by Nicole Fox
“You should have seen what she was wearing at the club,” Lev says. I give him a dirty look, but he just smirks at me.
“I’m sure he remembers every detail of what you were wearing, Allison,” Sophie says. She wraps her small arm around me. “You brought your dress, right?”
“Yes. It’s in my car. I’ll get it.”
After I get my dress—still in the box—I retreat with Sophie upstairs. She’s brought expensive shampoos and conditioners for me to use. As I shower, enveloped in the warm, musky scent of her shampoo, I contemplate what kind of information I might get out of Sophie. Ilya must know some details about Lev’s Bratva connections, but that doesn’t mean Sophie will. She seems too delicate to be involved in any of this.
When I finish my shower, I put on the dress. Sophia combs my hair with a gentle touch. I watch myself in the mirror as we talk about the gala, my family, and her relationship with Ilya.
“He is truly the sweetest man,” she says. “He’s the only man I’ve ever been with that I know I can trust no matter what.”
“Oh?” I ask. “So, you know everything about him?”
She slides a bobby pin into my hair. “I know what I need to know.”
“Does that mean you know a lot about Lev?” I ask.
In the mirror, I see Sophie’s face skip through several emotions. Her lips press together for several seconds before she looks up at me. “Could I give you some unsolicited marital advice, Allison?”
“Sure,” I say, though I’d strongly prefer court-admissible criminal evidence.
“I married Ilya because I knew he’d always value me and that’s what I needed. I didn’t want men who treated me like something that was fragile or like a ball and chain,” she says. “And what Ilya needed was someone who was willing to accept the messy parts of his life. He couldn’t give it up and I wasn’t going to force him to choose between me and those messy things. You have something inside you that you need. It could just be companionship. But you need someone who is willing to fulfill that need and someone whose need can be fulfilled by you.”
“You know I don’t have a choice in this,” I say. She finishes my hair.
“Let’s do your makeup now,” she says. She opens her various makeup sets and starts applying foundation. Initially, I think she’s just going to ignore what I said. We sit in awkward silence for a while as she works.
But when she’s nearly finished, she looks me in the eye.
“Do you think, if you had a choice, you’d never return here?” she asks.
She doesn’t wait for my answer as she starts putting away her makeup kits.
“I can’t wait for Lev to see you. He’s going to fall on his knees and worship you.”
I laugh bitterly. “Maybe you don’t know him that well after all,” I grumble.
Sophie winks with a weird kind of all-knowing confidence. “You’d be surprised.”
After she’s done packing her things, she helps me down the stairs. I’m not used to the heels, but after walking down the hallway and getting tips from Sophie, it becomes a bit easier. Sophie enters the den first.
“Lev, are you ready to see your date?” she asks.
He makes some noise that could be a no or a yes.
“Allison, come in,” Sophie calls to me.
I step inside. Lev is by the home bar, drinking from a glass. He must have showered in the downstairs bathroom and changed while I was getting ready. His hair is combed back and he’s wearing a dark gray suit, fitted to show the sharp lines of his torso and the width of his shoulders. His hand is shoved into his pocket, with a diamond-encrusted watch winking from his wrist. The black shirt underneath the suit jacket is the perfect complement to his skin. It takes everything I have not to pounce on him and run my tongue along his jawline, to undo the buttons of his shirt one by one and let my fingers explore what’s beneath …
He looks so damn good that I finally understand why Julia goes out of her way to pursue certain men. Lev turns male beauty into a religion that I’d put my faith in.
He turns to look at me. His green eyes soften suddenly from their usual severity. The tension that seems to encompass his body leaves him. It’s like someone sucked the air from the room.
“Oh.”
The Tide & Shore Hotel sits on a hill, the driveway curling around it and splitting to lead either to the parking lot or the beach. As Lev and I walk up to it, his hand skims against my back. The dress I’m wearing is black and backless. It ties together behind my neck, with lace that covers my shoulders and extends past my knees. There’s a black skirt underneath it, but it only reaches partway down my thighs. If I had been going to the gala solely to support my father, I’d have chosen something more conservative, but knowing I’d be by Lev’s side the whole night, I selected something to hold his attention. It must be working; Lev has kept his hand on some part of me ever since we got into his car.
