Page 15

Hard left. Head down. Fast.

But I only make it six steps. A hand closes on my arm. Not hard enough to make a scene. Hard enough that I am not going anywhere.

“Easy,” a voice says near my ear. “It’s only me, Mackensie.”

Mackensie. Dmitri’s colleague.

I twist. He does not let go.

“Get off me,” I protest.

“No chance,” Mackensie replies, laughing.

I try to yank free and he turns my body just enough that running would look like a tantrum in the middle of the sidewalk. People pass us. Nobody stops. A man holding a boy’s arm at midnight is either a boyfriend or a problem nobody wants.

“You were behind me the whole time,” I say.

“Yes.”

“And he knew I was following.”

“Yes.”

I curse under my breath. The whole walk. The diner. The split on the sidewalk. All of it arranged so I would pick the pretty option and follow the Pakhan like a boy who thinks he is too clever for school.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

I drive my heel back toward Mackensie’s shin. He shifts and the kick hits coat.

“Don’t,” he says. “Just don’t even try.”

“It’s fine. Let him go,” Dmitri says as he appears, a look of amusement on his face.

Mackensie’s hand leaves my arm. I could run now. I do not, because he is close enough that running would only make the next part worse.

“You left through the kitchens,” Dmitri says. “Then you came back. Then you sat in the window like a child at a zoo. And then… you followed me.”

I lift my chin. “Maybe I wanted to see where the great Mr. Pakev lives.”

“No, no, no, that’s not it,” Dmitri says. “You wanted to see if you could. You wanted to test yourself. You wanted…”

Mackensie steps aside, not far. Still there. Still watching the street.

Dmitri looks at me the way he did in the upstairs hall. Like he has already decided what I am and is only letting me talk because it amuses him.

“I finished my shift,” I say. “I can walk where I want.”

“You can,” he agrees. “Until you walk after me.”

A group of drunk dudes spills past, laughing too loud. One of them looks at Dmitri and then at me and decides this is not his business either.

The city keeps moving. Just like always.

I am standing still in the middle of it with a man who had two bodies left in an alley last night if the rumors in the staff room were even half true.

Have I bitten off way more than I can chew? Yes. I knew that upstairs. I knew it when he said my real name. I came back anyway.

“So what now?” I ask. “You drag me into a car? Give Steven a story? Make me disappear because I got curious?”