“Oh, thanks.” Suppressing a yawn, I push my empty plate away and get up. I have no intention of being here long enough to need that many clothes, but I do need shoes and warm basics for escape. “I’ll check them out right now.”
Peter gets up and starts clearing the table while I sort through Yan’s purchases. All the tags show bigger sizes than I’m used to, but the clothes look like they’ll fit me, so I must be a Medium or a Large among the petite women of Japan. The shoes are the right size too. I try them on right away, excited to find a pair of comfortable sneakers and warm boots, along with less practical sandals and high-heeled pumps.
“Does your colleague think I’m going to be going out clubbing?” I ask Peter when I go through the rest of the bags and find some equally impractical dresses in addition to common-sense basics like yoga pants, jeans, sweaters, and T-shirts. There’s underwear too, most of it lacy and pretty, and a couple of slinky silk nighties—a man’s idea of what a woman would wear to bed.
“Yan is good with clothes, so I told him to get whatever he thought was best,” Peter says, grinning as I hold up a low-cut tank top that wouldn’t look out of place at a summer beach bash. “I guess he went a little overboard with some items.”
“Uh-huh.” I stuff everything back into the bags and grab a couple, about to lug them to the closet upstairs, when Peter comes up to me and snatches them out of my hands.
“I’ve got it,” he says, picking up the rest, and I watch, bemused, as he carries all the bags upstairs.
This is yet another example of his extreme solicitousness, I realize as I follow him up the steps. Back home, not only would Peter free me from all chores when I was tired, but he also wouldn’t let me carry anything heavier than a plate of food when he was around. I don’t know if he thinks I’m incapable of lifting a shopping bag, or if someone taught him to always carry things for women, but it definitely adds to the sense that he’s pampering me.
When he’s not drugging, kidnapping, or threatening me, that is.
“Was this a part of your upbringing at the orphanage?” I ask, following him into the bedroom walk-in closet, where he puts the bags down and starts hanging up my clothes next to his. “When you were a boy, did someone instruct you on how to be a gentleman or something along those lines?”
Peter stops and looks at me, eyebrows raised. “You’re kidding, right?”
I frown and reach for one of the bags, taking out a sweater to fold. “No, why?”
He laughs darkly. “Ptichka, do you have any idea what orphanages in Russia are like?”
I bite my lip as I put the sweater on the shelf next to me. “No, not really. I’m guessing not so good?”
He resumes hanging up the clothes. “Let’s just say that gentlemanly behavior wasn’t high on my list of priorities when I was a child.”
“I see.” I should be helping Peter, but all I can do is stare at him, struck by how little I still know about the man who’s taken over my life so completely. I know he was raised in an orphanage—he told me he ended up in a juvenile prison camp after he killed the headmaster of that orphanage—but that’s as far as I’ve gotten, and all of a sudden, it’s not enough.
I want to know more about Peter Sokolov.
I want to understand him.
“What happened to your family?” I ask, leaning against the closet doorframe. “Did you ever know your parents?”
“No.” He doesn’t pause in his methodical unpacking of the bags. “I was left on the doorstep of the orphanage as a newborn. They think I was three or four days old at the time. Their best guess is that my mother came from one of the nearby villages. She might’ve been a schoolgirl who fooled around and got pregnant or something along those lines. I didn’t show any signs of fetal alcohol syndrome, and I tested negative for drugs, so that ruled out prostitutes and such.”
“And no one’s ever come forward to claim you?” I ask, trying to ignore the painful squeezing in my chest. I don’t know why, but picturing this dangerous man as an abandoned newborn makes me want to cry.
Peter lowers the hanger he’s holding and gives me a mildly surprised look. “Claim me? No, of course not. No one claims the kids at those places—that’s why they’re called orphanages. Well, nowadays, rich foreigners like to pop in and adopt a baby or two if they can’t have brats of their own, but that wasn’t the case when I was growing up.”
I swallow, the ache in my chest intensifying. “Did you ever try to find out about your mother? To find her or your father? I mean, you have the resources now…”
Peter’s jaw flexes, and he turns to fully face me. “Why would I waste my time looking for someone who abandoned me?” His eyes gleam with a hard, dark light. “There’s only one thing I’d want to do if I found her, and even I draw the line at matricide.”
He turns away, continuing to fold and hang my clothes, and I force myself to join him in the task despite my shaking hands and knotted stomach. His revelations both terrify me and fill me with crushing pity. It’s obvious to me now that the rage I glimpsed in Peter goes deeper than the tragedy that befell his wife and son, that he was shaped by forces I can scarcely comprehend.
That his focus on family—and his obsession with me—might have roots going all the way to the darkness of his childhood.
15
Sara
* * *
I fall asleep in Peter’s embrace as soon as we lie down, and I wake up sometime later to the feel of him sliding into me from behind, his muscular arm looped around my ribcage to hold me still. I’m not wet enough, and the first few thrusts burn, but then his hand moves down to my sex, finding my clit, and my body softens, melting for him as the fire ignites in me again.
It takes only a couple of minutes for me to come, and he’s right behind me, his thick cock jerking inside me as he reaches his peak with a muffled groan. He holds me then, not bothering to pull out, and I fall back asleep like that, with him still buried in my body. In my dreams, he kisses my temple and tells me how much he loves me, but when I wake up in the morning, I’m alone in bed, with the bright light streaming through the floor-to-ceiling windows.
As I shower, I find traces of dried sem#n on my thighs—evidence that we didn’t use protection once again. I wash it off quickly, trying not to give in to the panic bubbling inside me, and get dressed to go looking for Peter.
He has to get me that pill.
He has to keep his promise.
To my surprise, he’s nowhere to be found downstairs. Neither are any of his men.
My pulse jumps, then settles into a rapid rhythm. Could it be? Could they have left me alone and gone to take care of some business? Before I let myself get too excited, I grab my boots and go outside to check if they might be training there.
Nothing.
Everyone’s gone, and so is the chopper.
“They’ll be back this afternoon,” a man’s voice says behind me, and I jump up with a startled squeak.
Spinning around, I face Ilya, who’s stepping out of the house behind me. He must’ve been in one of the guest bedrooms upstairs—the only places I didn’t check yet.