"I forgot what birds sound like," he says.
The words hit me in the throat.
It's a simple statement—neither a strategy nor a threat—just a truth.
For a few seconds, I yearn for something impossible. I want to keep him here in this bed, in this morning that smells like pine.I want to pretend the world outside these trees can't reach us. That men like Boris don't exist.
But the world always intrudes.
It intrudes with knives, with bullets, with men who smile while planning your funeral.
"Coffee," I say, forcing myself upright before my body decides to stay in bed. "Then we need to talk about what comes next."
The kitchen is small and functional. I start the coffee maker. Maksim moves through the room instinctively—checking the lock, the window latch, the line of sight to the treeline. Habit. Training.
Even after last night, that part of him doesn't rest.
I watch him instead of the coffee.
He adjusts a blind by a centimeter so the glass won't reflect sunlight. He pauses, listening, then moves again. It's not "efficient." It's just him.
The coffee finishes.
I pour two cups and set them on the table by the window. The lake is calm, a pale sheet reflecting the sky. A dock juts into it like a line drawn with care.
Maksim sits, but his eyes keep drifting outward, scanning the trees.
"We can't stay here," I say, my tone firm. "Not for long."
"I know."
"Boris will find us."
He doesn't argue; he's already strategizing. The car, the route, a device, a code. In the city, Boris had reach. Out here, I thought I'd created a blind spot.
I was wrong.
"But we have time to plan," I continue. "Enough time to return on our terms, gather what we need, and put it in my father's hands." I take a breath. "I want to end this. And then I want—" I pause, swallowing hard. "Then I want us to stop living like we're a mistake to manage."
Maksim's gaze settles on me.
"What exactly are you proposing?"
He asks it like a professional question, but his eyes are guarded.
"I'm proposing we go back to the city. We put Boris in a corner and force my father to pay attention."
"And then?"
"And then I burn the paperwork," I say.
He freezes.
"No more files," I clarify. "No more notes. No more... documentation. The pages you found. The assessment. The parts of me that thought they could reduce you to a mechanism." My fingers curl around my cup. "I destroy all of it."
"You can't unmake what you did."
"No. But I can stop doing it. I can stop treating you like something I own."