In the lobby of the hotel, an older man wearing a dress uniform is standing behind a table covered with a white cloth. He checks the licenses of two people at the table against the clipboard in his hand before smiling at both of them.
“Welcome, Mr. and Mrs. Sadler. Thank you for honoring our men in blue. The red tables are for our donors. Please enjoy the music and the hors d’oeuvres before the dinner starts.”
Lev’s hand grazes against my ass as we step up to the table and he pulls his wallet out of his back pocket. The man smiles at us.
“Welcome to the Great Blue Foundation gala. May I see your IDs?” the man asks.
As I fumble with my new clutch, Lev gives the man his driver’s license. The man glances at it. He stiffens. His eyes shift back and forth between the license and Lev. Lev keeps his eyes locked on him, his expression passive. It reminds me of when we first met and I thought he was apathetic about everything.
The man hands the license back to Lev, careful not to let their fingers touch. He stares at Lev for another second before turning to me.
“Ma’am?” the man says. I offer my license. He barely looks at it before his eyebrows shoot up. “Oh, Miss Harrington. I apologize, but you’re not on the list. Does your father know—”
“She’s my plus one,” Lev interrupts.
The man frowns, glancing between the two of us.
“I see,” he says. “Well, welcome, Miss Harrington. Please enjoy the hors d’oeuvres before the dinner starts.”
He hands me back my license. Lev’s hand drifts to the small of my back. I lean toward him, our bodies bumping together, as he pushes open one of the doors to the ballroom. He steps aside to let me in, then follows behind me. His fingertips briefly touch my hips before he slips his arm around my waist. In the wake of his touch is a light, simmering tingle dancing on my skin—just like always.
At least a hundred people are spread out in the ballroom. Two lines of tables are on either side of the room while the center is empty except for a marble dance floor and a bar in between two massive speakers at the front of the room. On the right, the tables are covered with blue cloth and have vases filled with bluebells. White stars flicker on the cloth from the table lamps. On the left, it’s the same setup, but the tables are red and the vases are filled with small red roses.
“Very patriotic,” Lev remarks.
“He recognized your name?” I ask. When he doesn’t answer, I look over at him. He’s looking up at the blue fairy lights that crawl over the ceiling. “Lev?”
He glances back down at me, forcing a smile. “Unfortunately, my father and I share the same last name and he was less than friendly with the police. I’m guilty by association.”
“You are guilty, period,” I say.
“Semantics. And they wouldn’t know that if it wasn’t for him.”
He pulls a bit away from me. It would be barely noticeable to anyone else, but I feel the slight absence of body heat and miss it instantly. I turn my focus to each person in the ballroom, trying to forget all of the guilt between us and attempting to find my parents
hidden among the crowd.
A group of people moves away from the bar. Talking to the bartender are two people, polar opposites. The man, with his dark gray hair and his broad frame, stands tall, posture rigid with years of ingrained discipline. The woman, with her dyed blonde hair and tiny frame, leans against the bar, laughing at a joke that no one else is laughing at.
My parents.
They’re slanted away from me, but I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve been caught. I am the worst kind of person—I let a man die in front of me, I lusted for a murderer, I dreamed up an extravagant con to fool my parents and all their friends, and I’m going to marry a man who is involved with one of the most powerful crime syndicates the city has suffered under.
I’d disown me if I were them.
“Take a breath,” Lev says. His body is pressed against mine, his hands on my hips. He told me the same thing the night he killed that man on the motorcycle. I try to force in a breath, but the thought of that man, his limp body on the side of the road; the memory of the celebratory ambience in Black Glacier before I followed Jeffrey Douglas, collides in my head.
The breath gets caught in my throat. I press my hand against my chest, bending down to try to get it out.
