Page 84 of Sexting the Pakhan

I cross the office and step onto the landing. Anton is on his back now, staring up at the warehouse roof. His mouth opens like he wants to speak.

I crouch beside him. His eyes find mine. There is fear there, and anger. And something else.

Maybe desperation. Maybe the truth.

“I…” he manages.

Blood fills his mouth.

I wait.

He tries again.

Nothing comes. His hand twitches once against the metal floor. Then he’s gone.

I stay crouched for another second, looking at him.

Dead.

12

ZOYA

Ruslan leaves before breakfast.

I’m sitting up in his bed when he gets the call, the sheet pulled to my chest, my hair tangled around my shoulders, still warm from his body. The morning is gray through the windows, the sea restless beyond the glass. For a few minutes before the phone rings, it almost feels ordinary. Not normal, exactly. Nothing about this house or this man is normal. But ordinary enough that I let myself sit there and watch him button his shirt like I have some right to the sight.

Then his phone lights up. He looks at the screen, and whatever softness was in the room disappears.

I hate how quickly I recognize it now. The small change in his face. The way his eyes go distant before he even answers. The way the man I sleep beside becomes the man other men fear.

He takes the call near the window. I don’t understand most of it. Names. A few Russian words. Stepan’s voice low and urgent through the speaker before Ruslan turns it off and holds the phone to his ear.

He asks two questions. “Where?” Then, after a pause, “Alive?”

My stomach tightens.

When he ends the call, he stands there for a moment with his back to me.

I already know he’s leaving. “What happened?” I ask.

He turns. His face is controlled, but his eyes are alert now, sharpened by whatever he has just heard. “We found the mole.”

The word brings the whole world back. The library. The gunfire. The closed doors. The reason I’m here at all.

He crosses the room and takes his watch from the table.

“How long will you be gone?” I ask.

“I don’t know.”

That answer has become familiar too.

I watch him put on his jacket. “Are you going to be careful?”

His mouth moves slightly, not quite a smile. “No.”

“Ruslan.”