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Or he just doesn’t care.
“You don’t know me, but you will, soon enough.” His smile spreads like poison. His eyes are pure ice. “How old is that little boy of yours now, Katerina?” His eyes dance, and I feel cold pour into me. Glacial. Paralyzing. “He looks just like his father.”
My mouth goes dry, and I feel every bone in my body stiffen into stone. I’m frozen there, gripping my beer bottle so hard my knuckles are white. My head is spinning, questions breaking against my skull like waves on a shore.How does he know about Adam? How does he know what my son looks like?
How the hell does he know Aleks?
“My, my, such a timid little thing, aren’t you?” He reaches across the table, and to my disgust, brushes his knuckles against my cheekbone. I don’t even have the wherewithal to shudder. I’m completely paralyzed. Out of body. “I never took Aleksander for the kind of man who’d like a girl like you. Tell me—did you know what he was, before? Before you fucked him and had his baby?”
Tears, not of sadness but of rage, prick at my eyes. The man withdraws his hand and sits back against the booth, watching me as his smile sours. If I could speak, I don’t even know what I would say. If I could open my mouth, I might just scream.
“How disappointing. In truth, I thought you’d be a bit more fun.” He drums his fingers on the table, casting his gaze away from me for the first time since he materialized beside my table. “I thought you’d have a bit more spark. You’re just like this little town of yours—boring, and too small for notice.”
Heat floods my face. “Fuck you. You don’t know me.”
His eyes cut back to me, dancing.
I lean forward, but it’s barely my own conscious doing. It’s anger, pure and hot, melting the ice of fear off my bones. I look the man dead in the eye. “I don’t know who you are,” I say, my voice barely a whisper, quivering. “And frankly, I don’t give a fuck who you are. If you ever come near me or my son, I swear to God, I’ll kill you.”
His smile spreads again, slow and delighted. “Yes, that’s more like it. That’s the Katerina I was imagining.”
“Don’t imagine me,” I nearly spit out. “Go back to wherever the fuck you came from. I haven’t seen Aleks in years. And I don’t plan to ever see him again. Whatever fight you have with him, keep it with him.” I shove myself out of the booth and turn to walk away.
But I hear him sliding out after me. I turn around, slamming one hand on the table and one on the back of his seat, blockingthe man from getting up. We’re face to face, nose to nose. And a pulse of grim pleasure goes through me at the way his eyes widen slightly, as though I’ve caught him off guard.
“I mean it,” I snarl, keeping my voice low. “I know how to protect myself. And I swear to God, I’m prepared to.” Does he understand what I’m saying? Does he believe me? Does it matter, whenIknow that I have a Glock .42 in my nightstand—and I made sure I know how the hell to use it? “Don’t follow me.”
As soon as I turn my back on him, I feel all the fear and adrenaline crash back into me. I grip the strap of my camera bag, mind reeling, heart beating like a fist against the inside of my ribs. My body is moving of its own volition, walking me fast through the saloon and a crowd of drunk men in jerseys, out onto the street where the wind has picked up and is keening down the road. Head down, breathing ragged, I half-run back toward my office.
What if he knows I’m here? What if he knows this is my place? Was he watching me?I swallow, practically gulping. It smells wild and wintry out here, like rain. When I look back, I don’t see the man. He’d be easy to spot with his black getup and white hair.I need to get home. I need to get homenow.Almost mindless, I jog toward the intersection. I’ll walk until James can get me.
I don’t care what I do, as long as I get the hell away from here.
Chapter Two
Aleks
This? Here? This is the Podunk, middle of nowhere town where Katerina May was born and raised—this is where she comes from?
It doesn’t suit her. Not at all.The narrow streets and smiling people, the warm crowds on the sidewalk, the family restaurants. Lamp posts, street signs. It’s all too mundane. The girl I knew was made of fire. Cheer and bliss and sweet naivete, yes; but also, secretly: fire.
But then again—I really only knew her that night. That one night. Leading up to that night, she was no one to me; a pest, maybe. At worst. The annoying girl who blushed when she saw me. Every damn time. The little sister of my best friend from college. Until.
Until that night…
When I find her photo studio empty and the street deserted, I’m displeased. My intel told me that if she’d be anywhere, it’d be here. But I still have other addresses. Her farmhouse, outside the town limits, set back in the woods. Her mother’s house, not far from that. Her friend Lilia’s apartment in town. And of course—James’s house.
How is my old friend, I wonder? When we met at Dartmouth, I thought for certain he’d move to the big city with his business degree, get some kind of fancy corporate job. But no. Instead, somehow, he’s back here, back in this odd little backwoods town. Why? What coaxes a person back here, I wonder? It looks like a place I’d fly over. A place I’d forget the minute it was in my rearview mirror.
It would be nice to see James, I think, after all these years. But he’s not why I’m here. I have one reason to be here right now, and she’s nowhere that I can find.
Annoyed, I turn my truck onto the interstate, a rental, one I regret how much I like, and begin driving toward Kat’s farmhouse.
It’s dark outside, but streetlights from town run in streaks along the bottom of the fresh clouds that have been blowing in fast. In the distance, where the forest rises up like a tide of shadows, I spot lightning. It’s low, illuminating vast domes of dark cloud.Ominous. I don’t care much for that.
But itisominous. All of this is ominous. And worst of all—it’s my fault.
Something uncommon. And something I don’t generally care to admit. But if I hadn’t killed his brother, my gang rival Konstantin wouldn’t be here. Here, in this country. Here, in this town. Hunting down the girl he somehow knows I cared for, once. The girl I slept with, one night. Long ago. The girl I fell for, and walked away from.
