I never asked why he stopped.
Maybe because I already know. Maybe because it feels like he’s done hiding himself. Done pretending to be anything but exactly what he is.
Pakhan.
Juggernaut.
Maksim.
Mine.
The thought slips in so naturally now it doesn’t even jar me.
The bike slows.
I lift my head just as he turns through iron gates and onto a narrow paved road lined with old trees and rows of pale stone.
My stomach tightens.
A cemetery.
I sit up straighter as he parks the bike beneath the shade of a sprawling oak. For a second, neither of us moves. The engine clicks as it cools, the sudden quiet strange after the ride here.
He taps my thigh and I swing off the bike. He gets off as I hand my helmet to him. He hooks it over the handlebar without a word.
Only then do I glance around properly.
Headstones. Flowers.
Wind moving softly through green leaves overhead. A crow somewhere in the distance.
My brows pull together. “What are we doing here?”
He looks at me, unreadable as ever.
I glance out over the rows of graves, then back at him. “Are you going to chase me in a cemetery?”
I lower my voice on the last word, like the dead might overhear me and take offense.
His mouth twitches.
“No,” he says. “But that’s a good idea. Maybe for Halloween.”
A small laugh escapes me before I can stop it, quiet and breathy in all this stillness.
Then he says, “Your mother is here.”
Everything in me goes still.
I stare at him. “Mama’s buried here?”
“Yes.”
The word leaves me before I can stop it. “Oh.”
I don’t even know what that means.
Oh, like that’s all this is.
