by Megan Hart
Alicia’s mouth turned down at the corners, and she gave him a sad shake of her head. “No, honey. No. We got together because we both loved her.”
“Don’t do it, Allie. Please. Don’t.”
That was when she started to cry. “I’m sorry, honey . . . but I already did.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
She hadn’t told him to, but Nikolai had shown up at her door with takeout Indian food and a six-pack of that craft beer she’d started to grow so fond of. She’d already changed into flannel pajamas and pulled her hair up on top of her head, but if there was any point in worrying about that, Alicia had gotten over it a long time ago. She greeted him with a kiss, after he quickly shut the door behind him to keep the cold air from coming in.
“How did you know I was craving curry?” She took the takeout bags from him.
Nikolai shrugged out of his coat and hung it on the hook. “Just a guess. And I was on that side of town anyway. Had to run to the home store.”
“Ah. Your mom’s projects, huh?”
“I don’t mind. Why should she pay someone to do it when I can?” He laughed and pulled her closer for another kiss. This one lingered.
“You’re so handy,” Alicia murmured. Nikolai’s hands shifted, roaming over her back to settle on her ass. She laughed and wriggled away. “Hey, hey. I meant like hammering things . . .”
“I’m great at hammering. Better at screwing.” He chased her into the dining room.
It was no difficult feat for him to catch her, although she did make him wait to kiss her until she’d put the food and beer on the table. “Mmmm. Such a funny guy.”
She’d been cleaning in the kitchen, her wireless speaker transmitting music from her computer. As she put her arms around his neck, a slow song came on: a new download and one of her current favorites she sometimes kept on REPEAT. They eased into a slowly circling dance. Nikolai stepped deliberately on one of her slipper-clad feet, but not hard enough to hurt. Laughing, Alicia kicked his shin lightly.
Nikolai pulled her even closer, tucking her face against his shoulder. One hand smoothed over her hair, tugging it gently from the loose tie. Freed, it tumbled over her shoulders and down her back, and he ran his hand over the tangles to rest it finally at the base of her spine.
“You smell good,” Alicia said against his skin.
“Mmm-hmm.”
“Like curry and beer and snow,” she continued as she breathed him in.
Nikolai laughed into her hair. “Nobody’s ever told me smelling like curry and beer was something good.”
“It’s just you,” she told him. “Your skin. You always smell good to me.”
Nikolai kissed her again. His hands moved over her, squeezing her ass before moving up to settle on her hips to squeeze her there, too. When he moved up farther to cup her breasts, though, Alicia pulled away.
“Food first. What kind of girl do you think I am, anyway?” she said with an arched brow. “Don’t answer that.”
Nikolai grabbed some plates and silverware while Alicia set out the food. He’d brought her favorite—lamb rogan josh with basmati rice. She paused as she opened the carton.
“Something wrong?” Nikolai slid a plate in front of her.
Alicia shook her head. “No. It’s nice, that’s all. That you remembered what I like best.”
“Well . . . it’s not that hard to remember.” Nikolai’s grin faded at her expression. “Right? I mean . . . not when you pay attention.”
It was no big deal, she told herself as she kissed him. It was just takeout food. It didn’t mean anything.
Except it did, she thought, watching him serve the food. It mattered that he’d taken the time to pick up the food and bring it to her, that it was her favorite. That he was choosing to be here with her, here and now, instead of anywhere else in the world that he could’ve been. She loved him for all of that.
She loved him.
“Alicia? You okay?” Nikolai reached to brush the hair off her forehead. His fingers stroked down her cheek. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” She cupped his hand to her face for a second. “Nothing’s wrong. I’m just hungry.”
He gave her an odd look but didn’t pursue it.
Alicia dug into the food on her plate, although now her stomach was doing rolls and tumbles worthy of a circus act. So were her thoughts. How had this happened? And when?
Watching Nikolai laugh as he told her a story about one of the repair jobs he was doing for Galina, she knew the answer to those questions; they became clear and sharp as diamonds. Not how. Not when.
