Into My Arms (8 page)

T
he helicopter touches down on the launch pad and I do as Z asks and stand, holding his hand.

He tightens his grip. “Let him come to us.” Despite everything he said, I still have more questions. What happened with his father, with Maryska that made him fear physical touch for seven years? His story shocked and saddened me, but nothing so far warrants such an intense reaction.

The engine cuts out and within moments, Katya emerges, striding across the lawn toward us. Z isn’t a small guy by any stretch, but Katya is bigger still, a hulk of a man. He must work with an excellent tailor to attain such a good fit to his own suit.

He calls out something to Z that I can’t understand.

“She’ll stay,” he responds. “And we talk in English when she is present.”

Katya freezes, as if this reaction is not expected. I can’t decipher his eyes due to the sunglasses, but a muscle tics in the place where his jaw meets the skull. “Maryska’s gone.”

Z sways a moment before fixing his stance, turning to stone. “When?”

“Not long.” Katya demonstrates all the emotion of a statue. “A few hours.”

“
Kurva
.” The word bursts from him as a deep red flush blooms across his cheeks, his face locked in unbearable strain. “It is for certain?”

My whole body trembles, desperate to pull him to me, protect him from the unfolding horror but unable to do anything to stop the pain.

“You want to see her body?” A ragged tear of emotion rips through Katya’s stoic façade.

“No. Just…
Kurva mat
!” Z tears a hand through his hair and drops my hand, giving us his back, vibrating with a desperate rage.

“Take her,” he says in a grim voice. “Take her away from here. From me.”

Katya doesn’t miss a beat. He reaches toward me and I step back. Oh hell no. “I am not going anywhere.”

Katya hesitates. He honestly expected me to bounce off with him, as if Z says a thing and we all automatically obey.

That may be the case when I’m at the Fishbowl, at Zavtra Tech, on the clock. But here, on the coast in this fog-locked battleground between earth and sea, I owe no one anything. But that’s not true. I owe this hurting man my compassion. My touch. My reminder that he is only human and that it is okay to hurt.

“I’m not going,” I say, raw determination swelling within me.

Z’s teeth grind audibly. “There are things you do not understand. That you can’t possibly comprehend.”

“I won’t if you don’t try. Please. Let me in.” Katya rustles with impatience and I whirl around. “I need time with him. Alone.”

He stares without comprehension, as if I just spoke gibberish.

“I’m not kidnapping him,” I continue. “In case you haven’t noticed, he outweighs me by at least a hundred pounds. If you’re so paranoid, go back to the helicopter. I won’t move from your view.”

I can’t see his eyes but sense they swivel to his boss, the one he serves with such blind devotion. Z doesn’t turn around but he doesn’t contradict me either, so apparently that serves as an adequate response because after a few huffs, he retreats, heading back to the helicopter and climbing inside.

I wait until he’s out of sight and then settle my hand on Z’s shoulder, kneading the hard muscle. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Maryska must have been sorrier still, to miss the chance to spit at my face before she died.” He lightly brushes back my hair while his gaze is fierce on my face. If his eyes held the promise of a kiss last night, today they try to shove me away. “To look at you, to touch you, for a moment I had thought it could be enough. That perhaps that would be enough to move forward, heal me. But nothing is ever as easy as we hope.”

“We’ve had one evening and look how far you’ve managed to come.”

He shakes his head. “Even looking at you—all I see is her, that night…”

I reach for his hand and try as he might, he can’t hide the effect my touch has on him. I long to pull him closer, into my arms, and cradle him. But for now, all I can do is hold his hand and hope that will be enough.

“That night we returned,” he says, continuing his story. “I didn’t realize what Father intended. My first thought was we were going to see my mother. It had been some time and it seemed like a natural parental gesture.” His mouth twists in a bitter smile. “Instead, I found she had gone, disappeared. Later I learned she’d run off with one of Father’s associates and died from an overdose in Monte Carlo. The other women didn’t treat me as they once had. But I didn’t string together the clues. No one ruffled my hair or commented how I had grown. They treated me with the stiff formality of a client. I was ushered not to the attic where I had slept for so many years, but to a small red room, and there, beside the bed, stood Maryska. I was so happy to see her that it took me a moment to realize she was dressed in see-through lingerie.

“‘Things have changed,’ she said.

“For a moment, I couldn’t move or react. I was horrified to see what had happened to her in my absence. But then she approached and everything she did next was practiced, professional, and perfect. I’d always loved her, like any boy would love a beautiful girl who he is pushed into close proximity with. When she raised her lips to mine, murmuring words of affection and desire, I believed them for truth. I had her on that bed, with the silk sheets, red walls, and golden lamp that cast everything into a soft dreamy glow. When it was over, as I began to drift off on the dreams of angels, she whispered words from hell.

“You see, I had left her behind and she felt she had no choice but to retreat to this career path to survive. But men treated her badly and she…she…she had contracted a disease. HIV. And that night she cursed me with the knowledge that she had given the condition to me. I’ll never forget her words: ‘You fucked me, now I fuck you.’”

A chill shot down my spine.

