CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Savina
I WAKEUP the next morning alone. The other side of the bed is cold, so I know Dimitri has been gone for a while. Trying not to be too upset or overthink, I go to the bathroom and brush my teeth. Then I retreat out to the kitchen where I see Darby sitting at one of the barstools with a roguish smile on her face. She looks like she’s practically bursting at the seams to tell me something.
“What?” I question.
“Dimitri was here pretty late,” she drawls out.
“Yeah. Do you know when he left?” I ask, anxious to know.
“A little after three in the morning,” she says. “But then he came back a little while ago. Actually used the front door this time,” she mutters under her breath.
I cock my head to the side as I try to decipher her words. “Wait. If he didn’t come through the front door last night, which way did he come in?”
“Through the window. He came up the fire escape,” she says, pointing towards the living room. “I threatened him with a butcher knife,” she says proudly.
“Of course you did,” I say with a groan. Only Darby would be able to threaten someone as intimidating as Dimitri Soklov and live to tell the tale.
“Anyway, he left something here for you,” she says, her grin widening.
I look on the island and see a familiar logo on a tall iced vanilla latte along with a paper bag. Next to those is a note. I read aloud, “Make sure you eat today. P.S., you drool in your sleep. P.P.S., I think it’s cute. Dimitri.” A hot blush burns my cheeks as I read it over and over quietly to myself. This is so out of character for him that it’s almost…alarming.
“I never took Dimitri as a P.P.S. kind of guy,” Darby says.
“Me either,” I confess. It’s surprising and super sweet, and it puts me in an instant good mood. I open the bag and tell her, “Hey, there are two bagels in here, and one has your name on it. He got you one too,” I say before scrunching my face up and batting my eyelashes at my best friend. “Aww, how cute.”
Darby rolls her eyes. “He’s just trying to butter me up.” She snatches the bagel from the bag, unwraps it and takes a bite before moaning out loud. “And damn it, it’s working,” she mumbles around a mouthful.
As we eat breakfast together, I can’t stop thinking about last night. My mind feels like it’s being torn into two. I want to keep hating Dimitri, because I know it would make everything easier. But somehow, I’ve fallen into this rabbit hole where I think maybe he’s not as bad as I thought he was, and I’m not even sure which way is up anymore. I don’t have any tangible evidence to back that up, however, and I do not want to get hurt. And I fear if I go too far down this hole, I’ll never surface again and nothing will ever be the same.
“So…is everything…okay?” Darby asks, dragging out her question and effectively pulling me from my conflicting and convoluted thoughts. For the past week or so, Darby hasn’t been able to talk to me or comfort me or lure me out of my room, so I’m sure she’s surprised to see me smiling and happy for once.
“Yes. Everything is fine,” I assure her. And it’s the truth. After what Dimitri did for me, I feel like my spirit is free from that lingering guilt and impending sense of doom. He took care of my problem, no questions asked, no strings attached.
“Oh, thank fuck,” Darby huffs with a long sigh. “I was really getting worried about you, Savina. I thought I was going to have to, like, go kill somebody for you or something.”
I grin at her words. “Honestly, Dimitri took care of my problem,” I say vaguely. I don’t want to burden Darby with the creepy doctor stuff. Dimitri handled everything, so I’m going to try to put it all in the past now. I still can’t believe he did that for me. How we went from hating each other for years to this moment is mind-blowing, to say the least. If someone would have told me just a few weeks ago that I would be regretting the marriage contract change, I would’ve thought they were crazy. I was so relieved when my father told me I’d have to marry Pavel instead. And now…all I can think about is how I wish I could reverse it.
Darby reaches across the island and puts her hand over mine before giving it a reassuring squeeze. “Well, I’m here if you need to talk. Aboutanything,” she says assuredly.
“I know. I appreciate you,” I tell her.
She lets go of my hand and finishes her bagel. “I’m opening the bar early today for an employee appreciation party. You wanna come?”
“I think I’m just going to hang around the apartment. Maybe clean,” I say as I eye the pile of dirty dishes in the sink. My phone goes off just then, and I see it’s a text from my stepmother.
She who shall not be named:Wedding cake tasting tomorrow at one.
I frown at the screen, and Darby asks, “What’s wrong?”
“Wedding cake tasting tomorrow.” I set my phone down and holdmy hands up like I’m praying. “Please come with me, Darby.Please,”I beg. “I can’t put up with Cosette for longer than a few minutes before she drives me crazy,” I whine.
“For you? Anything,” she says with a wink.
“That’s why I love you.”
“Love you too, bitch,” Darby says before retreating to her bedroom.
