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“No, No, Tasha said her house. She will make room,” Ilya said. Tess didn’t know if Tasha agreed to it or not. Ilya was a force when she wanted to be.
“It is already paid for, Ilya. Mathias is not used to all the people. He will need to get away.” She stole another glance over at the man, who she couldn’t imagine sleeping on Tasha’s couch. And if he got the couch, where would she sleep?
“How is the baby?” Ilya asked. She must have decided Tess was right.
“She is good, no worries,” Tess replied. The baby was the last thing on her mind at the moment. “You come to the hospital, then go to Tasha’s. I will see you when I get there.”
As Tess hung up, she leaned her head against the back of her seat and shut her eyes. Now she needed to make a hotel reservation.
“How was everyone? You talked to more than one person, right? And a doctor?” Mathias asked from beside her. Had he been paying attention to her call? How could he have known she spoke with two people?
“Yes, I spoke with Mama and Ilya. How did you know?” She looked over at him.
“Because after a while, you started to speak a mixture of Russian and English. We are getting a hotel, so you don’t have to stay with your niece.” He smiled at her lie.
She stared at him in shock. She did not speak English. “No, I do not think I did.”
“Speak English and Russian interchangeably? Yes, you switched over every few words. But you talk a lot faster in Russian.”
“It is the language I was raised on,” she finally admitted. “I do not have to think as much when I speak it.”
“You have to think about English?” he asked.
“I did not learn English until I was six, so yes.” She hated telling people that.
“When you went to school?”
She shook her head. She had to tell him; after all, he would know all too soon. “No, when I left Russia. I did not go to school until I was closer to eight.”
“You’re pulling my leg, Tess. You have no accent. Your niece has an accent,” Math said.
Chuckling, she said, “And Tasha was born in Wisconsin.”
“Why did you come at six?”
“Eight. We came to the US when I was eight. We spent eighteen months in England, waiting to come over. I first learned British English. I was the only one who could speak it when we came over,” she told him, watching his face for any sign he thought she wasn’t like other girls.
“And now? Do they speak it now?”
“Most do, but Mama does not, and Papa does not want to.”
“You talk in your sleep all the time. I thought you were just mumbling, but you were speaking in Russian.” He tucked a curl behind her ear, and his hand lingered as it skated across her jaw.
“I do not talk in my sleep.” Nobody had ever told her that before.
“Not going to argue the Russian part?” His hand caught hers and held it.
Still holding his hand, she turned away and mumbled, “My dreams are in Russian. Almost always.”
“You once said you were in speech therapy. Was it for your accent? I assume you used to have one.” He squeezed her hand, not letting it go as he drove.
Tess turned back to him, surprised he remembered she’d said that. “Yes, it was horrid. The school I chose had a great speech therapist who helped me a great deal. Then I worked on it at college.”
“Is that why you don’t use contractions?”
“What are you talking about?” Suddenly, she realized he might be more attuned to her than she had thought.
“At Easter, Kit said you don’t use contractions, and you don’t. Ever.” He shifted but held fast to her hand.
