by Jane Henry
But I have to choose what’s best for Taara, not me.
Love isn’t a choice of what’s best for me, but for her.
If I love her, and I know now that I do, I have to let her go.
Chapter 18
Taara
When he got on the plane, it took every bit of self-control I could muster not to break down. I wanted to run to him, to throw my arms around his shoulders and ask him why.
Why he made me leave. Why he sent me on this plane back to America alone.
Why he came back.
What have I done to deserve his dismissal? It hurts so badly I can’t even think about it, so I bury myself in magazines and finally welcome sleep when it comes, though it’s fitful and restless, and the weighted pain of his rejection settles back on me as soon as I open my eyes.
Why is he here? If he wanted to send me back to America, he could’ve stayed back and saved me the torture of his presence.
I get off the plane, disheveled and barely dressed, and it surprises me that Marissa waits outside with Nicolai. I don’t want to see them right now. If I were to become Stefan’s, those two would be like family. And I can’t mentally go there. I can’t.
Marissa reaches her hands out to me. “Welcome home, Taara,” she says. “How are you feeling?” She looks at me so probingly, I become concerned.
“I’m fine,” I say, baffled. Nicolai looks at me sternly, though, his eyes narrowed, and arms crossed on his chest. Does he still not believe me? Does he still think me a spy? Well he can fuck way the hell off, because I have no interest in wasting an ounce of my breath convincing him I’m innocent. Nope. Not gonna do it.
“I just feared that you’d be worried, once you—”
“Marissa.” Stefan’s sharp voice cuts in from behind me. “No.”
I turn around to look at him curiously. What the hell?
“No what?” I say, confused.
Nicolai sighs. “She doesn’t know.”
Stefan shakes his head.
Know what? God.
“Sure,” I say. “Go ahead. Keep talking like I’m not even standing right here before you.”
But they don’t even bother to acknowledge that I’m there. Instead, they talk right over me.
“I didn’t want her worrying uselessly for the entire flight. She needed rest,” Stefan says.
Nicolai nods. “Fair.”
Wait. What’s going on here?
“Do you have something to tell me?” I ask Stefan coldly, crossing my arms over my chest in an effort to self-protect.
But I’m unprepared for his response. I’m not ready for the cold tone of his voice, the aloof and detached manner, but most of all? The news he tells me.
“Taara, it’s your mother,” he says, and when he looks at me, I swear I read sympathy in his eyes, but it quickly vanishes. “We got news that she’s very ill. And I—” his voice trails off before he clears his throat and turns back to me. “I wanted to be sure you were here, actually able to see her, before I told you.”
“Thanks?” I ask, huffing out an angry breath. “I could have made that decision myself, you know?”
A muscle ticks in his jaw, but he doesn’t respond at first. I turn to Nicolai. “Who knows how she’s doing?” I demand. “Where is she? What are her symptoms?”
“Let’s go see her,” Nicolai suggests. “And we can talk on the way.”
“Thank you.” I look down at the clothes I’m wearing and up questioningly to Marissa. “But what about…”
“Her clothes, Nicolai,” she says. “Let’s get her back to the compound so she can at least change.”
He sighs. “We have so little time.”
And that’s when I realize what’s happening. My mother’s dying. He’s flown me back to America to see her.
How long has he known this?
“I’ll bring them to her,” Stefan supplies. “Drop her off there now so she doesn’t have to wait.”
Nicolai pulls onto the highway. We ride in stony silence. Marissa clears her throat.
“So, how was your trip to Russia?”
I sigh. “Fine. I met Demyan and Larissa.”
“How are they?” Nicolai asks. “I was once a member of that group.”
“They seemed well enough,” I say with a shrug. “They were very kind to us, and their brotherhood was welcoming as well.”
The rest of our ride is silent.
We finally pull up to the nursing facility where my mother lives, but no one greets us on the ample front porch as they usually do. My mother likes to sit on a rocker with a cup of tea or by the checkerboard table so she can play a game with a friend. But she isn’t there.