“In the end, I didn’t get it. Do not worry about last night. I have been tested every six months for seven years and am as clean as a virgin. But eventually the illness progressed with her. For years, I have sent her money, made it possible to go anywhere she wanted, do anything. But I believe in my heart that all she craved was death. Life had proved too cruel. I failed her.”

I brush tears from my cheeks. “What she did to you, it was wrong. So wrong, you know that, right?”

“More wrong than leaving her alone in a brothel? When I founded Zavtra Tech, I tried to get her to move here, to San Francisco, promised her an apartment where she’d never have to see me, excellent medical care at Stanford, but she wouldn’t come. Her little brother did, though.”

Realization dawns. “Katya.”

“Yes. I might have failed her but I’d not fail her brother. He is now a U.S. citizen and is like my own sibling. As for my father, I developed a computer supervirus, one that targeted his companies, his vast financial empire—the thing that he valued more than anything else. Within two years, he was on the brink of total economic ruin and collapsed of a heart attack. Thus, without pulling a trigger, I avenged Maryska and myself. The bastard deserved to suffer more, but in the end, my only regret is that he didn’t know for certain it was me. Oh, I am sure he suspected. But I never had the satisfaction of telling him.

“And so,” he says wryly, “you got your bedtime story at dawn, pretty Bethanny. And now go, walk away and know you possess my darkest secrets. Everything that rots my heart.”

“Stop. Your heart isn’t rotted. You had an awful childhood and look what you overcame, how you succeeded.” But even still, uncertainty niggles at me. Will I ever understand him, what he has faced? I thought my own parents were the worst things ever, but they could win Mother and Father of the Year in comparison.

“I need you to go.”

“But do you want me to?”

“What I need and what I want are vastly different things, Bethanny. Please. Leave. I need to go bury the past, but I’ll never be able to get rid of the ghosts.”

“I can’t walk away, not now, not when we stand on the edge of everything.” I throw myself against him, my tears wetting his shirt. “This, you and me, it wasn’t for a night. It can’t be.”

“What we had wasn’t a night.” He cradles my face. “It was a lifetime.”

“Then give us a chance. Give
me
a chance. Go if you have to, I understand that, but I don’t understand you shutting the door on the possibility of us.”

He brushes his mouth over my forehead. “You deserve so much more than me.”

“No. I don’t. I’m not perfect. My best friend died because we were bickering in the car while she drove. She was being moody, not talking and shutting down. I yelled at her to open up, suspecting she was dealing with so much more than she was letting on. She started to tell me her story, then clammed up, said that I didn’t understand. Those were her last words. And in so many ways, she was right. There is so much I don’t understand about the world and how it works. But I do know one thing, that the connection between you and I doesn’t just happen. We can’t let this moment slip away without seeing if maybe we are destined for greatness.”

“I don’t deserve—”

“Stop. You deserve good things. And so do I. So did Pippa and Maryska. You deserve more than to live out your life amid sterility with only a fish for a pet.” It strikes me then why Koroleva is perfect for him. He can’t touch her.

“What do we owe the dead?” he murmurs.

“To live our best truth. And mine is that I want to stop waiting to live. Who knows when our chapters will end? None of us know how long our stories will last. All we can do is make sure the pages are filled with life.”

“And you think we can write a happy ending?”

“I don’t know, but I’d rather try than not.” I kiss him then, hard, fast, and furious. “Go deal with your past and I’ll be here, waiting in your future.”

I
am gone for ten days. Katya and I cremate Maryska’s wasted body and scatter her ashes at Blue Lake on the outskirts of Kiev, a place we once spent the happiest of afternoons not long before I left for boarding school, perhaps the last truly happy day in her life. We then fly to Moscow, to the cemetery where my father is interred. As I stood in front of the stone, I waited to feel anything. But none of the old anger and hatred rose within.

Only Bethanny’s reply to my question, “What do we owe the dead?” rang through my head.

“The truth.”

And the truth was that I didn’t want to be ruled by the past anymore. Ghosts surely have better things to do than haunt me.

“Svidaniya, Otets.” Goodbye, Father.

When I get back to my hotel, I dial her number.

“Hello?” Bethanny sounds sleepy.

“Shit, the time difference.”

“Z?” There is a rustling and despite everything or maybe precisely because of it, I harden. It is a comfort to know that despite the horrors of my last few days, she is somewhere safe, in bed.

“I’m here,” she says, more alert. “What do you need?”

I rest my head against the wall, place a hand against the creamy wallpaper, and pretend it’s her skin. Impossible when it’s not soft or warm against my palm.

“Are you okay?”

“I am now.” Then I remember, yesterday was her big day. “How did everything go with your presentation?”

She giggles softly. “I don’t want to brag or anything.”

“You nailed it?”

“With a Thor-sized hammer. I got the funding.” She breaks off midlaugh. “You didn’t happen to pull any strings, did you?”

“No,” I say honestly. “This success was all you.”

“Thank you.” I know it’s gratitude for respecting her enough to know she could handle this challenge on her own.

“However, I am not entirely altruistic.”

“Oh?” Her voice dips to a husky octave.

