The doors open; the grate opens. “Comrade Rostov!” I recognize the voice—it is not the usual voice of Valentin, but the suave, sexy psychopath he can become. “What a lovely surprise. I believe you’re needed in your room.”
Rostov staggers out of the elevator. I cannot tell if he is dazed or drunk. Perhaps I am one, or both. Static crackles all around, Rostov is on marionette wire, I am on wire, I do not know who commands whom. All I know is that I am on the floor, and then I am in Valentin’s arms, propped against the elevator foyer of the boys’ floor. Valentin pats my face, too gently to really wake me up. A door slams in the distance, Rostov pushed away.
“Yul. Yulia. Please, talk to me.” Something warm sizzles against my cheek, and it occurs to me that it might be a tear. Valentin’s? But his eyes seem so impenetrable. Nothing goes in or out. “What did he do to you? Bozhe moi, show me that you’re okay.”
“The murder,” I mutter. “He pulled it out of me.”
“What murder? Yulia, please, look into my eyes.”
Adrenaline is still thumping in my veins as I look at him. He is not Valentin. He is that molten god of confidence and lust that I first met in Natalya Gruzova’s building. But as the haze in my brain clears, I realize I don’t care anymore. They are one and the same. I reach for his face to caress his cheek, to strip away his glasses, to taste his lips once more.
“Concentrate, Yul. I need to make sure you’re all right.” He brushes his fingers through my hair. “Let me check your thoughts.”
“Relax. I’m fine.” Damn his gorgeous, huge, dark, mournful eyes. Even though I’m furious with him, all I want is to kiss him until he smiles. “Rostov. Are we safe?”
“For the moment, but let’s hurry.” He helps me to the far end of the hall, a round room at the corner of the building that smells like dust and fancy cigarettes. I settle next to him on the couch, acutely aware of his warmth beside me.
“What was he after?” Valentin asks. “We can’t run if he knows what we’re planning.”
“No. He doesn’t know.” I draw a deep breath and explain the murder I’d seen and how Rostov tried to make us forget, Valya’s face darkening as I do.
“We have to leave. Now, if we can,” he says.
I shrink back into the couch. “Valya … I want to run. But I’m scared.”
He tilts his head, a sustained rest, waiting for me to go on.
“I’m afraid for my mother and brother. She’s researching again, yes, but she’s a prisoner still.” I lean forward, and it’s like I’m coming up for air. “They were going to send me to Moscow State, Valya. My dream. And Sergei thinks that I—”
“I don’t give a damn what Sergei thinks,” he snarls, and stands up to pace.
I clench my hands into fists. “But it scares me. You left Anastasia behind before. I’m offering you a way out. Is that what draws you to me? Am I just another puppet for you to use, like your scrubbing victims?”
Valentin cringes. “I wouldn’t … I could never…” He circles behind the sofa, shadow falling across me. “I didn’t ask to be this. I know I haven’t always made the right choices with my powers, but … Please, Yulia. Hear my side.”
I don’t move, though I’m still shaking from frayed nerves and too little sleep.
“Anastasia was my friend,” he says. His hand falls to my shoulder. “Just my friend. We’d come under the KGB’s care around the same time. We’d both lost parents, and…” He exhales. “She wanted a romance when I needed a friend. But she was so volatile and wanted a lot of things that simply couldn’t be.”
I shiver as his other hand joins the first at my shoulders, massaging away months of paranoia and tension in my bones. “You tried to ‘fix’ her,” I say. “Her jumbled thoughts. Just like I asked you to do for me.”
“I knew it wouldn’t work, deep down. I was too weak then, and too afraid of becoming a monster. Like Rostov. I don’t want to use people this way—you have to believe me. But she begged me to, and I thought I could at least do something.”
My head lolls with a weary nod.
He sighs. “So I tried. But Anya was already long gone by then—mentally. I waited to run, waited until I thought I might be strong enough to help her sort through whatever had her head so messed up. But every day in that place was like a noose tightening. And she slipped further and further away.”
Exhaustion slumps me forward, saps me straight through. “I’m not sure I’m ready myself.”
“You deserve freedom. You deserve … so much more than the KGB could give you. You’re too powerful to keep caged.” He sits back down beside me, pulls off his glasses, and rubs the sweat from his nose. “But I can tell you that I have faced similar choices. And when I stayed, I have regretted that decision ever since.”
“What, you regret not trying to run from the mansion again?”
“No.” His eyes cloud as early dawn sunlight filters into the hotel. “This is something else. When my father and I came to Moscow…”