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“I will.”
Once the door is closed behind him, I consider his warning of telling Phoenix now. It’s what she wanted from the beginning. Maybe if I had known I would have told her.
I’m glad I didn’t. She would have walked away from me. If I were a better man, if I really wanted to protect her, I’d walk away from her. As long as we’re together it will be there, a bomb waiting to explode.
I can’t.
The universe has a sick sense of humor sending me my fate in the form of a woman who will make me pay for everything I did wrong, knowing it wasn’t just wrong, it was evil. I knew selling another human was vile. The first time I heard it, deep within me everything screamed no. Only I was too weak to go against my father. Too weak to even share my misgivings aloud with Milos.
Yet in the same fashion there were things we only said between us, no words needed—we both bristled. If ever Father mentioned a shipment among us we recoiled from it. But we steeled ourselves and did it, the same way we tortured and killed when necessary.
I am not the man Phoenix deserves. I never claimed to be. I’m a selfish bastard. I cannot let her go. I will give her everything she needs, all of me is hers. I will make her so happy by the time we get to the end she won’t regret loving me, giving me her whole heart. I can do this.
Sixteen years ago when her father sold her to my father, I was twenty-two and living an indulgent life anyone would envy. Two years previously my father mentioned the cargo coming in didn’t bleed. I thought he meant men who would be sold to farms and factories. Not all human cargo were for sex trafficking. When he clarified they were women, disgust filled me, I didn’t know what age a girl started her period, but I knew it meant they were younger than teenagers.
What if I had said something then? Would I have saved her from being sold? I shake my head. It was the argument all over again. If we didn’t do it someone else would.
Except it’s bullshit. It’s one thing to sell drugs and arms. They were things—inanimate objects. Not a human with thoughts, feelings, pain we caused them.
Phoenix appears in the doorway. I hold out my hand to her. My whole fucking body goes tense in the ten seconds it takes her to get across the room and take it. I tug her into me, holding her close.
Everything in me eases at her soft body against mine. She needs me as much as I need her. Phoenix doesn’t want to know any more than I want to tell her. So I’m not going to tell her.
* * *
Phoenix
Consciousness slams into me with the force of an out-of-control train straight to my chest. I’m in his arms with my head on his chest.
Fear sends me from him, jacking upright, terrified I might have hurt his wound again. Even in sleep Aleksander frowns at letting me go. Yet in another moment he eases back into sleep. I’m riveted, unable to take my eyes off him.
Yesterday we hid from it, neither of us talking about anything other than what we were both thinking. He sat up in bed, working on his laptop. I read a book while we pretended nothing was wrong. Even while he worked he demanded I be close to him until I gave in and laid my head on his lower thigh. We both found comfort in it, from time to time he would stroke my hair and when he did I melted further into him. Then we both simply fell asleep, no plan or preparation.
Today I can’t hide anymore. I wish I had a way of taking a picture of this moment to have forever. Only it’s not possible. I’ll have to leave my phone behind, not like I know where it is anyway.
Closing my eyes, I hate the way my lungs stutter at the idea of this being the last time I see Aleksander. Except it has to be now. Before I don’t know where I end and he begins. Before I give in to this stupid teenage infatuation with him. That’s it. That is all this is. For some bizarre reason I’m not afraid of him, so my stupid body is giddy and desperate for more. It’s not what I think it is and it could never be.
I fucked up. I am too stupid to live if I stay. If I give into this man and the fantasy he’s offering. Because this is a fantasy, it isn’t real life. It can’t be. There’s too much blood and misery on both sides.
His father sold me.
Aleksander and Milos were afraid of me because of the trafficking their father did. That they did, until Milos decided otherwise. It didn’t matter they didn’t want to do it. If the FBI wanted to, it would be easy to convict every one of the Levins for trafficking.
I recall how surprised he sounded when I brought up Ray. How is that possible? How is it someone might ask how we met, and I would say it’s when I warned him that I was going to make his family pay for killing my uncle, but he thought it was for his father selling me when I was seven years old? What an amusing little mix-up, don’t you think?
No, no, it’s not amusing. It’s fucked up on a level I can’t even comprehend. This farce of a marriagehasto end.
Slipping out of bed, I refuse to look back as I cross to the walk-in closet. It takes way too long to get a skirt on and I’m so frustrated I’m nearly in tears trying to button a blouse with one hand. I pick the white slip-on sneakers and am relieved at how easy they are to put on.
I turn and find Aleksander filling the doorway.
His smile destroys my resolve. “Finally wearing your clothes. I was worried you didn’t like them.”
“I didn’t wear the clothes because you don’t buy me. It wasn’t about not liking the clothes.” The clothes were beautiful, I’d love to wear all of it.
His frown is scary. “What do you mean, no? It isn’t about buying you. You are my wife. I will need to attend events with you at my side. You will also come to the club. And as hard as you make me in the shirts and boxers, you can’t wear that around the condo all the time. No man is allowed to see you wearing what most women do after a night of sex. I don’t need anyone thinking of you and sex—Milos will be pissed if I kill anyone else. We aren’t supposed to be killing.”
“I have clothes. Bring memyclothes.” Kill…what does he mean we aren’t supposed to be killing? With how dumb I realized I am, I kind of thought it was a given Aleksander was a killer.