I untuck my shirt. “What are you wearing?”

“I…um…a tank top.”

“Panties?”

“No.”

My breath hisses.

“Are you trying to phone-sex me?” she whispers, half scandalized, half intrigued.

“There is no trying,” I growl. “If I want, I will phone-sex you.”

“Wow, Mr. Romantic.”

I can hear the smile in her voice and answer with one of my own. “With you, yes.” What was it that Bran had said, how with the right girl I’d want to be romantic? He is a smart fucker. “Slide your palm to the inside of your thigh, but don’t go higher.”

“Are you serio—”

“Do it.”

“Okay, okay.” She laughs quietly. “You have quite a bossy streak, don’t you?”

“I haven’t touched a female body besides yours in almost a decade. All I want to do is get my hands on you again.” Oh, the sweet irony, to want to touch, desperately now, but to be halfway across the world. “Are you doing it?”

A soft, restless gasp. “Yes.”

“Slide up, just a little, until you graze the hair.”

“Okay.”

My mouth dries at her whimper. “Are you wet?”

“I don’t know. I’m doing what you said, not going any farther.”

I clear my throat. “Slide one finger over your skin, drag it through your folds.”

She makes a desperate sound.

“That good?” I’m so hard it hurts.

“Mmm-hmm.”

“Are you wet?”

“Mmm-hmm.”

“Now stop.”

She gasps. “Are you serious?”

“I’ll be home tomorrow. The next time you come, I want to be there.”

“You are killing me.”

My own groan echoes hers.

“Seriously, I am a ghost over here.”

“Tomorrow,” I whisper.

“You strike a damn hard bargain—that ruthless reputation is well earned.”

I allow myself a single touch, stroking my cock once through my trousers. Shit, I almost come from that alone. “I plan to strike a harder bargain tomorrow night.”

“I’ll be ready to negotiate.” She drops her voice a sexy octave. “I hope you bring your A-game.”

“Good night, Bethanny.”

She lets out a frustrated breath. “Good night, most infuriating man in the world.”

“You love it.”

She pauses for a moment. “I really do.”

I press the phone against my heart, staring out the window at a street that could be anywhere. And in a few hours I fly from the place I once lived to a place that might actually be home.

After I land at SFO, the driver takes me straight to Zavtra Tech. I enter my office and head to the security screen. There’s a new face at the desk outside, and even though I knew this moment would come, I can’t do anything, not even breathe. Bethanny has become a vital key to my day-to-day sanity. Knowing I could look in on her whenever my heart desired was a steadying presence.

My phone buzzes. Bran must be wanting to check up already, like a pain in the ass, one I’m profoundly grateful for.

I glance to the screen and freeze.

Bethanny Jacobs:
Meet me on the roof in five minutes.

My mouth slides into an inadvertent smile. So she wants to give a few orders? Can’t say I mind. Not with her.

I’m on the roof in three. The sun is out and the temperatures are high, nearly a hundred degrees. Rolling up my shirtsleeves, I glance around. She’s there, alone under a canopy on the rooftop patio in a creamy sundress, looking as fresh as a rose. I begin walking toward her, taking my time to savor her beautiful face.

How did I ever think she resembled Maryska? Perhaps they share similar features, but that is where their resemblance ends. Beth is brightness, a slash of primary color in my monochromatic world.

She chews her top lip in concentration, hands clasping her ever-present cup of coffee.

I take a seat. “You wanted a meeting, Ms. Jacobs?”

She gives me a private smile, sets down the cup, and opens a large canvas bag, pulling out two sandwiches, two apples, and two bottles of lemonade.

“Now that my app has been approved, I have more flexibility in my schedule as a product manager,” she says. “I’m not chained to my desk for an exacting taskmaster.”

“The idea of you chained to a desk isn’t a bad one,” I rumble.

Her cheeks glow. “Why, Mr. Zavtra, this is a business lunch between colleagues. One I’m hoping your new assistant will continue to schedule into your busy day. You’re a little lean, need to eat more because I like my guys with bulk.” She picks up a red apple and takes a slow, tantalizing bite. “I went to Whole Foods last night,” she says after. “My raise means I can indulge in organic produce.”

I want to devour that mouth, taste the tart fruit on her tongue. “How is Koroleva?”

She grins. “I love my new office aquarium. She was quite a surprise gift, but I think she misses you.”

“Now you are making jokes.”

“Just projecting.” She scoots closer. “
I
missed you, okay?”

“Very okay.” I am glad she missed me. I want her to ache as bad as I do. “Are you liking your new position?”

The glow in her eyes lights up her whole face. “
Loving
is a better word. I’m finally following my heart, which seems smart, seeing as how it led me to you.” She reaches out and does a thing that up until recently I thought would be impossible. She takes my hand, holds it between her own. Lifting it to her face, she kisses my knuckles. “You don’t have to fight alone anymore.” Her tongue darts out and I’m cock-hard and brain-soft in an instant. “You have me in your corner now.”

“All I want is you in my arms.” I pull her close and kiss the top of her head, inhaling the faint floral hint of her shampoo.

“Guess it’s a good thing this is my favorite place to be.”