My nerves are fraught by the time I get out of the car. My hands shake, and I’m still wearing the stupid sheath. I sure as hell hope Stefan will bring me clothes to change into. We aren’t far from the compound.
I don’t want to go in here alone. I don’t.
“Would you like me to go with you?” Marissa asks. I shake my head. The only person I would have wanted with me yesterday was Stefan, but after he’s acted today, I don’t even want him there.
“I’ll be fine, thank you,” I tell her, but I know it isn’t the truth. I won’t be fine at all. My nerves are frazzled and I’m wearing practically nothing. And my mother, God, my mother. She could be dying. I’m steeling myself for what I’ll see when I go in. For what I’ll face.
“Take this,” Marissa says, taking off her own sweater and handing it to me. It’s such a small gesture, but when I place it on, my nose tingles and my throat gets tight.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
She squeezes my hand. “Stay strong.”
And I know she isn’t just talking about my mother, but more. She knows things aren’t right with Stefan. She doesn’t know exactly what I’ve been through, but she knows it hasn’t been all sunshine and daises.
Caroline’s words come back to me. The women of the Bratva stand together.
They do. They do.
When I enter the lobby, my stomach churns with nausea from the strong scent of antiseptics. The overwhelming hopelessness of this place makes me want to run, but I have to stay. I can’t leave now. If he flew me here from Russia with the clothes of a slave still on my back, this is important. Something is very, very wrong.
I go through the routine of checking in and giving them my name. The guard at the main desk gives me a curious look at my weird outfit, but the sweater does make me look a little less conspicuous. I make my way to my mother’s room, and when I arrive, I see a familiar nurse, Leah.
“Oh, Taara,” she says, coming to me. “Thank God. We were told you’d traveled outside of the country and no one could reach you.”
A lie, but whatever. This all happened so quickly, I imagine that I couldn’t have really gotten here any faster than I did.
“How is she?” I say. “I got here as soon as I could.”
She sighs and shakes her head. “Not good,” she says softly. “She suffered a heart attack and has been moved to the intensive care unit on the hospital side of the facility.” She gives me a look of sympathy. “She’s holding on, though. We aren’t sure for who or what, but perhaps you’re the answer.”
“Oh.” Oh.
Oh God, this is not good. I let her lead me in a sort of stupor to the other side of this floor, past rows and rows of people in wheelchairs or walking on wobbly walkers. But my mother will be in bed. Who knew how much I’d want to see her in one of the wheelchairs today?
“Be prepared,” Leah says softly when we reach a closed door. “She isn’t well at all. She has breathing tubes and an IV and may not be conscious.”
I nod, unable to speak. The lump in my throat is so tight I can’t even swallow.
Leah opens the door. When I go in, the first thing I notice is how dark it is. The second thing is how quiet it is.
“Mom?” I go to her bedside, only to see that she is indeed, asleep. And God, she looks terrible. Breathing tubes and app
aratus surround her.
“I’ll leave you,” Leah says softly. “Ring if you need anything at all.”
I take my mother’s hand. “I’m here,” I tell her. At first, I think she isn’t going to even know I’m there. She’s so deeply asleep, she doesn’t even hear me. But after a moment, her paper-thin eyelids flutter open briefly. “I knew you’d come,” she whispers, then she closes her eyes once more.
I sit beside her and I take her hand, placing it on my cheek. Needing to feel my mother’s touch.
We sit in amiable silence. I listen to the sound of her oxygen, and the quietest beeping of the machines she’s hooked up to.
“Where were you?” she whispers, and it’s odd, but I know then that my mom is at her most lucid. I haven’t gotten to talk to my “real” mother in so long, it feels a little out of the ordinary.
“I had to go on a small trip,” I tell her. Oh God, as if. A long trip, and it involved a plot to take down the men responsible for the kidnapping of women from our homeland.
“Did you enjoy yourself?” my mother asks.
“Yes,” I lie. “Very much.”
“And who did you go with?”
