“Nikolai Rustanov,” he answered. “I already told you this. However, my assistant can’t find for sure who you are. Maybe you weren’t invited to my party? Maybe you, how Americans say, crashed?”
“No, I didn’t c-crash,” Sam answered, knowing it would be too complicated to explain that she came as the plus one of an Indiana football player who couldn’t attend, but used to be on the L.A. Sun’s with Josie’s husband and hadn’t minded letting her use his wife’s name to get into the event.
He regarded her shivering form with thinned lips.
“Where is your coat?” he asked, unbuttoning his tux jacket.
“I g-gave it away,” she answered.
“Why?” He took his jacket off and wrapped it around her shivering shoulders. “It is very cold.”
The large jacket was surprisingly heavy and even though she probably should have told him straight away that she didn’t need it, Sam found herself reflexively pulling its front panels across her chest like a blanket. It was just so warm, radiating heat like it’d just come off a furnace.
“How about you?” she asked him with a worried look.
He looked back at her, confused. “How about me, what?”
“Don’t you need your jacket? Like you said, it’s very cold outside.”
“Da, but I am Russian,” he answered, as if that explained everything about everything.
“Okay, well, maybe I should thank you for loaning me this jacket, but I would have been fine if you hadn’t made sure I had to wait here outside for my car.”
He frowned down at her from his great height.
“Tell me why you gave away your coat.”
She shook her head with a sad sigh, thinking of the poor boy she’d met in the alcove. Who had he belonged to? Someone who worked for the man standing in front of her? One of the fans who had been milling around the front gates at the bottom of the long hill when she arrived?
“Do you know any little boys?” she asked. “Like one who’s maybe a tall seven or eight years old?”
Another confused look from the big guy. “Why would I know little boy?”
“Because…” she trailed off, her instincts telling her a man like this probably didn’t have any children he was close to in his life. And even if the boy had belonged to someone on his staff, Nikolai didn’t seem like the type who would ask after his employee’s families.
“It’s nothing. Nothing you’d understand anyway.”
With a bracing breath, she took off his coat and held it out for him to take back.
He just stared at her. Hard. “You should come back inside my house and explain to me your missing coat.”
She gave him a sad smile. “No, I don’t think so. It’s been a long night and yeah, you’re really hot. So hot, part of me is very flattered you went through all this trouble just to spit some more game. But I can already tell. You…” she circled the palm of her hand in his general direction, “…you’re the kind of guy who would chew me up and eat me for breakfast. So as cute as you are, I have less than zero desire to go there with you.”
To make her point final, she waved his jacket towards him, clearly signaling he just needed to take the damn thing, already. “I’m calling it a night. A really long night.”
But he didn’t take the jacket. In fact, he stepped closer to her, his hard tank of a body pushing the arm holding the jacket back. So close, she could feel the heat coming off him.
“I only agree with one thing you said.” His eyes bore into hers. “The part about eating you for breakfast. But I think you will like the way I eat you for breakfast.”
A hot chill ran over her, despite the cold, and she felt herself clench down below as the image of his face between her legs barged its way into her mind without invitation.
And suddenly he was no longer high above her. Suddenly, his mouth was coming down on hers, a hot shock of an invasion on a cold winter’s night.
Her first thought was that his lips, which she remembered thinking were set in harsh, cruel lines, were actually much softer than they appeared. Her second thought was that he was kissing her. Kissing her! Why was he kissing her? And why wasn’t she stopping him?
Maybe because it was cold and he was warm. Actually, make that hot, throwing off heat like a furnace as his lips took easy possession of hers.
Yeah, that had to be it.
Luckily her Prius pulled up in front of them at that moment with a whisper of tires coming to a stop underneath the low hum of its electric engine.
“Okay, okay…” she said, pushing away from him. Though only their lips had been touching, it somehow felt like she was ungluing herself from him, and she had to resist the urge to come right on back for another hot kiss.
“You spit great game and your kissing business is on lock, but here’s my car.” She seemed to be pointing this little factoid out to both herself and him. “So, I’ll be going now. Take your jacket, please.”
She held it out to him, this time with insistence.
He stared at her for what felt like eons, before he finally reached out and took the jacket from her.
“I will see you again,” he said, his eyes so hooded now, they almost seemed sleepy.
“No, you probably won’t,” she answered, heading for the car as quickly as her strappy heels would let her. She mentally made a decision to double the number of grant applications she’d been planning to write away for this year, because she wouldn’t be attending any more of these charity events, especially if there was any chance of him being there.
“I will see you again,” he repeated to her retreating back, not like it was a request or even a desire, but something that was inevitably going to happen. Whether she liked it or not.
Sam didn’t answer this time, just took the keys from the valet and got into her Prius. She didn’t even bother to crank up the heat before pulling forward out of the carport, insanely wishing she had one of those superhero cars that turned into a high-speed jet with the push of a button.