But always.
“Nikolai . . . ,” she began, but stopped herself.
He put down his bottle of beer and wiped his mouth with the napkin. He gave her a curious, wary look. “Yeah?”
The sound of the front door opening turned both of them toward it. It could only be one person, of course. Nobody else would simply come inside her house without knocking first.
“Hey,” Ilya said, then stopped at the sight of his brother. “Wow. What’s the occasion?”
“It’s just dinner,” Nikolai said evenly. “What’s up, man?”
Ilya held up the packet of papers and looked at Alicia. “Maybe I should be asking you that. Both of you.”
“We’re eating dinner,” Alicia said tightly. “And we can talk about that stuff in your hand tomorrow, at work.”
“I want to talk about it now.” Ilya slapped the papers onto the table and grabbed at one of the takeout cartons. “Great, I’m starving.”
Alicia leaned to snag the carton from him and set it out of his reach. Ilya raised both brows. His smile did not reach his eyes.
“What, am I interrupting something? Is this like . . . a date or something?” He looked from his brother and back to her. “Why don’t you tell me what’s going on?”
“Nothing’s going on,” Nikolai said. “I was out getting some stuff at the hardware store. Figured I’d pick up some takeout. I brought it over to Alicia’s house because I know she likes Indian food. That’s all. You don’t need to get bent about it.”
“No, I guess not,” Ilya answered with a short bark of a laugh. “I mean, except that she’s my wife. And you’re my brother.”
“I’m your ex-wife, Ilya.”
He turned to her. “And he’s still my brother.”
“You didn’t seem to think that sort of thing was a very big deal,” Alicia bit out, “when you started fucking me after you’d been fucking my sister.”
Ilya’s fists clenched, resting on the table. Nikolai started to speak, but Ilya’s glance shut him up. Ilya fixed her with an unwavering, impassive look. She took a long pull on the beer to wash the taste of bitterness off her tongue, but she didn’t look away from Ilya’s gaze.
Ilya stood. “The difference is at least your sister was dead before I took up with you.”
“Ilya!” Nikolai stood, too. “Don’t, man.”
Alicia flinched at his words and closed her eyes for a second before looking at him again. “Because of you. Right? Isn’t that what you think? Isn’t that why you came after me at all? To replace her?”
“You,” Ilya said with a sneer, “could never replace her.”
Nikolai moved around the table to take his brother by the arm—firmly, but gently. “C’mon, man. You want me to walk you—”
“I’m not fucking feeble.” Ilya yanked himself out of his brother’s grip and focused on Alicia. His sneer became a sly, nasty smile. “Did he tell you he’s not going back?”
“Not going back?” Alicia looked at Nikolai, confused. He frowned and ran a hand through his hair with a sigh. She looked back at Ilya. “I thought you said you were only on a short leave, that they expected you to go back? That you had to—you had a contract.”
“He dissolved it.” Ilya thumped the packet of papers. “Got a bunch of money, got bought out. He doesn’t have to go back to Israel. He can stay here, right here in good old Quarrytown, for as long as he wants to. H
e didn’t tell you that, did he?”
Stunned, uncertain of what to say, she looked at Nikolai. His expression was confirmation enough. Blinking, Alicia stood slowly. Now the three of them faced off, over the remains of takeout food going cold.
“I thought you were going to leave,” she said after a few seconds of silence.
Nikolai sighed again. “I was. But I changed my mind.”
“Were you going to tell me?” She put her hands flat on the table to steady herself, as if she might fall over at any moment.
“Yes. Of course.” Nikolai backed off from his brother but didn’t take a step toward her. “Tonight, actually.”
Ilya snorted derisively. “Aw, how cute. See, Allie. He brought you dinner to soften the blow.”
“It’s not a blow,” she said after a moment. “It’s just unexpected. It just changes things, that’s all.”
Ilya said something else, but Alicia in that moment couldn’t have cared less what he had to say about anything. All she could do was look at Nikolai. He looked back.
