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“So, um, how did you get involved?” I ask, wondering where the line is before he tells me to stop asking questions. I’ll keep my curiosity surface level. No questions about how many people he’s killed.

“My family came here from Russia when I was thirteen. We were trying to find somewhere to live where there were more opportunities, but my father had trouble integrating into American society. It was just easier for him to join the bratva here. Everyone was like him, and everyone spoke his language. So, growing up alongside him, it came easily to me and I built a network of people I trusted.”

“How did your mother feel about it?” I ask. I wonder to myself where this person would be if he had remained in Russia for his whole life. Obviously, we would have never met, and that thought bothers me more than I want it to.

“She resented my father for it. She chose to go to night school to learn the language and become a nurse. Whenever he came home injured from one of his failed missions, she’d refuse to tend to his wounds out of spite. Not a healthy relationship by any means, but I respect her reasoning,” he replies.

I pause before asking more questions, assuming that he’ll tell me what he wants to tell me as the night wears on. It looks like we’re going to be out here for a while, and I might as well save some of the questions for later.

“It was scary at first, because my father was new to the enterprise and was sent on all the shittiest missions. He came home hurt a lot, and when I was younger, I would beg him to give it up and find something else. But he was stubborn as hell, and eventually he was able to rise to the top and start bringing in real money. That really pissed off my mom,” he continues.

I’m shocked that he’s giving more details of his own volition, but I’m not about to complain. Besides, it’s interesting as hell to hear about. “Is that how you learned then? From him?”

“Yeah. He never turned his back on the life either. A lot of people go into the bratva expecting to get rich and live a lavish lifestyle just from association, but it takes real work. My father was willing to put in the work and taught me to as well. Without him, I have no idea where I’d be.”

Now that I have some context for Saint’s story, I feel like I can trust him more. He’s had plenty of chances to hurt me if he wanted to, but all he’s done is try to protect me whether I knew it or not.

8

Saint

Even though I found her to be stuck up and self-righteous when I first met her, I’m really starting to like having Holly with me. She might be completely removed from every aspect of my life, but in a way, that’s what I need right now. I’ve gotten so caught up in the increasing pace of the bratva’s operations that I’m running myself ragged.

It might not have been the most intelligent decision to tell her anything about who I am or how I make a living, but seeing how interested she was made it easy. I hate having to be so guarded around everyone all the time, and now that I’ve spoken to her a little more now, I don’t feel as if she would be vindictive about it. I’m trying to make a better impression after we got off on the wrong foot, and so far, she doesn’t seem to be objecting to any of it. I just have to keep a cool head in the event that she challenges me somehow. I’m the only one here who knows how to survive a dangerous situation overnight. That, at least, is obvious.

Seeing how small she is as she walks alongside me makes me feel like I want to protect her. I force the feeling to dissipate, or at least be suppressed. I can’t have mixed emotions about her right now. It would be a horrible time for me to get distracted. I told her it was stupid to ask if I thought she was pretty, and I was right. It’s not the time for either of us to even be introducing the idea of flirtation into the equation, but now that some interest has been confirmed, it’s just as hard for me to not think about it. I’d feel like a hypocrite if I were to initiate something with her, but depending on how much she likes me, she might not care to begin with.

This might be a bigger struggle than I thought it would be.

The fact that she’s curious about my feelings at all signals my curiosity heavily. I’m frustrated with this response, stealing away my focus like I’m still in my early twenties. I haven’t allowed a woman to take up very much of my mental space in probably ten years. The bratva has needed me, and I could never forsake my family, my birthright, for a woman.

Not to mention, most women don’t even want to be involved with someone like me unless they’re just as caught up in the money as every other naïve idiot. They say they can handle it, that they won’t get upset with me if I have to leave in the middle of the night, but they always do. The glamour and status that comes with the lifestyle isn’t worth it to them for long, and they’re not even the ones who have to work for it. In a way, I really should have known better than to even try with some of them, but I was too lonely to see through it all. Maybe I was expecting too much just by hoping they would like me enough to see through it all.

Holly hasn’t spoken much, and I can’t help but wonder if she’s having the same thoughts as me. I haven’t even asked if she has a boyfriend or even a husband, but right now I doubt it would deter me if she were to touch me even just a little. I don’t have enough blood in me to spare for her – I hardly have enough to get me through the night.

But I can’t stop wondering about the possibilities.

“So, what do you think we’re going to have to do for the night? Like, have you ever had to stay outside overnight before?” she asks.

“I have a couple of times, but I was a stupid teenager who could have survived anything if I had enough caffeine and a gun with me. This time is going to be a little different. It’s also way colder than it’s ever been any of the other times. Why? have you stayed outside overnight before?” I reply, secretly hoping she has any survival training at all.

She laughs a little, which doesn’t give me much hope. “Um, nothing really. I mean, my family tried to go camping in the winter one time just to say that we did it, but our portable heater died on the second night and it was impossible to justify staying out anymore.”

“Damn, is that really something that rich families do sometimes? What the hell is the point?” I ask, dumbstruck.

“What makes you think my family was rich?” She asks defensively. She’s crossing her arms over her chest now, and I’m not sure if she’s trying to keep herself warm or look confrontational again.

“I don’t know any other kind of person who would choose to sleep outside in the freezing cold just to say that they did it. That’s some rich people shit. It’s just like climbing Mt. Everest or hiking the Appalachian Trail. Nobody who isn’t rich has the time and resources for dumb shit like that.”

She’s silent for a bit, and I assume that I’ve pissed her off somehow with my comment. I was just trying to be honest, but something I’ve picked up about wealthy Americans is that they hate it when people acknowledge that they’re wealthy. It’s weird to me, because in Russia, people don’t get defensive about having a lot of money. Just about having too little.

It takes around an hour total for us to come to a clearing at the top of a steep cliff. We’re able to overlook the rest of the forest, and relatively close in the distance, I can see the next city over. The moon is bright enough to illuminate the space around us, and for the first time all night, I can actuallyseeHolly.

She has short blonde hair, which usually isn’t my taste in women, but admittedly looks great on her. It cascades over her face in a messy, disheveled way that looks sexy and rebellious despite her strait-laced lifestyle. I can’t tell if her eyes are blue or green, but they stand out as the moon lights up her pale, paper-white skin. She has great lips as well, and I find myself lost in the thought of kissing her even as we race against time to find a place to sleep.

I’m beginning to lose sight of the reason I chose not to pursue her in the first place. Maybe I was trying to be a bigger man than someone else would have been. Taking advantage of a situation like this for sex is the kind of thing I’d expect a letter person to do.

But to be honest, it’s getting more difficult for me to resist her. Even if I were only to sleep next to her for warmth at first, I can imagine it would lead to sex sooner than later. She doesn’t strike me as beingeasy,but she gives me the impression that she can be adventurous under the right circumstances.

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