I knew some of this, but hearing Katya say it makes it sound even worse than I imagined.
“How did you forgive him?”
“I didn’t. Not right away.” She looks out at the garden. “I was furious. Felt violated. He’d stolen my identity and my choices and wrapped it all up in a twisted version of protection. But then I had to ask myself what mattered more. The lies he told when he was trying to control the situation, or the choices he made after I learned the truth?”
“And what did you decide?”
“That the man who kidnapped me from a hospital and lied to me for weeks was also the man who saved my life when rival families tried to kill me. Who could have kept me prisoner forever but chose to let me go when I demanded my freedom.”
I rest my chin on my knees. “Tony didn’t kidnap me.”
“No, but he took a contract to destroy you and then spent six weeks sabotaging his mission because he couldn’t go through with it. Those are choices, Sasha. Not accidents. Not coincidences. Choices.”
“He could be lying about all of it. He’s admitted he’s a liar by trade.”
“He could be,” Katya agrees, “but Dmitri verified everything. The fake intelligence. The sabotaged reports. Tony was destroying his investigation from the beginning.”
I pick at a loose thread on my jeans. “I had sex with him last night.”
Katya doesn’t look surprised. “How do you feel about that?”
“Confused. Angry. Stupid.” I pause. “I went to his cell because I needed to know which parts of him were real. And when he toldme about specific moments—things that had nothing to do with Adrian’s contract—I believed him. So, I kissed him, and it turned into more, and now, I don’t know what I’m doing.”
“Do you regret it?”
“I don’t. And that terrifies me.”
Katya is quiet for a moment. Then she asks, “When did you start falling for him? What was the moment you knew?”
I close my eyes and remember. “We were in the safehouse kitchen. He was trying to make dumplings, and he was terrible at it. The folds kept coming undone. But he kept trying, and while he worked, he told me about his uncle teaching him to cook after his parents died. How his uncle said the best meals were the ones that went wrong because they taught you to adapt.”
“That sounds real.”
“That’s the problem. All of it felt real.” I open my eyes and look at Katya. “How do I reconcile those memories with the fact that he was hired to destroy me?”
“I don’t know if you can,” Katya admits. “I think you just have to decide which version of him you believe in more. The operative who took Adrian’s contract, or the man who couldn’t go through with it.”
“What if I’m wrong? What if I believe him, and it turns out to be another manipulation?”
“Sasha, living in fear of being manipulated again means Adrian wins, even if Tony’s telling the truth. He wanted to break you. Don’t let him do it by making you too scared to trust anyone.”
I hate that she’s right.
“I don’t know how to trust him again,” I confess. “Every time I look at him, I remember that he lied to me for weeks, and that he took money to destroy me. How do I get past that?”
“You probably don’t,” Katya concedes. “You just decide if what he’s shown you since the truth came out matters more than what he did before. And that’s not a decision anyone can make for you.”
“What would you do if you were me?”
She considers the question. “I’d ask myself what I want. Not what’s smart or safe or what my family thinks I should do. Just what I want.”
I pull my necklace out from under my shirt and twist the chain between my fingers. “I want to believe his feelings were real. I want to believe that the man who made me laugh and listened to me talk about art. I want to believe that person exists, but I’m terrified I’m being naive and falling for another performance.”
“Tony confessed when he could have maintained his cover,” Katya points out.
“Maybe he knew Dmitri would figure it out anyway.”
“Or maybe he cared more about you knowing the truth than he cared about saving himself.”
