“How can you say that to me? You, of all people! You’re the one who was telling me that I should travel, that I could go anywhere or do anything, but now what? Because you’ve decided to stick around, I should, too?” She advanced upon him, not wanting to raise her voice but doing that anyway. Helpless to stop herself from wanting to rage at him. “Every time we were together, you could never tell me really how you felt. You let me think that it was nothing. It wasn’t permanent. You let me believe that it was all going to end, because you were going to leave again. You lied to me!”
“Oh, like you were so up front with me? You knew about this offer and what it could mean, and you never said a word about it to me, not even when I was telling you—yeah, I was—that you could go anywhere or do anything. You said you had no choice but to stay!” he shouted. Toe-to-toe. Face-to-face. He didn’t grab her or shake her, but that’s how it felt.
She almost wanted him to, if only because it meant his hands would be on her body. If he hurt her, all the better. If he bruised her, there would be marks she could look at when she was far away, to remind her of this moment here in her front hallway, when Nikolai Stern had last touched her.
Because this was the last time he was going to touch her, and if it didn’t hurt now, it was going to hurt later, and for the rest of her life. He didn’t have to cut her for his touch to leave behind scars.
“Now I have a choice,” she spat. “And I’m going to take it!”
“But . . . why now?” Nikolai asked her, and for that, Alicia had only one simple answer.
“Because I didn’t then.”
She was the one who reached for him. To take his hand, linking their fingers. She pulled him closer, one, two, three steps, and she kept pulling him, toward the stairs and up to her bedroom, where she led him to her bed and pushed him gently down.
She let him watch her as she undid the buttons on her blouse, one at a time. This was no striptease, but it was a show, put on for him so that when time and distance had once more come between them, he would have something to remember.
Alicia eased open the fabric over her collarbones, drawing her fingertips over the hard curves beneath the softness of her skin. Lower, she traced the lacy edges of her bra, then cupped the fullness of her breasts. Under the heat of his gaze, her nipples tightened. She ran her thumbs over them, emphasizing the shape of them through the lace. Making sure he could see.
She turned as she shrugged out of the blouse and tossed it to the side. Her hair came down with a few tugs at the pins that had been securing it, and she shook her head to feel it brushing her back. She pushed the elastic waistband of her skirt over her hips and stood in her bra and panties for a moment, half-afraid to look around, to see his expression. The low, agonized sound of his voice saying her name nearly sent her to her knees. Instead, she reached behind her to unhook her bra and let it fall away.
But when she moved to hook her fingers in her panties, Nikolai said, “Wait. Let me look at you. Just for a minute.”
She stood still, not moving. Letting him drink in this last sight of her. When he made another noise, she turned to look into his eyes. She slid a hand between her legs, over the lace, stroking for the joy of watching the way his pupils dilated. Her breath caught in her throat at the pleasure she brought herself.
“Take them off,” Nikolai rasped. “Please.”
She smiled and did as he’d asked, as slowly as she’d done everything else. When at last she stood fully naked in front of him, the instinct to cover herself rose up as it always did. She refused to give in to it. If nothing else, this last time, she wanted to feel as beautiful in front of him as he’d always told her she was.
“You’re a goddess,” he told her.
She blushed then, heat rising up her throat to paint her cheeks that had nothing to do with being embarrassed. She could dispute him, but she did not, because it was so easy to believe he meant it. She crawled up over his body to kiss him, and he rolled them both so they could get him out of his clothes a lot faster and with less fanfare than she’d taken getting naked.
They made love slowly. Almost with caution. He touched her as though she were fragile, the lacework of a spiderweb hung heavy with dew and ready to shred at the slightest touch. And wasn’t she? Ready to tear? Over and over again until there was nothing left of her but broken threads.
When it was over and they’d both settled onto their backs with the blankets pulled up to cover them against the chill, Alicia thought they might sleep. She didn’t want to. It would waste the time they had left together before daylight came and she was ready, at last, to finally go. And, having him there in the morning would make all of this more awkward and painful than it was already going to be.
She tucked herself against him, her hand over his heart. “You should leave.”
“Ilya already knows about us,” Nikolai answered. “It doesn’t matter if I stay all night.”
“That’s not why.”
He didn’t reply at first, but the skipping beat of his heart pounded harder against her palm. “Why, then?”
“I’m getting up early. I need to be at the airport by four. My flight leaves at six. It’s late, and I won’t sleep if you’re here . . .”
He covered her hand with his, curling the fingers tight around hers. When he looked at her, the darkness of his pupils had nearly swallowed up all the gray green. She could see nothing of herself reflected there.
“You’re leaving . . . tomorrow?”
“Yes.” She waited for him to ask her where she was going, but he didn’t. She thought he might at least ask how long she’d be gone, but he didn’t ask her that, either.
“Were you going to tell me?”
She pressed her lips to his skin. “No.”
“That’s . . . I can’t even think of what that is. It’s bullshit, Allie.” He sat, pushing her hand away from him hard enough for it to smack against the covers before she withdrew it. “But seriously, what the hell, you were just going to . . . leave? Without saying anything?”
“I don’t want any long, drawn-out good-byes. Okay?” Irritated at the waver in her voice, Alicia sat, too, and swung her legs over her side of the bed. She found a T-shirt and tugged it on over her head. It hit her midthigh and meant she could feel covered up without finding a pair of panties, but . . . it was his.
“You want to leave without any good-bye.”
This time, with her back to him, she felt exactly like she was shutting him out and not drawing him in. The best truth now was still mostly a lie, though. “Yes. The way you did to me.”
“Fine.” Nikolai didn’t sound angry anymore. He sounded resigned. She heard the soft thump of his feet on the floor on the other side of the bed. “I’ll go, if that’s what you want.”
Ask me to stay.
Irrational. It was all he had to do, wasn’t it? Say the words out loud. Tell her that he loved her and he wanted her. All he had to do was ask her to stay, but of course, Nikolai didn’t.
He didn’t ask her to walk him to the front door, but she did. He turned before he opened it, and she hadn’t thought she would kiss him again—why drag this out? Yet her mouth found his, and she backed him up against the wall, and his hands were in her hair, and her tongue was in his mouth, and all she could do was try not to devour him where they stood.