by H L Day
"I'm a generous man."
I knew he meant it as a joke, but when I thought about everything he'd done for me that day, it was hard to dispute. He’d gone against Dmitry, he'd sat with me for hours in a hospital, he'd held me up literally as well as figuratively, and then he'd brought me back to his house. The generosity wasn't in doubt. The question was why. It went way beyond just developing feelings. "Are you falling in love with me?"
There was the tiniest hitch in his breathing, but no hesitation apart from that. "Yes. Does that scare you?"
"Does it scare you?"
"Do you have to answer a question with a question?"
"Do you?"
His chest shook as he laughed. Then it subsided suddenly. "After James, I didn't think I'd ever have feelings for anyone again. Maybe it helps that you pretend you don't have any. Which is also why you're about to change the subject."
I considered his words and then did it anyway. Love was a concept that I was going to need a lot longer to wrap my head around. "You know you can't turn up for work tomorrow, right? You have to stay away from there. Stay away from Dmitry."
He nodded, his chin moving against the top of my head. "I'm not stupid. I'd worked that out. I guess that means though that you'll have me all to yourself tomorrow."
"Great!" The word laden with sarcasm might have been convincing if it weren't for the smile I couldn't quite manage to hold back.
Max shifted slightly. "Will you tell me about him? About your history? I'd like to know."
My smile died. "Who? Dmitry?"
"Yes."
I closed my eyes. And there was the question I'd expected earlier, raising its ugly head. "Sure. But not tonight. Later. I'll tell you anything you want to know."
Chapter Eleven
Max
I dropped my keys on the table, the clatter sounding loudly in the empty hallway. "Valentin?" No answer. My senses immediately went to red alert, nightmare scenarios jostling in my head for the position of most likely from Valentin leaving to Dmitry having found him and dragged him away from there.
We'd spent three days holed up together. The only person I'd spoken to in that time was Yakov. I'd called him at the theater and made up some bullshit excuse to cover not returning to work. The fact he'd accepted it so readily told me that he knew the real reason, that we were both going through the motions for courtesy's sake. At least I was freelance, with an otherwise good reputation. Leaving without notice shouldn't cause any problems long-term. After all, I'd stepped in at the last moment as a replacement anyway. Noel had called constantly, but so far, I'd ignored him. It was probably a blessing that we'd left the theater without any of Valentin's possessions, including his phone, or I dreaded to think what sort of calls he might be getting.
Today was the first day I'd left the house, and I'd only been gone for ten minutes. Could someone have been watching? Ready to spring into action the moment I'd left Valentin alone? I took a step forward, fear, a living, breathing creature sitting on my chest. I repeated his name but louder this time. "Valentin?"
He appeared in the doorway of the living room with a frown on his face. "Why are you shouting? I'm not deaf."
He'd stopped using the crutches around the house, the boot doing a good enough job of protecting his ankle from being put under too much strain as long as he didn't try to do too much. Relief made my tone terser than it needed to be. "Then answer the first time."
He hobbled past me toward the kitchen, his only response the slight lift of one eyebrow. I followed, aiming my words at the back of his head. "Sorry. I was worried when you didn't answer."
He crossed his arms and looked decidedly unimpressed. "You're the one who insisted on going out, even though I told you it wasn't a good idea. And you're worried about me?"
I held up the carton of milk. "You don't drink tea without milk. I have to keep the diva in the style that he's accustomed to."
He tilted his head before gesturing down at himself, clad as he was in borrowed sweatpants and an old T-shirt. There'd been no other option, other than him living in the ballet tights he'd left the theater in. "Really? Well, you're sadly lacking in that department, then."
I moved forward, depositing the milk on the table before wrapping my arms around him and nuzzling his neck. His neck, which sported a number of red marks where I'd gotten carried away in the heat of passion. I'd apologized after the first one, and then when he hadn't seemed remotely bothered—and I suspected he was actually quite pleased—I'd added to them. I kissed over each of the marks before moving to his lips. He responded for a moment before pulling his head away. "You are obsessed with kissing."
I smiled against his lips. "No. Just with you."
We both startled as my phone started to ring. I scanned the kitchen, locating it over on the kitchen counter. Valentin grabbed my arm. "Don't answer it."
"I don't even know who it is. It might be my mum." He refused to let go, so I ended up dragging him with me. I held the screen up so he could see. "It's Noel. He keeps calling and leaving messages. I'm going to have to answer it eventually. He's entitled to some sort of explanation.” Valentin looked less than convinced, and I realized that the bubble we'd co-existed in for the last few days where nothing mattered apart from sex, banter, and more sex had had to come to an end at some point. We still hadn't talked about Dmitry, and that conversation was probably well overdue, the anxious look on Valentin's face showing more clearly than words ever could that I needed to know exactly what I was dealing with. It was one thing to know the basics, but I needed to get my head out of the sand and know the full story.
I pressed the button before the call could go to voicemail, Valentin still glued to my side. "Hey, Noel. If you're going to shout at me, can we pretend that you've already done that part and skip past it?"
"Max?"
I frowned at the phone, wrapping my arm around Valentin's waist so that he could lean against me and take some of the weight off of his ankle. "Who else would be answering my phone?"
