Page 65 of Deadly Knight

It’s like a damn movie.

He’s a mobster.

I leave him at our spot after asking for time, which he gives.

It’s after two days of avoiding that I text him, asking to meet up.

“I want to know everything. When you deal, when you train… I don’t want to be hidden from this world, Dimitri. It’s my only request.”

He’s shocked, his mouth open. “You don’t mind?”

“I mind. But I love you more.”

I gasp. He gasps. I’ve never said that aloud. It came out so naturally.

“I love you too, Katya.” Dimitri sweeps me up in his arms, spinning me until my back is against the fence. He presses against me and claims my mouth in a kiss that promises forever.

“I’m so fucking sorry,moya dusha. Yet again, you’ve been hurt because of me. Nothing I do will ever be enough.”

Why don’t I remember that memory?

Why does it feel like I’m being carried?

What is that noise?

Blackness sweeps over me once again, and I fall into my next dream-memory.

Katya groans,shifting on the plane’s leather couch. It’s the most movement I’ve seen from her since we’ve taken off, and given the passing hours, it’s probably time she finally does. Whatever my father drugged her with was a blessing in disguise, because she stayed asleep the entire time—from the abandoned laundromat, into my car, onto the plane, and now a few hours into the twenty-hour flight.

I’m sitting across from her, elbows on my knees and a glass of bourbon dangling between my fingers. Every once in a while, I swirl it, using the sloshing noises to distract my mind.

She’s safe, and until Ivan is finally eradicated from the earth, she’ll remain so within the specific confines I’m about to give her. Twice now, he’s used her against me. Two mistakes. There won’t be a third.

She groans again, her eyes slowly fluttering open, her head moving side to side. Her limbs shift, likely getting feeling back into them, and her sigh is the final piece of sleep she shakes off.

I recline in my seat, sensing the instance she realizes she’s not in her bed or anywhere familiar. When last night catches up to her, and the realization there are gaps in her memory.

She shoots upright, her head turning towards me.

I imagined this moment a million times over the years, and none of them involved these circumstances. I’ve pictured one day passing by her on the streets, feigning it’s a coincidence and she’d be pleased—excited even—to see me. Visualized waiting for her at her work and admitting all the ways I haven’t been able to let her go.

In every fantasy, Katya was receptive. Enthusiastic to see me and eager to tell me all the ways she’s missed me too.

But that’s why fantasies and dreams are what their namesake is: false hope.

Because that isn’t at all what’s happening now.

A million emotions pass over Katya’s expression: shock, confusion, fear, anger, shock again…but never happiness. Never love.

She jolts, pressing herself as far back into the couch as humanly possible, while her shriek is loud enough it could probably be heard by the country we’re flying high above. The pilot was warned to ignore any noises, because I suspected she wouldn’t be pleased when waking.

“Wh—how? Dimi—no.” Her words are stuttered, unfinished, confused as she shakes her head, wiping her palms over her face. “No,” she repeats, this time with a laugh. “No, no, this is all in my head. Too much wine at dinner.That’s all.”

I remain silent, letting her work it out for herself that this is reality; harsh and real.

“You…your father—no!”

Her words turn to mumbles, her voice low and only for herself. She stops looking my way, staring at her hands as they rub over her thighs. Her hand goes to her arm, her nails scrapingup and down her skin, covering old self-harm scars that gut me every time.