“No, Vitali!”
“Katya.”
“No.”
“Katya.”
We faced off, my wild-eyed expression to his curiously calm one.
“Katya,” he repeated. “Take the money.”
“No,” I drew out, in case he didn’t hear me.
“Take the money or I’m not taking you to the movies.”
“Take me home.”
“Did you decide on the rabbit or the bear?”
“He isn’t a bear; he is cursed andunspecified.”
“Take the money.”
“No.”
He gave it another moment with some undoubtedly nasty thought turning over in his head, then shrugged and heaped the money back inside the drawer. “Are you hungry?”
“No.”
We were already on our way to the cinema with the leftoverpirogifrom lunch when my mind caught up to me, but only in flashes. I glanced at him in the driver’s seat, then at the radio, then at the road. We were going to see the matinee of Beauty and the Beast, and it had been a day so overwhelming, not a lick of it made sense.
For a second, I’d forgotten about the tattoos. I’d forgotten about the stacks of dollars. I’d forgotten what tea I ordered.
That bliss of denial ebbed through me as we watched Belle insult the existence of her entire town, then dance around withsome furniture, and finally decide that she was in love with the bear. His transformation at the end was off-putting; I preferred him as the Beast instead.
Vitali had his hand on my knee the entire movie, but still hadn’t tried to hold my hand, and I would be damned if I made the first move.
The pirogi were nearly frozen when we got back in the car.
“I didn’t like what he turned into,” Vitali said. “It was off-putting.”
And then we were at my podyezd and he was typing in the numbers that strangers weren’t supposed to know.
Strangers like Vitali Konstantinov with his not-prison tattoos and honestly-earned bricks of banknotes.
The elevator dinged its arrival, but the sound was broken, and I knew no one would repair it—probably ever.
The little light moved to the second floor, then third, then Vitali flipped open a thin switchblade and jammed it into a slot below the numbers, and the elevator came to a jarring stop between floors with the violent shake sending me off balance and right into him.
“What—” There was no reason to ask, but I did anyway.
“Katya,” he said patiently, but did not let go of me. He did, however, allow me to stand on my own two feet as he left me locked between him and the gross, sticky wall that had potentially been peed on, more than once. “I like it when you get an attitude, because then I get to iron it out. But in the end, Kotik, it will be ironed out.”
My shallow breaths matched the wild beating of my heart, and all I could do was look at him impishly with my head tilted back.
His brows twitched, then drew together. “What is this?”
He brushed aside my hair with one finger, exposing the side of my neck, then tugged the sweater collar until I felt the leather choker shift against my skin. The frown on his face made me regret my good idea.
