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I turn back to the table and he’s watching me. His feet are kicked up on the chair next to him, crossed at the ankle.
“We’re exposed.”
He shakes his head. “No one comes within three miles of the fence without someone on staff knowing about it. They won’t get close enough to take a shot. You’re safe.”
“I thought I was safe at the diner.” I pad over and drop down into the chair opposite him. “That was in public.”
“Yeah, well a sniper can blend in better in public. They can disappear into the crowd. Out here?” He shakes his head. “They don’t stand a chance. Plus, no one with even half a brain would try to break onto the Pushkin estate. It’s a death sentence.”
“And Francia has this same kind of protection?”
“She’s covered. Don’t worry.”
I wrinkle my nose. “I’m always going to worry when my friends’ lives are at risk.”
“Speaking of friends.” Yasha drops his feet to the ground and folds his hands on the table. “Is there anyone you need to alert about your whereabouts?”
I’m used to Yasha being kind of a smart ass, but he’s being serious now. This is what he’s like in his official role as…uh, whatever it is he does for Ivan.
I’m embarrassed by the lack of names coming to mind. “Jorden and Francia already know. Maybe I could tell my neighbors.”
“I left a note for Angela and Geoff.” I arch a brow and Yasha shrugs. “They’re nice people. They seem to care about you.”
“They might be the only ones,” I mutter.
Yasha turns to the side and plucks a marigold out of the planter. He twirls it around his finger, stripping the leaves from the stem one gentle tug out a time. “Do you have any family?”
“None that would care if I went missing.”
You’d think I’d get used to my family’s dismissal of me. That, at some point, the ache of their indifference would stop hurting. But the wound reopens again and again, as fresh as the day I first left.
“Are you an only child?” he asks.
“How did you know?”
He smiles knowingly. “I recognize my own kind.”
Talking about myself is one of my least favorite pastimes, so I jump at the opportunity to shift the focus to Yasha. “What about your parents?”
He moves from the marigold stem to the petals. He plucks them one by one, making a pile on the table in front of him as he talks. “Addicts. They had other priorities. Getting high, mostly.”
“It must have been hard growing up around that.”
“It was. That’s why I left when I was thirteen.”
I gawk at him. “Thirteen? Like…ten plus three? That thirteen?”
“Is there another kind?”
“I just can’t believe it,” I breathe. I was on the streets at thirteen, but I was with my mom. That was scary enough. I can’t imagine doing it alone. “Where did you go?”
“Wherever I wanted. I started out as a thief.” My thoughts must be written on my face because Yasha waves me off. “Don’t judge me. Growing boys get hungry and I needed to eat. Stealing was easier than anything else. My parents were hopeless and shelters always tried to call the police and have me put in foster care. It was easier to be alone. I got good at it.”
“You got good at being alone?”
He gives me a sad smile. “No. I never got good at that. But I was great at picking locks, taking only what I could carry, and then finding the right buyer. By the time I was seventeen, I was getting hired by grown men for high-level jobs. Serious shit. That’s how I met Ivan.”
“Ivan hired you?”