Sam risked a peek into her rearview mirror and yes, there he was… staring after her. Though she should have been relieved by her successful exit, she had an uneasy suspicion that she hadn’t truly escaped.
It was more like he’d decided to let her go. For now.
5
Here was all Sam wanted by the time she got home to her cozy two-bedroom cottage (conveniently located directly behind Ruth’s House Indiana): lots of love from her dog, who she could already hear on the other side of the door, panting in excitement over Sam’s arrival. She’d let the sweet girl get in a few licks before she settled down with the next two things on her list: a HUGE glass of wine and an old episode of Veronica Mars.
She’d recently splurged, downloading all three seasons to the Apple TV device Josie bought her for Christmas, and she’d been enjoying re-watching her favorite television show from back in the day—this time without any commercial interruptions. Maybe tonight she’d watch the one where Veronica kisses the good guy cop (who eventually went on to play Schmidt in New Girl) at the school dance after taking down members of the Russian mafia.
Sam thought of Marco, the real life good guy cop she was sort of, kind of, maybe seeing a little bit. He’d also kissed her. A few days ago on the their third takeout date after work. And it had been nice. Really nice. It hadn’t set her on fire like the kiss with Mount Nik, but in all fairness, she’d been wearing her jacket and distracted by the prospect of having to get up early to lead a Mindfulness Class at Ruth’s House.
She put her key into the lock. Yeah, that episode of Veronica Mars would help her put what happened with that super intense Russian hockey player in perspective.
But just as she was about to turn the lock, her phone went off, the screen lighting up with a 3-1-7 number.
“Hello?” she said tentatively, thinking the Russian might have tracked her down somehow, despite not knowing her name.
“Sam from the party, is that you?”
It was a child’s voi
ce. A boy’s voice. The one she’d met earlier. And he sounded scared.
“Hi!” she said, trying to hide her alarm. “Is everything okay?”
“No!” he answered. “Some bad men are here. Knocking on the door. Telling Papa to let them in.”
Sam’s heart went tight with fear for the boy. “And is he…?”
“No, he’s yelling for them to go away! But I don’t think they’re going away. They’re yelling about some money for drugs. I think he was supposed to sell them but he used them instead. They are Russian, like us.”
She hadn’t known the little boy was Russian. Just like Nikolai Rustanov, she thought to herself. But he’d claimed not to know any children when she’d asked him about it. Had he been lying or was this a case of coincidence? Like how all black people didn’t know each other, and neither did all Russians?
It didn’t matter, Sam decided. There was a way bigger matter at hand.
“Okay, listen to me carefully…” She paused realizing she still didn’t know his name, even though he knew hers.
“Pavel,” he supplied on the other side of the line. “My name’s Pavel.”
Wow, he hadn’t been kidding about the Russian stuff.
“Okay, Pavel, I need you to go somewhere and hide. Somewhere good, not under a bed or in a closet. Like in a cabinet if there’s one you can fit into. Stay there until I come for you.”
There came the sound of a lot of shuffling, and then Pavel whispered, “Okay, I’m hiding.”
“Good, good, Pavel,” she said, allowing herself a little breath of relief. “Now just give me your address and I’ll get there as quickly as I can.”
“Just you. No police!” Pavel said. “Papa will be very angry if you bring police.”
“Fine, no police,” Sam lied, knowing full well she was going to be calling Marco as soon as she got off the phone. But she didn’t want Pavel to freak out about the possibility of police coming to his home, especially before he let her know where he was.
“Pavel, I need your address. I can’t help you if I don’t have it.”
Silence, and in the background she heard the muffled sounds of a door crashing open and angry voices, speaking in a hard language she guessed to be Russian.
“They’re here,” Pavel whispered. “They’re inside.”
SAM KNEW IT WOULD BE BAD even before she decided to go in on her own. The house she was now parked in front of looked even more neglected than Pavel, with peeling paint and boarded up windows, all telling Sam that the little boy’s current residence might not exactly be “on the books,” with a proper lease agreement and all that. It also explained why Pavel didn’t seem to have much access to water for a bath or a shower. No, Citizens Energy Group wasn’t running water through this place for sure.
A shiver of fear ran down her back as she took in the dilapidated building. A home invasion had obviously taken place. The door at the top of the cracked, grey cement steps was standing halfway open, despite the fact that it was deeply cold outside and the house wasn’t in one of Indiana’s best neighborhoods. She should know… it was just a few blocks from Ruth’s House, and she’d purposefully chosen the downtown Indianapolis location for its proximity to both upper and lower class neighborhoods. This one definitely qualified as the latter.
Sam got out of her car anyway. She couldn’t just not go in. Poor Pavel was in there somewhere and Marco still hadn’t returned any of the messages she’d left him on the way over, even though this was technically one of the neighborhoods he was supposed to be serving. She’d also put in a call to the local police department, but they hadn’t seemed all that excited about the prospect of coming out to one of Indianapolis’ worst neighborhoods based on a phone call she’d gotten from a kid she’d just met at a party.
