Page 184 of Sexting the Pakhan

Nadia shrugs. “I’m not here to flatter. I’m here to observe.”

Ruslan shuts the trunk with one hand and looks entirely too normal for a man being hunted by his own people. Dark shirt, jeans, cap pulled low, no limp unless he forgets himself.

I say, “You should be wearing a hat too.”

He starts walking toward the entrance. “Nobody is going to recognize me.”

I hurry after him with the girls. “That’s exactly what famous criminals say before becoming news.”

He glances at me. “I’m not exactly a wanted man.”

“No, that would make things simpler.”

Mila slips her hand into his without asking.

He looks down at it. Then at her.

Then keeps walking.

I look away before the sight can do something to my chest.

Inside, the grocery store is bright, overcooled, and offensively normal. Fluorescent lights. Shopping carts with one bad wheel. A bakery smell strong enough to make Mila gasp like she’s entered a holy place.

We get a cart. Ruslan puts a hand on the handle before I can, and I stop.

“You are not pushing the cart,” I say.

“I am absolutely pushing the cart.”

“You were shot.”

“In the leg.”

“Yes.”

“Not in the hands.”

“It’s not about the hands. It’s about your whole body being attached to the leg.”

Mila looks between us. “Are you fighting about the cart?”

“Yes,” I say.

“No,” Ruslan says.

Nadia says, “You are.”

Ruslan pushes the cart.

I let him, mostly because if I continue to fight him, we’ll still be in produce at sunset.

The girls run the operation like tiny generals. Mila wants everything colorful. Nadia wants everything sensible. Mila throws a mango into the cart because it “looks promising.”

At the cereal aisle, Mila finds rainbow marshmallows and clutches the box to her chest. “Emergency food.”

“No,” I say.

“Yes,” she says.