“You'll stay here,” he says, opening a door. I stifle a chuckle. The room is likely bigger than my old apartment. Another magnificent series of windows makes the room bright and cheerful. There is an enormous bed and an oriental carpet glittering with jewel tones of red, green and blue that spreadsacross the wooden floor; it looks soft enough to roll around on, like a cat in the sun.
“You should consider subletting,” I say. “You could comfortably fit a family of five in here.”
He looks vaguely horrified and I suspect Dmitri is not one who shares his space willingly. I'd overheard his mother mention something to him about safe houses, but he was firm that I'd be staying with him.
I’m eyeing a pile of garment bags lying on top of the bed. “My mother picked out some clothes for you,” Dmitri says. “I don't think we're going to be able to retrieve any of your belongings.”
That's the first time it hits me: my terrible scrapbooks from my scrapbooking phase when I was fourteen are gone. Boxes of family pictures I've never had time to sort, my old medical textbooks, letters from my grandma because she was too stubborn to use email.
My grief must show, because he says, “A lot of things can be recovered you know, like photos.”
“I know,” I say. “I'm alive. I'm safe. And if you can end those fuckers who did this to me - and God knows who else - losing everything else will be worth it.”
“Why don’t you take a shower and get settled? I’ll call you when dinner’s ready.” I like Dmitri’s smile, kind without being pitying.
In the bathroom, I find a beautiful walk-in shower bristling with copper appliances, but I head straight for the elegant clawfoot tub. It's situated in front of a window and we're high enough up that I know no one can witness me tearing off my clothes and getting into the water with a satisfied groan.
I haven't had a proper bath since I left home back in Colorado. Any apartment I could afford in New York would never have room for a tub. There are even elegant little jars of different potions and I pour in some lavender, watching the purple oil swirl through the water.
“Oh my God,” I groan. “I'm never getting out.”
I might have been dozing a little because when there's a knock on the bathroom door, I shriek, sitting up and sending water splashing over the side of the tub.
“Just making sure you're not drowning.” Dmitri's voice is clearly amused.
Did he hear me sounding like I was having a tub orgasm? “What are you doing in my bedroom?” I shout, offense being the best defense, of course.
“The bedroom door was open,” he says, still clearly amused. “I could hear the water running. Dinner will be ready in about twenty minutes.”
“Thank you,” I call back. “You’re a wonderful host.”
I stay in the tub until my fingers are so pruned that they look like an octogenarian’s and I climb out, going through the outfits on the bed. When he said ‘a few,’ I figured that Dr. Morozova had kindly given me a couple of pairs of leggings and a sweatshirt.
Oh, no.
These are full outfits with shoes and accessories and underwear to match and this is ridiculous because there's like twenty garment bags here. “These Russians know how to go overboard,” I murmur, settling on a light blue sundress, and silky underwear made of something soft and rare, like unicorn skin.
Blow drying my hair, I avoid looking at the red marks on my neck. I've treated scars like this before on burn patients in the hospital. A lot of recovery depends on how quickly they were treated. Some of these are from my first night in that hell pit, but they still look better than most I've seen on patients in follow-up visits, so I have hope.
The rest of me is still littered with cuts and bruises. The bruises are fading from blooms of vicious purple and gray to more of a sickly yellow. Still, the ones on my arms make me flinch and I find a cardigan to pull on over the sundress.
Lovely smells are coming from the kitchen, sizzling beef, the creamy smoothness of some kind of sauce, and the succulent sweetness of red wine. Dmitri has abandoned his suit jacket, his sleeves rolled up on his white shirt. I can see tattoos snaking down his forearms. There's one of a dragon coiled around his arm like a caress, the scales sparking silver and red. Another is a blue line made up of tiny marks, flowing along his forearm like music.
“Look at you, man of many talents,” I say, coming up to the enormous granite counter. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Yes,” he says, “pour me a glass of wine.”
“Oh, have we been letting this fancy winebreathe?”I tease, holding the bottle up. “Since most of my wine comes from a box, this is new and exciting.” The label is beautiful and I raise a brow. “The script at the bottom, Morozov Vineyards? Is there anything you people don't own?”
He smiles wolfishly, another hint of those sharp, white canines. “Not really, no.”
The beef stroganoff is sinfully delicious, tangy and a bit smoky. The mushrooms and beef are tender and the noodles taste likethey’re homemade. “You might have missed your calling,” I say, clearing my plate with an unseemly haste. “This is incredible.”
I’m embarrassed to note that his plate is still half full while I’ve been gobbling like a farm animal, but not mortified enough to refuse a second helping.
“My mother was insistent that her sons learn to cook at least a couple of decent dishes,” he says. We’re sitting in the kitchen instead of his chilly dining room, and the antique pendant fixture surrounds us in a soothing circle of light. “Along with sewing on a button, learning where the dishwasher might be located." He grins. “Though I’m not sure Roman ever figured that one out.”
“That’s nice,” I say. “There are six kids in my family. We all learned that it was either cook or starve to death.”