“Oh, shit,” Ilya said. “So it’s like that?”
Without looking away from Nikolai, Alicia said, “Yes. It’s like that.”
CHAPTER FORTY
Then
Niko didn’t want to admit it to himself, but he couldn’t wait to see her. Through all the cold, dark nights of Antarctica and all the long, hot days working in the apiary fields of Beit Devorah, he had not missed Quarrytown or, for the most part, the United States. He certainly hadn’t missed Galina, whose letters still found their way to him, but which he’d refused to answer. He thought of his brother now and then, but the only person consistently on Niko’s mind was Allie.
He didn’t regret leaving. He’d seen a chance and taken it, and it had led him to bigger and more exciting things. Leaving had saved his life, but it didn’t mean he didn’t wish he’d done it a little bit differently.
It was almost a year since he’d been home, and he hadn’t noticed until now that he’d grown another couple of inches. His chin and cheeks bristled with scruff if he didn’t shave every day. His arms and legs bulged with the muscles he earned fixing broken pipes and dealing with heavy equipment, as well as from all the work he’d done for the past few months back on Beit Devorah, where he went to stay after leaving the science station. He noticed now because he’d been on a plane for something like sixteen hours and on a bus for another five. His clothes were rumpled, his hair, a mess. He wasn’t sure whether he smelled bad or whether he’d become immune to his odor, but a shower would definitely not have been a bad idea.
That wasn’t the way the universe worked, though. When the cab dropped him off in front of his house, the first thing Niko noticed was the construction along the street. Then, the flowers in front of the house in window boxes that had been empty for as long as he could remember. He held back, uncertain. He knew Galina had moved away; her last letter to him was postmarked South Carolina and had taken months to reach him. And it was possible Ilya’d gone, too; maybe he found his own place. But surely Babulya would still be there, and his grandmother had never been a fan of planting flowers.
This wasn’t his home any longer—hadn’t been for a long time—and that was his choice. He’d made himself a stranger to it, so it felt only right that he knocked on the front door instead of simply letting himself inside. He wasn’t expecting to see Allie’s face on the other side of it when it opened, and clearly by her startled expression she was not expecting him. Then his arms were full of her, the familiar scent of her hair tickling his nose, and she was laughing but also crying a little.
“Come in, come in!” She stepped back into the hallway, welcoming him.
All of this was overwhelming, but he noticed that she wore pajama bottoms and a faded T-shirt. She was talking, but he wasn’t really paying attention to what she said as she led the way to the kitchen, where Ilya was at the table, and Babulya turned from the stove to greet Niko with a cry of joy. It wasn’t the strangest thing in the world for Allie to be there with them, but still, something about it jarred him even as Niko allowed his grandmother to enfold him into her embrace. His brother got up to clap him on the shoulder, shake his hand, and even hug him, as they all seemed happy and surprised and excited to see him.
Niko wasn’t sure what he felt.
Everything was off. Subtle changes in the house. The smell of a different fabric softener. The easy way Allie moved around the kitchen, not like a guest or even a longtime family friend but something more. And finally, ultimately, the flowers in the window boxes outside.
“What’s new?” he asked at last, a plate of breakfast in front of him that he didn’t want to eat. He looked at his brother, who was grinning, and then at Allie, who was not. “What’s going on?”
“Congratulate us,” Ilya said. “We got married two weeks ago.”
“In Las Vegas,” Babulya added, the disdain thick in her voice to show exactly what she thought of that.
It wasn’t until much, much later that night, after his brother had taken him drinking—even though Niko was not even twenty-one yet—that he managed to have a moment with Allie alone. Ilya had stumbled off to bed. Babulya, too. Allie sat at the kitchen table with a laptop, a paper ledger next to her along with a stack of papers and a checkbook. Work for the dive shop she and Ilya opened together. A dive shop, Niko thought derisively. In the middle of Pennsylvania?
