Page 177 of Ruthless Rustanovs

To Ivan, the look on Sola’s face was worth it. The painful series of final surgeries. The torturous months of recovery. Every agonizing second he’d gone through was more than worth it just to see her like this.

“Da, Sola, it’s me,” he said, clasping her around the shoulders. “I wondered if you would still recognize me. The doctors had to alter my face somewhat in order to fix it.”

“I can’t believe it…!” she said, her voice filled with the same shock and wonder clearly etched across her face. “I just can’t believe it!”

“Neither can I,” Ivan answered her truthfully. “But the doctors Alexei found for me are very skilled.”

“Obviously.” She reached up and tentatively, oh so softly, touched the previously scarred side of his face. “Is this real?”

“Da. It’s a combination of my own skin grafted with artificial skin created by a 3-D printer. It’s completely safe for you touch with whatever amount of pressure you wish.”

“Are you sure?” Sola asked, her tone both scared and doubtful.

“I promise you, Sola, I am completely healed.”

“Oh, good! Then I can do this…”

With only that small warning, his little Sola hauled back and slapped him hard across his brand new face.

Ivan’s head flinched to the side, more out of surprise than anything else, but then he looked back at her, enjoying the glint in Sola’s fierce brown eyes. Oh, how he’d missed that righteous indignation of hers during the past several months. “You still have the ability to surprise me, Sola.”

As glad as he was to see her, she looked nothing but furious to see him. Even though he was now one hundred times easier to look at.

“What kind of man—no…what kind of jackhole, just ups and vanishes like that? You made me love you, and then you just took off!”

“You love me?” he repeated, his heart filling with wonder despite her other much angrier words.

“You basically made every dream I’ve ever had come true. Even the ones I didn’t know I should have. Yes, of course I love you! But then you just…disappeared.”

He tried to answer, but his beautiful Sola raged on before he could.

“And you didn’t even have the balls to tell me you were leaving the country! Instead you had your cousin do your ‘Dear John’ dirty work! And then six months go by without a word. How could you do that? To me? To us?!?!”

“I am sorry, Sola,” he said, cupping her shoulders. “But I knew I wasn’t the man you deserved. Not with the face I had before...”

She shook her head, eyes blazing, “I told you…”

“I know what you told me, Sola, and I believe you. But I cared. That face belonged to the man I used to be. The killer who only lived for revenge. I wanted—I needed to be better than a man who hides himself away from the world for you. More than the Russkie monster too scared to come out of the manor and live in the light with you. That’s why I left.

But now I have this new face, and I used the time in recovery to set up that program for promising opera fellows from around the world at the St. Petersburg Opera. ”

Her eyes widened behind her glasses. Black now, with colorful flower details painted across the top and edges. They were unreasonably adorable—just like her. And he found himself missing her that much more, even though he was finally standing right in front of her.

“That was you? But it’s named after your cousin, Alexei…”

“Actually, the fellowship is named after my father. He and Alexei shared the same name after a Rustanov ancestor, and I wanted…” He looked away from her for a moment, struggling to come up with the right words. “…I wanted to do something good in my father’s name. Finally.”

He squeezed her shoulders and continued, “I’ve also been talking to my cousins.

They’ve helped me through a lot these last few months, and though I used to think I wanted nothing to do with the family business, I have changed my mind.

Like you, Alexei and Boris have shown me more kindness than I deserve and now I wish to pay them back with my service.

But that means I must finish my university studies… in St. Petersburg.”

He moved his hands down her arms to take her hands in his. “So you see, Sola, I’ve spent these last months setting up a life for us in Russia. One we could both enjoy together. And now that I’ve fixed myself, I am presenting myself to you. A better man, the kind of man you deserve.”

He had never felt or said anything more sincere in his life, but she looked away from him like his words cut her to the bone.

“The man I deserve….” she repeated with a bitter shake of her head.

And her voice sounded pained when she said, “But you planned all of this without me! You talked to your cousins, arranged for that fellowship—without saying a word to me about any of it. Not a call…not an email…not even a text...”

“Sola…” he pleaded. “It was something I had to do on my own. Please understand.”

“Meanwhile, I’m out here in California, barely able to keep it together enough to make it through the school year because you just took off after killing my ex-boyfriend!” Sola continued on like he hadn’t said anything.

Ivan shifted uncomfortably. “Sola, I missed you every single moment I was away—”

“Yeah, well...” Sola yanked her hands back from him. “Now you’re really going to miss me!”

Then she surprised him yet again by shoving past him and walking out of his life mere minutes after he’d walked back into hers.