“Stefan,” I say before I can stop myself.
She actually opens one eyes. “Did you really?” A corner of her lips quirks up.
“I did. Really.” But I don’t offer anything else at this stage. I don’t want her thinking that there’s anything at all going on between us, because there isn’t.
“Good,” she says softly, and to my surprise, she lifts the hand I’m not holding, and places it atop mine. “He’ll take care of you now.”
Her words send panic through me. She’s saying goodbye. I can’t stand it. “What?” I ask. “Mom, no!”
But her eyes fall closed like she’s too exhausted to say more, and when she coughs, it’s ragged and desperate. She’s barely hanging on. Barely alive. And I can’t keep her as mine anymore.
A soft knock comes at the door. I don’t look up. I don’t want to see any more nurses or really anyone right now. I want to hold onto this moment. Hold onto my mother.
But when I see Stefan through my blurred vision, I don’t look away. I don’t tell him to fuck off. I take his hand with my free one and he takes my mother’s. And we stand like that, in silence. And even though I want to hate him, or even feel indifferent toward him, I can’t do it. I don’t want to deny my mother time with him, but if I’m honest, I don’t want to be alone right now.
I forgive him for being an asshole, because right now that doesn’t matter. Nothing matters. He came. He didn’t leave me to bear this alone but came.
He’s murmuring words in Russian, and I don’t know exactly what he’s saying, but they sound like a sort of prayer. And I love that. I blink, and a tear rolls down my cheek. This man, this man that I love, he’s done terrible things, but he holds my mother’s hand and prays with her on her last moments on earth, and I will never forget that. I don’t know where we go from here, but I don’t care.
“You came for her,” my mother says, her eyes closing again, as if it’s too much effort to keep them open. Then they flutter open again, and she looks from me to him. She takes our hands, the two that she holds, and she joins them. She pulls in a deep, ragged breath. “You have each other now.”
She closes her eyes and my heartbeat spikes because I think she’s gone, but she isn’t, yet. Her breathing comes in ragged, shallow gasps for long moments, and we don’t let go. Standing over her, holding one another’s hands, we look at each other.
I don’t need to say anything. I forgive him for what he did. I love him. And if some stupid misguided notion got him to push me away as he did, I can forgive that.
He isn’t getting rid of me that easily.
He holds my gaze and I hold his.
“I love you,” he mouths, and it hits me in the chest so hard and fast the tears I’ve held back begin to flow.
He does. Oh, God, he does.
“I love you,” I mouth back.
We don’t move, not an inch. I look from him to my mother, and I grab at ragged bits of prayers I learned in my youth. I wipe away tears and gently stroke the top of my mother’s hand while holding Stefan’s with my other hand. And finally, when the sun is setting outside her window, fingertips of orange casting a gentle glow in the room, my mother breathes her last.
It isn’t as dramatic as one would think, watching life usher out of this world and into the next. No one comes running. No angels play their trumpets. But her body goes completely still, and right then, I know she’s more at rest than she ever was in life. I drop my head to her chest, now still, and I know she’s gone. A deep sob racks my body. Though my mother wasn’t perfect, and the past few months have been difficult to manage, she was still my mother. The woman who brought me into this world, who taught me right from wrong, who sacrificed countless days and months and years for me, to bring me to America and see to my education, my safety, my wellbeing.
But right now, my mind is blank, and I ride the waves of grief.
I cry until I have no more tears. I’m vaguely aware of people coming in the room and Stefan lifting me into his arms. I don’t speak but put my arms around his neck, and find that actually, I do have a few more tears to shed. I didn’t realize how badly it devastated me to have a rift between us. But I need him now, and I don’t want him to let me go. He holds me, speaks to the nurses in the room, and places a call on his phone.
“Let’s go, babygirl,” he whispers in my ear.
“We can’t leave her,” I whisper.
“We didn’t,” he whispers back. “But she’s gone now.”
