“I’d say I’m not deep enough. There are people after you, people who want to hurt you, and all this time I’ve been here, I asked you about pigments and inspiration when I should have asked about who they are, and how you got to this point.”
I meet Seva’s blue gaze, and this time I see all of him. The painter and the killer all in one. I can’t help being attracted to this intoxicating combination of a man so smart, sensitive, proficient, and unbearably attractive. I might need more vodka, but I’ll handle anything he throws my way to be with him. Does that make me reckless? Definitely.
Crazy?
Does it matter as long as he keeps hugging me like he does now?
Seva exhales, and his gaze drifts to the ceiling above. “It’s not something most people want to know about. I’m sorry you got hurt because of my past.”
I clink my glass to his and settle in even closer, so safe when tucked under his arm. “I want to know everything.”
His Adam’s apple twitches, blue eyes intense as he looks straight at me, as if searching for any falsehoods. But he finds none, and he never will.
“They, um...” Seva finishes his vodka and pours more into the glass even before the scowl of tasting the liquor leaves his features. “I was scouted at a youth judo championship. My mother felt I needed to know how to defend myself, so she would send me to martial arts classes very early on. And I was good,” he tells me, a small smile dancing across his lips, “Almost as good as I was at drawing. We were also poor, which made me the perfect kid to scout into the... program.”
“Did your mom know? Did you have any siblings? What about your father?” I ask despite being worried it might feel like I’m prying.
Seva plays with my fingers, the second glass of vodka emptying with his every sip. “My father was just some guy Mom met on a trip, so he wasn’t in the picture. No siblings. Just me and Mom. She knew better than to protest,” he says, chuckling when he meets my gaze. “Neither of us wanted her to have an unlucky accident.”
I squeeze his hand, absorbing all of this like a sponge. What was just a vague idea is now becoming flesh and blood in my mind. I can see the teen he was, his dilemma, his mother’s worries, all of it. “I’m so sorry. How did you handle that?”
The glass is empty again, and Seva’s lips twist as he swallows the vodka. “Mom and I were moved to a nice apartment. We could afford all the meat we wanted, and all I had to do was get better at things I already enjoyed. My first kill... I wasn’t even scared,” he says softly. “It was messy, but the guy kept shouting at me, sputtering. I think he was just some disposable goon, but for all I know he could have also been the boss of the Bratva. I didn’t want to hesitate, but there’s this instinct that keeps most people from hurting others, and I had to overcome it on that day. I bet he was glad when I finally succeeded.”
After what I witnessed him do tonight, I have a visceral picture of him killing in my mind. “And then? Did you do that… job for a long time?”
Seva glances at me, his face brightening. “Isthatyour question? You are the most precious boy in the world, Victor,” he tells me, gently taking hold of my chin. “Yes, I did that for years. I was effective. Prolific. One of the best in the business. I killed cheating husbands, relatives standing in someone’s way to inheriting a fortune, and even one wannabe-dictator. I got to develop as an artist too. In ways I couldn’t have if life forced me to go into the workforce straight out of school. I was lucky.”
Such a strange thing to say about a life of bloodshed, but I’m learning that Seva is an unusual person in ways I couldn’t have imagined when I plotted my revenge against him. It should probably scare me, but here I am, under his arm, drinking his vodka and only wanting to know more.
“And when—” My stomach rumbles so loudly I’m mortified.
But Seva just laughs and strokes my hand. “You can’t be drinking so much on an empty stomach. Come, let’s have something.” When he pulls me up, I realize I’m more than a little tipsy, but he holds me steady so I don’t stumble.
“Teach me how to make pelmeni?” I blurt out.
Fuck he’s so tall, so strong as he cages me against the counter. The world around us might be swaying, but Sevastyan wouldn’t let me fall. Am I too trusting? Maybe, but he’s the only person to ever protect me with his life, and I choose to have faith in him.
“Another day, pet. It would take way too long.” My face must have expressed my disappointment, because he nudges up my chin and presses a peck to my lips. “How about my mother’s recipe? Lazy dumplings. She’d always make this when I needed to have something warm fast.”
I follow his mouth for another kiss. “Oh? What is it? Yes, please.”
He chuckles, and then lifts me all the way to the counter. “Just watch,” he tells me before rushing around the kitchen. Soon enough, a pot of water is heating on the stove, and he is pouring flour into a bowl of fresh white cheese. “It’s so easy I would often do this after coming back from a job, sometimes even before I put away my rifle.”
“But I want to help.” I’m embarrassed to be slurring a little, but it makes Seva laugh.
“Okay, crack three eggs in here,” he passes me a bowl, and I get unreasonably excited. I don’t know if it’s the adrenaline or the vodka, but I lean over for another kiss just because I can. If this is my life now, maybe I can handle living under the threat of assassins?
“I wanted to ask how you ended up here after being so good at your job.”
He sighs and starts combining all the ingredients in the bowl. “Maybe I made it sound more exciting than it was? I’m not... passionate about killing. What I always wanted was to paint, so when I started becoming ever more successful as this elusive artist whose face no one ever got to see, I started withdrawing. The plan was to eventually stop altogether, and retire to this house I was already building by then. But that wasn’t to be. My mentor, the closest person I ever had to a father figure betrayed me to the son of that dictator-wannabe I mentioned, and running was the only option. I picked up Mom, and two hours later, there was an explosion in our apartment. We’ve been hiding ever since.”
I focus on Seva’s thick forearms. He portions the dough, then uses his hands to form each chunk into elongated ropes no thicker than a flute, then cuts them into inch-long dumplings I can’t wait to taste.
My mind might be fogged by vodka, but dots still connect in my head. I slide down to the floor and hug him from the side. Even though it makes his work harder, he doesn’t push me away. “But you’re… not in hiding. You showed yourself to the world. Why do that? You had a successful career painting yourself without revealing your face.”
His muscles relax at my touch, so I kiss his shoulder blade while he finishes cutting up the dough. “My mother and I hid here for almost a year. No one in the art world knew my face. There were no photographs, so I evenallowed myself a rare outing to the nearby town. But after she died... hiding like this seemed pointless. I sat at her grave one evening, and it occurred to me that nothing would ever change. I would always need to have eyes at the back of my head after my mentor revealed my identity. I figured it would be easier to deal with all the enemies I made if I showed them where they can find me. When they come here—I’m prepared to welcome them on my own turf.”
He turns and hands me a plate, instructing me that I can now throw them into the boiling water.
