complaint, wrapped in an insult, wrapped inaffection. Niko snorts, replies in kind, and the two of them fall into that easy sibling rhythm that feels too intimate to eavesdrop on even if I could understand every word.
Then Ari’s attention shifts to me.
It’s not a long look, but it doesn’t need to be. In one efficient look, I feel like I’ve been sorted into some category I don’t even know the criteria for. Not a threat or important enough to be an enemy, somewhere in the territory of annoyance. Then he turns and walks away, throwing comments over his shoulder to Niko.
Only when he’s gone do I notice how tightly I’d been braced and let it go. “Did...” I start, then stop, swallow, and try again. “Did I do something to him?”
Niko barks a laugh. “Arseny hates everyone, don’t flatter yourself. He is an equal opportunity bastard.”
I should probably be reassured. I’m not. “He looked at me like I stole his favourite toy.”