He wasn’t sure how the argument started, but it was his fault. He couldn’t hold himself back from telling her how wrong she was. Marry his brother? She must be insane, she must be desperate, she must be pathetic.
“You were gone,” Allie said in a voice so cold, so distant—yet somehow so broken—that it was a knife right through Niko’s heart. “You left. You didn’t even say good-bye!”
More words came after that, spilling out. He wanted—needed to explain to her that his brother did not love her. Could not possibly. Ilya was seeking a replacement for Jennilynn, and Allie would never be able to be what his brother wanted because of that. It all came out wrong. Nasty, mean, hurting her, and he couldn’t make himself stop, because he was hurting, too.
He had not intended to accept the membership at Beit Devorah, a contract that would require him to work on the kibbutz in jobs they determined were best for him in exchange for room, board, and a stipend. Niko loved working in the apiaries, tending the hives and harvesting the honey, but it was never where he saw himself staying for the rest of his life.
The trouble was that once it became real to him there would be no Allie in his life, moving all the way across the world had seemed like the only option.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Alicia had never imagined that the weight of a pile of papers could have ever felt so much like a stone, but there it was. The envelope in her hand, the paper slick yet rough at the same time. She put it on the table, went to the fridge, and pulled out the bottle of champagne she’d had chilling in there since Thanksgiving. She hadn’t bought it thinking she’d have anything to celebrate. She wasn’t sure she did, now.
She poured two glasses and handed one to Nikolai without a word. It was in place of a kiss, and if he didn’t know that, Alicia did. She sipped and looked at him over the rim.
“So . . .” He lifted the glass to the light spilling in through the sliding glass door to the backyard, twisting it from side to side as though he was studying the bubbles. “Celebrating?”
“I think it’s worth celebrating,” she said. “It was a big decision, and not an easy one, but I think it’s the right one.”
Nikolai nodded and put the glass on the table. “I told them I wouldn’t be going back after my leave. It was a contract, not a prison sentence. I got my payout. They wished me well. I’m welcome to visit anytime, and if I ever want to live there again, I’ll have to go through the same approval process I did the first time. It’s pretty cut-and-dried.”
“When did you decide you weren’t going back?”
“After—” He coughed,
then cleared his throat and shifted in the chair. “The night in the attic. It took me a while to admit it to myself. Then I had to work out the details. I wanted to tell you. I really did.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No,” he said with a sigh. “I didn’t.”
“You wanted to stay for me?”
“Yes, Alicia,” Nikolai said. “I wanted to stay for you.”
“I signed the papers two days ago. Already deposited the check.” She took another sip.
Nikolai smiled. “Uh-oh. Is all that money burning a hole?”
“Maybe just a tiny one.” She finished her glass of champagne and winced at the sting of bubbles at the back of her throat. She thought about pouring another, but didn’t.
She didn’t want to be crying, but she was.
“Would you look at me, please?” Niko asked.
She didn’t want to look at him. There was nothing in Nikolai’s face she would allow herself to see. Still, she turned because he’d asked her to. She could do that, at least.
It was a mistake, of course. How could she ever have thought she would be able to look at his face, the downward slope of his mouth that was not a smile yet fighting bravely not to be a frown? How could she look into the depths of his gray-green eyes without seeing her own reflection?
Nikolai took the glass from her hand and put it beside his. He put his arms around her. He kissed her . . . oh, he kissed her, and there was no way she should have ever even let him in the front door, but she had. She did. She always would.
Somehow, Alicia found the strength to put her hands up flat on his chest to hold him off. “Nikolai. Stop. Wait.”
He did, licking his lips as though to keep the taste of her lingering as long as possible. “Don’t say it, please. Don’t tell me you’re leaving.”
“But I am.” She drew in a breath and wished for a moment that she’d doused herself in a couple of shots of tequila rather than a few sips of cheap sparkling wine.
He stepped away from her and dragged a hand through his hair to push it out of his eyes. “You don’t have to.”