"Can we meet tomorrow? I need to talk to you. We could grab a coffee at that place around the corner from the theater?"
Valentin was close enough that even without the phone on speaker, he could hear both parts of the conversation. He started shaking his head. I gave him a squeeze to show that I understood what he was trying to communicate. "Can't we just talk on the phone?"
"No." There was a long pause. "I need to... see you. It's important. I really need your help with something."
This didn't sound like the usual Noel. He could be intense, but he wasn't usually this bad. "Are you all right, mate? You sound stressed."
Valentin leaned up to whisper in my ear, his breath hot against my face. "Tell him no."
I covered the receiver with my hand. "I can't. He's an old friend. We've known each other for years. Something's going on with him. I can tell."
Fingers dug into my arm. "You can't go near the theater. It's too risky."
He had a point there. I racked my brain for an alternative. I could invite him to the house, but then what about Valentin. I could hardly make him hide in the bedroom while Noel was there. If I said no to Noel, then there was a chance that he might drop around uninvited anyway. Therefore, it was better to bite the bullet and get the meeting over and done with so that he could moan about my hasty exit from the theater, and get whatever else was bothering him off his chest. But I needed the meeting to be on my own terms.
I pulled the phone back to my ear. "Listen, I'm really busy tomorrow, so I'm not going to have time to get over to Covent Garden and back. Can you come here? There's that little place on the corner of the High Street. Do you remember? The one that does all the fancy cakes?"
"Yeah, I remember. I'll meet you there at twelve."
I was halfway through agreeing when the click in my ear signaled that he'd hung up. I pulled a face at the phone.
"You can't go."
I maneuvered Valentin in my arms to face me. I'd finally gotten used to seeing
him without makeup. He was still gorgeous. He was just gorgeous in a more natural way that made him look a damn sight more approachable, even when he was doing his best haughty Russian act like he was now. "What's the alternative, I never leave the house again?" I gestured at the milk. "Besides, the café’s not much farther than the shop was. I'll be fine. And it's only Noel. He probably wants to borrow money, or he's had a row with his girlfriend or something. He said it was important and I don't want him coming here to the house. Not with you here."
"Max, I am concerned."
I gathered him close, pressing his body against mine and burying my nose in his hair. Three days ago, he probably would have pushed me away, but my icy Russian was slowly thawing. "I know, and it's sweet, but lovely as your concern is—and don't get me wrong, it is lovely—I have to go out at some point. I have to see my mum in two days anyway, and it's not like I cannot bother to work forever. I have savings, but they'll run out eventually."
Valentin's sigh reverberated against my shoulder. "I need to tell you about Dmitry. Then perhaps you will change your mind."
I pulled a face at the mention of the man's name. "Let's eat first. I have a feeling that whatever you're going to tell me will ruin my appetite." Valentin didn't bother to dispute the fact. He gave a terse nod and stared grimly back at me.
* * * *
Valentin leaned back against the headboard of the bed, a lit cigarette clasped between his long fingers. I'd seated myself in a chair next to the bed, wanting to give him a bit of space. I wasn't overly happy with him smoking in the bedroom, but I suspected he needed the comfort of the nicotine to be able to tell the story he was about to. He exhaled, a plume of smoke rising into the air. "Where do you want me to start?"
He'd told me so little it was hard to know. All I knew was that Dmitry might have connections to Bratva and was a dangerous man, and technically it wasn't Valentin who had told me that, it was Noel. Valentin had just confirmed it. "Wherever you need to."
He thought about it for a moment. "The very beginning, I guess. I grew up in Kasimov in Russia, a small town on the banks of the river Volga. It is very picturesque, but there is not a lot there. A chocolate factory, a fishing net factory, houses. It is not a rich place. There is very little in the way of opportunities if you come from a place like that." He cupped his hand under the cigarette, suddenly becoming aware of how precarious the long line of ash had become.
Instead of an ashtray, I gestured toward the mug on the nightstand. He tapped his cigarette on the side, the ash falling into the cold remnants of tea. I waited for him to start talking again. He frowned. "Actually, I probably have to go back farther than that, explain how my English mother ended up in Kasimov. She was a dancer, a ballerina." A small smile flitted across his lips. "That's why she was in Russia, to learn from the best. She was only nineteen. She was on the precipice of having the world at her feet."
"What happened?"
His mouth twisted. "Love happened. My father, or should I say the man that would become my father, saw her dance. He hung around by the stage door for hours afterward, just for the chance of being able to introduce himself to the woman that had already captured his heart." He tapped his cigarette against the side of the mug again. "They went for coffee. They talked all night. By the morning, they were already in love. My mother had... obligations. She was only meant to be in Russia for a few short weeks and my father, well, my father had connections which were less than savory."
"Bratva?"
He nodded. "An English dancer was far from an acceptable choice in their eyes."
I could join the dots and see where the story was going to go next. "So they ran away?"
Valentin smiled, but it carried a lot of sadness. "They chose love over duty. But it left them with nothing. Hence, how we ended up in Kasimov: my father working in a fishing net factory and my mother doing people's laundry. She was already pregnant by that time, but they hid it. They were married, and when I arrived earlier than expected, they lied and kept up the charade that I was premature."