I’m grateful he’s a take-charge kinda guy right now, because it makes it easier to know what to do next. To walk with him out to the car that waits. To place my head on his chest on the ride home and cry some more. To follow him as he leads us back to his house on the compound, and up the stairs. To walk in a sort of trance to the bed, where he strips me out of the clothes that I wear and tosses the bag of forgotten clothes he fetched on an overstuffed chair.
He leads me to the bathroom and takes my hand in silence, making me take a hot shower. The water feels good and washes away my tears as I cry yet again. I don’t realize he’s joined me until I feel his strong arms around me. I lean on him, and it feels perfect. It feels right.
Though there’s nothing sexual in his touch tonight, it’s deeply, beautifully intimate. He’s concerned and gentle with me, and it’s so damn sweet I let it soothe me. When I’m done showering, he helps me out and towels me off, slinging a towel around his own waist and leading me back to the bedroom.
Then he turns down the bedsheets.
“Hungry, baby?” he asks. I honestly don’t even remember the last time I ate. I nod dumbly but lay my head on the pillow and close my eyes. A short while later, someone knocks on the door. He says something to the person on the other side, takes a tray, then shuts it before he comes to me.
“You awake, baby?”
“Yes, daddy.” My eyes flutter open. I didn’t mean to say that. I feel small and a bit shy now that I have. But it feels nice right now, when I’m hurting and sad, to call him that. And he likes it too. I know he does when he sits on the side of the bed, slides the tray beside me, and bends down to kiss my forehead.
“You’re a good girl, Taara. You know that?” he whispers. He brushes his rough fingers along my cheekbone. “Daddy’s good little girl.”
His praise warms me through. I sit up and take the cup of soup he hands me, as well as some crackers.
“Aren’t you going to eat anything?” I ask him.
He just shakes his head.
“You should eat,” I say, unnaturally focused on how important this is.
“You let me worry about that,” he says, his eyes boring into mine with concern. I sigh, when the memory that I lost my mother today resurfaces. I swipe at my eyes but it’s no use. I’m full on crying again with no help for it. Quietly, he draws me to his chest and
holds me while I weep, until I’m completely spent.
“Sleep, baby.”
“I’ll sleep better if you’re next to me,” I confess.
And then he slides into bed behind me, wraps his arms around me from behind, and gathers me into his chest. And I fall asleep like that, tucked into his arms and as safe as can be. I wake several times in the night and remember the sad reality of what happened. I cry again and again. And every time, he holds me until I’m done, then tucks me back in.
I don’t make myself think about tomorrow or what happens next. I lost my mother today. But I found Stefan.
Chapter 19
Stefan
The days after Hesther’s death pass in a blur. It takes a week for us to prepare for the funeral, and Taara opted for cremation. We plan to give her the highest honor burial as one of our own and take care of Taara. Demyan and Larissa even fly out from Moscow, though their purpose is two-fold. Demyan came to convene with me and Tomas regarding where we stand with San Diego and the Russian Thieves. But they arranged their visit so they could be here early enough to be with Taara.
Larissa, Caroline, and Marissa help Taara prepare for the funeral. They get her clothing and shoes and help her dress in black, fix her hair and shoo me out of the way when I check in on her.
Things have gotten worse between me and Taara, but I tell myself it’s because she’s grieving. And because she’s grieving, I need to give her space.
“She’s fine, Stefan,” Caroline says cooly to me. “Now go drink some vodka or something.” And she shuts the door. I stand, bereft for a moment. I don’t know what to do with myself. I earned that, though, and I know it. I have no idea what Taara has told them about us, but it’s clear it wasn’t good.
I should be happy about that, but it makes me want to break a fucking wall.
“Let them take care of her,” Tomas says behind me. I didn’t realize he was here. I turn to face him with a sigh, but don’t speak.
“I don’t know what’s going on with you and Taara, but it doesn’t take a genius to see it’s not good,” he says. “Death has a strange way of either bringing people back together or driving them further apart.” He holds my gaze before he finishes. “See to it that it doesn’t do that latter, and you two will weather this.”