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“We tried regular movie night, and it didn’t go over so well.” I ate another handful of popcorn. “Damon had the audacity to criticize Jason Momoa as Aquaman. Then there was this whole discussion on Marvel versus DC Comics and people ended up in the MMA cage in the gym.”
Yuri shook his head and returned his attention to the screen. A single knife flew through the sky and killed soldiers on its left and right.
“This is…” He looked lost for words.
I snickered. “A really terrible series? Did I forget to mention that it’sbadmovie night?”
“That’s a thing?”
“Oh yeah, once a month, actually. We watch awful movies or series and then criticize them. Angel comments on the costumes and Damon on the martial art techniques.”
He shook his head. “That’s just weird.”
“Wait, shut up. Here comes the best part.”
I turned back to the screen, hiding a laugh as Yuri excitedly waited for the flick to get better. It didn’t. I knew because I’d watched the ‘best part’ two times already. A raccoon turning into an elephant was not best. It wasn’t even good, but it was fun.
An hour into the series, I got up. “I’m going to get some more popcorn. Can I get you anything?”
“Beer.”
Yuri’s eyes were fixed on the screen. Despite his grumbling and mumbling he’d been doing, he was hooked.
***
KRISTOFF
I stared at my bloody hands. Had it only been an hour ago that I’d helped my brother rescue his soon-to-be-adopted daughter? I needed to wash this filth off me, but I needed a drink first. Going upstairs to the wet bar seemed too far, so I trudged toward the kitchen. It was late and the corridors of this wing of the house were abandoned. Good thing too, as I felt dried blood pull tightly against my skin.
My footsteps echoed in the hallway, just as they had in the warehouse where I’d grabbed a guy by his collar to demand where Hector’s little girl was. Already it was a memory that I needed to put into the steel vault of my mind. Because if I thought about it too much, the rage that infused me could prove to be crippling.
Oddly, though, the man’s face had seemed somewhat familiar.
Ah, yes. I had killed his brother on a raid a year ago.
“Where’s the girl?” I had asked him.
“We don’t have any girls here. If we took a girl from you, it would be the pretty one who lives in your house.”
I hadn’t thought. I’d just slit his throat. Blood had trickled between my fingers as I’d watched him die.
No one could mention Katya to me like that and be allowed to live. No one deserved to know of her existence, let alone watch her from far away, scouting my one weakness. She was everything that organ-trafficking asshole hadn’t been—kind, caring, and, most of all, brave.
Being with you, but not really being with you, is not living.It’s just existing.
I stared into the fridge, her words still echoing in my mind. How could I ever do right by her, when I had even failed to avenge my own mother?
“Kristoff.”
My heart did a weird thud when I heard her voice behind me. I turned and found her standing in those damn yoga pants. The thin fabric clung to her thighs, but it was nothing compared to the tank top that showed a hint of her toned belly.
I wanted to grab her and hold her. My day had been filled with darkness and the filthy part of a sinister world where people sold children to harvest their organs. Katya was like a breath of fresh air.
She put an empty bowl on the counter. “Are you okay?”
I shook my head. When she stepped toward me, I held up my hand, palm facing her. She had to stay away from me.
I couldn’t let go of the reins. I could use her to cleanse me, but that would only turn her pearly white soul into a dingy gray one. Soot like me could never touch one like her without smudging her.