"Why didn't they both come to England? Surely, they could have had a better life over here?"
Valentin stubbed out the cigarette and immediately lit another. "I think they tried, but immigration laws made it difficult. They ran the risk of ending up separated, and I assume that my father was concerned that his passport would gain unwelcome attention at an airport. Bratva is nothing but thorough. Don't get me wrong, Max, my childhood was happy. When my mother wasn't doing laundry, she taught me to dance. I used to perform for all the children in the town."
Although it was a fascinating insight into a young Valentin, impatience still got the better of me. "Where does Dmitry come into this?"
"We'll get to that. All in good time, Max. All in good time."
"Sorry." I gave him my best guilty expression.
"They managed to hide away for years. But I guess it was always inevitable that their whereabouts would be discovered eventually. Bratva doesn’t let things go. So one day, we had visitors. I'll never forget the look on my father's face when they turned up at the door. Four men, all in suits—charming on the outside, but their eyes said something completely different. He knew the game was up. I was fifteen at the time. I was sent to my room out of the way, so I have no idea what was said in that conversation. I asked, but they wouldn't tell me. A week later, my parents were both dead, killed in a tragic car accident when the brakes failed."
I rocked back in my seat, taking a moment to process what he'd said before I risked saying something stupid. The question had to be asked though. There was no ignoring it. "You think there was a connection?"
Cool hazel eyes met mine, his fingers tightening around the cigarette. "It was one hell of a coincidence if not, wasn't it?"
I leaned forward. "What do you think was said in that conversation that you didn't hear?"
Valentin thought for a moment. Although, I found it hard to believe that he hadn't considered it at least a hundred times before, given what he'd told me. "I think they were given an ultimatum. And I assume that my parents told them what they could do with that ultimatum. My father had gone too far to let himself be sucked back into that life. We may not have had much, but he was happy nonetheless. We all were."
"Then what happened?"
The second cigarette joined the remnants of the first. Valentin's fingers twitched as if he were fighting the urge to light another. "I was too young to live on my own. I would have gone to an orphanage. For a year at least until I was sixteen. There would have been no dancing. My life from that moment would have been finding a factory job and working many hours to make ends meet. And even then, it would have been barely. Then Dmitry showed up and made me an offer. He said that it was not fair that I should be punished for the actions of my parents, that I deserved to be embraced into the bosom of the family that I'd never been given a chance to get to know."
"And you told him yes?"
Valentin's face took on an expression as if I'd insulted him. "Not exactly. Am I an easy person, Max? Or would you call me stubborn?"
I smiled. "Definitely stubborn."
"I told him no. I told him that I'd rather live on the streets. That I had no intention of becoming involved with an organization such as Bratva."
"And he accepted that?"
Valentin lost the battle and lit a third cigarette. "He made a counter offer. He told me that he was prepared to personally take me under his wing. Separate from the organization. That he would provide the best dance lessons that money could buy, and give me everything else that I needed in order to be a success, and in exchange, I would give him a large percentage of my earnings and make myself useful."
"The parties?"
Valentin nodded. "Although I didn't know what he meant at the time. I was only fifteen. My only kiss was with a boy I went to school with. It was difficult to be gay in a small village in Russia. The parties didn't start until I was sixteen."
My blood ran cold at the thought of a sixt
een-year-old Valentin being forced to entertain a string of middle-aged men. He may have learned to pull the wool over Dmitry's eyes since, but I suspected that had come much later. No sixteen-year-old virgin was capable of that. But I knew from our phone conversation that he didn't like to be thought of as a victim so I didn't broach the subject of what those early years must have been like for him.
There was another unanswered question though. Something I'd been considering ever since I realized the control Dmitry exerted over Valentin. Sometimes not knowing the truth was easier, but shying away from it wasn't fair on Valentin. And I had a feeling that this was the one and only time that he would be this forthcoming. I stumbled over the words. "And what about... Dmitry? Did he... is he? Christ! I don't know how to ask this."
"Did he touch me?"
I gave a jerky nod, hardly daring to breathe, my eyes fixed on Valentin as he stared into the distance without speaking. Finally, he shook his head. "No. Not in that way. I thought he would. I spent many nights lying in bed in his mansion, waiting for the day that I would have to accept that that was the way it was going to be. But he was never interested in me in that way."
"But he is gay?"
Valentin's scrutiny settled on me. "What makes you say that?"
"I saw the way he was looking at someone at his party, a cute blond guy. He seemed to be checking him out. Are you saying he's not?"
Valentin's mouth twisted. "Not openly. I'm guessing his organization wouldn't like it. I've never seen him do more than look at the parties. But I figured that his willingness to throw the parties in the first place—much as he might try and pretend that they cater to all sorts—means that he shares his preferences with the clientele. I guess I was just never small and blond enough for him. Lucky for me."
"Those men. They must be horrible."
Valentin thought for a minute. "Not all of them. Some are lonely. Some are trapped in a marriage that they should never have gotten into, and some of them just wouldn't get anywhere near the boys at the party without paying for it."