Lev is saying something, but I’m too far under to hear him. He guides me away from the middle of the room. I barely notice. I try to think of something else, but the loud music pounds in my head just like the music at Black Glacier did.
I can smell the pepper spray.
I can feel the fear. Like it’s only been buried under my façade this whole time. It never went away. It just waited until I was vulnerable.
Lev’s hands are in my hair. When his lips touch my mouth, the smell of the pepper spray fades, replaced by his scent of smoke and spice. When he pulls my hips tight against his, his lips moving against mine recklessly, the fear is burned away by the contradiction of need and satisfaction. His fingers trail down my spine and there is nothing in the world except where his fingers touch.
He steps away from me and my breathing slowly becomes more natural. His hair isn’t as neat as it had been. I don’t recall my hands being anywhere near his head, but they must have been.
His hand cups my cheek. “You’re okay now?”
I nod. He looks sideways. An older couple is staring at us.
“Hey,” he says. Like a pair of deer frightened by a gunshot, they scurry away and don’t look back.
Lev turns back to me. “We need to talk to your parents. You don’t want them to find out from the man checking IDs or that couple.”
I nod several times, but I don’t move.
“Allison,” he says. His hand brushes down my arm. “It will be quick. We came late on purpose. The dinner is going to start soon.”
“People already know we’re together,” I say. “So, let’s just leave. You got what you wanted.”
“What I wanted is for your father to be fully aware of the situation,” he says. His hand drops. Anxiety floods back into my body. I reach toward him, but he takes a step back. “There are two options. Either I kiss you right in the middle of this room like we just fucked, or you go over and tell your parents. Both options will get their full attention.”
Hate is a strong word, but entirely accurate in this moment.
I walk alone down the center of the room. With Lev by my side, the heels had begun to feel empowering and sensual, but without him, they feel unfamiliar and cumbersome.
When I turn my head, Lev is a few feet behind me and his eyes flit up from my ass. He shrugs, guilty but unashamed. I refrain from flipping him off.
I need to remember that, no matter how sweet or caring he acts, this is all he wants. I’m a pawn in his massive game of chess.
As I’m nearly in front of my parents, my mother turns. For a couple of seconds, she doesn’t recognize me. The location, the dress, the hair, the makeup—it all turns me into a stranger. The recognition slowly dawns on her.
“Ally!” she nearly yells, though I’m right beside her. She throws her arms around me, hugging me tightly. My father turns around. “I didn’t know you were coming! Why didn’t you tell us? This is so great. I feel like I haven’t heard from you in years.”
“I, um, I wanted to surprise you,” I say. My father pulls me into a hug.
“It’s good to see you,” he says. “You look beautiful. How did you get in? Did Michael just let you in?”
“No, uh …” I bend the clutch in my hands. “I’ve … there’s something I need to tell both of you. Something important.”
I could tell the truth right now. Lev isn’t within earshot. My father would arrest him without evidence and jam him as far up the ass of the correctional system as humanly possible.
But it would end up costing him everything and it would break his heart to know that he was one of the reasons I decided to go into this deal. It would cost everybody an irrevocable amount of pain and Lev would, more likely than not, eventually walk free with an effusive apology from the city government.
And then he’d probably come for me.
My mother puts her hand on my arm. “Go ahead, Ally. What is it?”
“I’ve been in a relationship,” I say, letting the lie simmer on my tongue. “For the last six months.”
My father looks over at my mother, observing to see if she knew about this. My mother tilts her head.
“That’s … that’s good, Ally,” she says. “Why would you hide that from us?”
“It’s a bit complicated.” I twist my clutch harder. “But … he’s here.”
I turn. Lev is already approaching us. I keep my eyes on his face to avoid looking at my parents. He looks so impossibly good.
“Mom, Dad, this is Lev,” I say. As I turn to glance back at them, Lev’s arm slides around my waist and I see my father’s face. I watch it change from faint recognition to confusion to disbelief, then straight to livid with ‘do not pass go; do not collect two hundred dollars’-type speed. Blood rushes so quickly to his face that I have no idea how he manages to remain upright.
