“I’m fine.” It’s true in the narrow sense that I’m not distressed, and false in the broader sense that I have things to say and am saving them for a location that doesn’t have a witness in it.
The tree line opens to reveal the ivory colonial-style mansion. The grounds are immaculate in the late afternoon light, and the quiet settles over the property like something earned rather than imposed.
I have been living here for two weeks now, and I have not stopped finding it beautiful, which surprises me every time because I didn’t expect to be the kind of person who responds to grandeur. Never have been before now. But the moment I walked into this house, I felt like I had come to my fantasy home.
I never want to leave it. Not even when I’m mad at my husband for continuously keeping me in the dark.
His men are present in the way they are always present—visible enough to be a deterrent, positioned with the practiced efficiency of people who have been doing this long enough that it has become instinct rather than procedure. I have learned their faces. Dmitri at the east gate, who nods at me now with contained respect. Sasha, near the garage, younger, who still looks mildly startled every time he sees me, as though my presence in his employer’s life continues to be information he is processing. Others whose names I am still learning are distributed across the property.
Pavel goes directly to his office when we come inside, which is his habit—the transition from the car to the house runs through the office, through checking messages and reviewing whatever Igor has left for him, before he surfaces into the domestic portion of the evening.
I have learned a great many things about him in two weeks of shared space that the months of the affair did not fully prepare me for. An affair is curated in ways that a marriage is not, and the uncurated version of Pavel Strakov is both more surprising and more interesting than the version I knew.
He’s also more infuriating. I give him ten minutes, then time’s up.
His office in the mansion is a different room from the one in the city, but it has the same quality. Ordered, serious, the room of a man who works hard. No distractions tolerated.
Too bad.
He’s at his desk when I come in, jacket off, sleeves rolled to the forearm, reading something on his screen with the focused attention he brings to everything. He looks up when I close thedoor behind me, and something in his expression shifts as he registers the closing, which tells me his read of my silence in the car was accurate and that he has been expecting this.
“How can I help you?”
“Vet told me about the informant.”
He leans back in his chair. “I see.”
“She shouldn’t have had to.” I come to stand in front of his desk rather than sitting, because sitting feels like a negotiating position, and I am not negotiating. “She told me because she understood that I needed to know, which is the correct instinct. The problem is that the information should have come from you.”
“The problem is the informant.”
My gaze narrows without my consent. “The problem is you’re always keeping important things from me!”
“I didn’t want to worry you?—”
“Pavel.” His name comes out with more edge than I intend, and I let it. “Someone in your organization may be watching me every day and is probably feeding that information to a man who has already used my existence as a threat to your face. That is not a worry. That is my life. I deserve to know what is happening in my own life.”
He’s quiet for a moment. “There are aspects of my role,” he says finally, “that are not appropriate to bring into our home. Things that belong to that part of my life and not to this part. I am handling it. I will not bother you with trifles.”
“Someone I see every day, who might be spying on me and everything I do, is not a trifle! It’s not a work problem that stays at work. You don’t know who it is. That person could be here, in our home!”
“Yes, they could be. They could also be at the office. If you knew, what would you do differently?”
“I…” I’m not sure. “I would know to be careful around them.”
“Hence why telling you is a bad idea. Forgive me, Molly, but you are still a civilian when it comes to these things. You don’t know the games I must play?—”
“Then teach me! For God’s sake, Pavel, I’m out here with my neck exposed, and you think that’s a good thing?”
Another heavy sigh from him. It sounds like disapproval. “You did not grow up in this world. There are things it is hard to explain.”
“Aren’t I worth explaining them? Even if it’s hard?”
“Of course you are. I’m not saying this right?—”
“Who is it? Do you have suspects? Vet didn’t know.”
He sits back, and I see the day on him. “Vladimir Cheski.”
