4
YAROMIR
“Your left side is slow tonight.”
Alexei’s fist clips my jaw half a second later.
I grunt and shove him back hard enough to make him stumble across the mat.
The boxing gym is nearly empty this late at night. Just us, the sound of gloves hitting flesh, old music playing quietly through blown-out speakers, and sweat soaking through my shirt.
Usually, boxing clears my head. Tonight it’s doing the opposite.
Alexei pulls his mouth guard out and spits into the bucket beside the ring. “You’re distracted.”
“I’m not.”
“That punch says otherwise.”
I roll my shoulders, ignoring the ache settling into them. “You talk too much.”
He laughs under his breath and raises his gloves again. “Come on, then.”
We circle each other slowly.
Alexei has known me since I was nineteen and angry enough to break things for sport. He’s one of the few people alive who doesn’t flinch around me. Mostly because he’s too stupid to.
I throw another punch. He blocks it easily.
“There it is again,” he says.
“What?”
“That look.”
I hit him properly that time. His head snaps sideways.
“Careful,” I say calmly. “You’ll start sounding like my therapist.”
“You’d kill a therapist within ten minutes.”
“That’s generous.”
Alexei wipes sweat from his mouth and studies me for a second longer than I like. “This about your father?”
“No.”
“Dmitri?”
I don’t answer immediately. Which is answer enough.
Alexei’s brows lift slightly. “Interesting.”
I step back toward the ropes and pull my gloves off, irritation crawling under my skin. My hands ache pleasantly from impact. Better that than the other thing lodged in my head all night.
Blonde hair. Blue eyes. A white dress with a pink stain near the waist.
I grab a towel from the corner and drag it across my face. “She’s not what I expected,” I say finally.