“It’s wonderful to finally meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Harrington.” Lev holds his hand out. My mother shakes it, but my father purposefully turns away from him and toward me.
“I need to talk to you privately, Ally,” he says. I reach for Lev’s hand that’s around my waist without thinking. When my father’s eyes follow my movement, my hand retreats back to my clutch.
“Don’t you want to all talk together?” I ask.
“It’s fine,” Lev says, his arm disappearing from my waist. As much as I hate to admit it, I miss it. “Your mother and I can get a drink and get to know each other.”
“Or you can step back,” my father says.
“Peter,” my mother chastises. “Don’t be a jerk. This is your daughter’s boyfriend. Let’s not make a scene. How did the two of you meet, Ally?”
The look that my father gives Lev could turn lions into kittens, but Lev looks back at him without any indication that he’s noticed my father’s anger.
“As strange as it sounds, we met at the gas station,” Lev says. He smiles at me as if remembering the moment. I imagine the real memory is playing in his head—my body leaning over Jeffrey Douglas’ as I perform CPR, trying to tell him that a corpse isn’t dead. “She came up to me, acting like she knew me from a long time ago. After about a minute, I realized she thought I was one of her old classmates.”
I nod, touching my temples like it can erase the image of Jeffrey Douglas choking.
“It was super embarrassing,” I tell my parents. “I kept apologizing, but he was very cool about it. He bought me the soda that I had been planning to get.”
Lev’s hand settles on my back again. His thumb strokes against my spine. It’s enough to center my thoughts, banishing the memories of that night to shadowy parts of my mind.
“And you happened to be in a gas station?” my father asks Lev.
“Why wouldn’t he be in a gas station?” my mother asks. My father r
uns his fingers down his tie.
“Mr. Alekseiev is rich,” he says. “Rich enough that he doesn’t need to get his own gas.”
“He’s rich?” My mother appraises Lev again.
“I’m well off, but I still get my own gas. Chalk it up to a quirk of personality,” Lev says. “When we met, I was getting gas and, at the time, I was still smoking and needed a lighter, so I went inside. Simple as that. I quit now, though.” He winks at my mother, dripping with charm.
“You know that Ally wants to be a prosecutor, correct?” my father cuts in the moment Lev stops talking. He takes a step closer to Lev.
My mother takes an unsteady step back. She tries to catch my eye, but I’m too aware of how easily violence could break out between these two, so I keep my eyes on both of them. “District attorney in fact, one day.”
“Yes,” Lev says. “I’m looking forward to it. I know that Ally is passionate enough about justice and doing right by the victims’ families that she’ll put in all of her time and effort to convict them. She will be an amazing DA one day. I’m certain the city will be safer with her in that position.”
“Well, that’s so nice of you,” my mother says. My father shakes his head. A caterer stops beside us.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,” he says. “Would any of you like to try the cheddar, apple, and arugula flatbread?”
“Sure,” I say a bit too quickly. I take two pieces. Impulsively, I give one of them to Lev. As I take a bite out of mine, I see my father watching my hand pass off the flatbread to Lev. It might as well have been a kiss.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter, though I’m not completely certain why. Lev briefly squeezes my hip. It could be a reassurance or a reminder to keep the con up.
My whole world becomes two men’s reactions—my father’s frustration and Lev’s arm around me.
“Ally, we need to talk privately for a moment,” my father says firmly. As he opens his mouth to speak again, the sound of a microphone being tapped fills the ballroom. We all turn to see an older man in the center of the dance floor.
“Everyone, thank you so much for coming,” the man on the mic announces. “I’m certain you’re all starving and we’ll have plenty of time to honor our wonderful law enforcement officers after we’ve eaten, so we’re going to start the dinner now. You’ll notice that every table has six names on it and we’d be immensely grateful if you could take a table with your name on it. Thank you so much, everyone. Let’s eat.”