“What?” I taste a bitter smile. “Your wife?”
His smile in return is small and sad and pained. “The enemy,” he corrects. “Fuck.” He backs away from me, sinking onto the edge of the bed.
My heart is still racing, my body aching, surprisingly deeply, for his touch again, however intense, however brief. I settle for sitting beside him on the bed.“You don't trust her,” I say, measuredly. “I don't blame you.”
“Then you haven’t totally lost your sense of self-preservation.”
“Not quite.”
“Do you think we should work with her? Follow this insane plot to overthrow our fathers and dismantle the work of their fathers and their fathers before them? Let her build her own mafia? Could we possibly trust her to do it like she says? Fair, responsible?”
Yes.
The speed and intensity of my mind’s reply catches me off guard.
It’s the idealist in me, the girl who wanted to make and trade art in another world and forget altogether that this one existed. But I can see it, clear yet impossible—a world where all of our fathers were rendered impotent, harmless. Where we were all safe to pursue real lives if we wanted to.
“She could know things,” I point out. “About Lebedev. About our fathers. Maybe she does have the power to cripple them—I believe Lebedev must, if everything we know about him is true.”
“And you think we should let her?” He looks suddenly younger, less sure. Beyond his anger there is confusion, and he’s searching me for an answer to it.
I find myself more confident because of it. I nod once. “I think we should help her.”
“She could betray us.”
“We could all betray each other.” Feeling bold, and a little lustful, I place my hand on his thigh. I don’t miss the cool flick of his eyes or the way his jaw tightens, if only slightly, at the contact.
“I want you safe,” he says darkly, looking dead ahead, hands folded and elbows resting on his knees. “This is the opposite of safe. This is the invitation of danger.”
“It already was,” I remind him, not unkindly. “We might as well make the most of this, Nik.”
He straightens, addressing me with new, clearer eyes. The way they move over my body ignites me, and the confused want I’ve been feeling in his presence clarifies and distils inside of me.
Married.
A cruel joke of marriage, but a marriage, nonetheless. He doesn't like me, and I don't blame him. But he cares for me enough to risk his life. And apparently, despite everything that's happened and our years of separation, some part of him is attracted to me.
“Make the most of this,” he says, and his eyes narrow. “This.” He stands abruptly and paces away from me. “Do you think you'll be any safer if you're pregnant?”
I jolt, startled by the electricity in his tone. “What? No, I—”
“I can't protect you, Zane. Not from my father. Not from Lebedev. Not…”
I stare at him, trying in vain to piece together his reasoning, the root of this anger. And it hits me like a ton of bricks:he feels impotent.He couldn't protect me from the marriage or my father's torture, he can't protect me from betrayal or Lebedev or whatever is coming.
But he wants to.
“I know that to you, maybe to everyone, this marriage isn't real.” I stand and go to him. He doesn't look at me. “But we can still work together. We can still be a team. But all of this anger and resentment you have toward me and my leaving and my father—you have to let it go, Nik. I trust you. OK? That's all that matters.”
His jaw clenches, and I gently tip his chin toward me with two fingers. When our eyes meet, my knees go liquid.
“Why?” he asks, so softly. “Why do you trust me?”
I don't know what possesses me to do it, but I rise on my toes and, ever so gently, press my lips to his. It's an antithesis to the aggressive kiss we shared earlier, and far briefer. Nik's eyes flutter shut, and for one impossible instant, he is vulnerable.
“I trust you,” I whisper, “because I never stopped trusting you.”
His beautiful eyes search mine. “I can't lose you again, Zane.”