No, she had to go in there herself. But Sam wasn’t a complete idiot. She wouldn’t go in without Back Up.
She came around the car to the sidewalk and whistled, “Hey, Back Up! Come with me, girl!”
Her dark, grey Staffordshire Bull Terrier immediately leapt through the open passenger window of Sam’s Prius. She bent down to scratch behind her ears. “Good girl,” she said. “But try to look a little more menacing, okay?”
Back Up just smiled up her, tongue lolling out, not realizing she was giving Sam the exact opposite of what she’d asked for. Thanks to a lot of misinformation and idiot breeders, rescue dogs that looked like Back Up had a bad reputation as far as the media and the general populace was concerned. But after being impregnated several times as an incubator dog for a dog fighting ring, then left out on the street still bleeding from her last pregnancy—thank God a rescue org had found her—Back Up now seemed way more interested in meeting new friends she could lick than tearing anyone limb from limb. If she had any blood thirst in her whatsoever, she was doing a good job of hiding it behind a perma-grin and an eager-to-please attitude.
But with her wide, square face, she looked mean enough from far away which meant she got the intimidation job done in a pinch. Sam led her to the house’s front door, hoping if anyone was inside, they’d run as soon as they saw Back Up.
“Hello? Is anybody home?” she said as she came through the door. “This is Sam McKinley from the Indiana Police Department and I have a very dangerous, completely rabid dog with me—”
Sam stopped short. There was a blue-eyed white man with blond hair and a long-sleeved Indiana Polar t-shirt, sitting on the couch—no, strike that—there was a body sitting on the couch in an Indiana Polar t-shirt. Slightly slumped over to the side with a hole in its head.
Bad teeth, crazy hair, hollow eyes. Meth was written all over the scene. An addict and possibly a dealer, judging from the professional holes in his body. There were two of them, she realized upon closer inspection, one in his head and one in his chest, right above the image of a mean-looking polar bear with a hockey stick.
A rap lyric about never getting high on your own supply floated through Sam’s head, even as her stomach flipped over on itself.
She might have stayed there, rooted to the spot in horror, if Back Up hadn’t chosen that moment to rush past her, nose down, probably searching the house for any incriminating food she might get into. She did have her priorities.
And Sam was grateful for the distraction as she turned her face from the scene, wishing like heck she could just run out of there like any sane person would upon getting hit with the sight of a dead body. This scene was triggering all sorts of bad memories for her. But she’d told Pavel she would come for him. Sam shook off a major case of the willies. Pavel had sounded so scared on the phone. She couldn’t let him down.
But where was he?
As if in answer, a whimpering sound came from the kitchen. Sam could see Back Up sniffing around a set of cabinets, below what would have been the kitchen sink before someone pulled it out completely. But the cabinets still remained, and Back Up had obviously caught the scent of something… or someone.
Someone small enough to fit inside a cabinet.
Sam knew she wouldn’t be able to keep her composure if Pavel was dead, his small body stuffed inside the cabinet underneath the sink, but she headed towards where Back Up was sniffing anyway.
She took a deep breath and bent down to open the cabinet door… then let out a huge sigh of relief when she found Pavel inside, staring at her wide eyed, a burner phone clutched tightly in his small hands.
“Pavel! Thank God!”
This time when she reached for him, Pavel seemed more than eager to come to her. But then Back Up ruined the moment by charging straight at the little boy, her mouth open wide.
Pavel shrank back into the confines of the cabinet, his eyes squeezing shut with fear. “Don’t let it eat me!”
“Sit, girl,” Sam commanded, pointing to a spot behind her.
Back Up whimpered piteously, but did as commanded.
“Good girl,” Sam told her, before turning back to Pavel. “Sorry about that. I love her, but she’s never met a person she didn’t w
ant to lick. I’m always like, ‘Calm down, girl, let a person get to know you first!’”
Pavel peeped over Sam’s shoulder, suspicion in his eyes, which she could now see were blue, like those of the man on the couch. Clearly it was his mother who was black.
“She just wants to lick me? Not eat me?” Pavel asked.
Sam let out a wry chuckle, despite the situation.
“No, she would never eat anybody. She looks mean—that’s why I take her places with me, but the truth is she’s as gentle as they come.”
Back Up started in with a series of high-pitched whines, so loud, Sam had to look over her shoulder and admonish, “Back Up, he doesn’t want to get licked. Not everybody’s into that, okay?”
Back Up once again whimpered, hanging her head in such a dejected fashion, one would think Sam had just kicked her.
Sam turned away from her dog back to the boy. “So is it just you here? Is your mother out?”
Pavel shook his head solemnly. “No, she’s dead. We all used to live together, and we were happy for a little bit. But she started using again, so Papa did, too. But she died a year ago.”
Sam stared at him in mute horror. So young and now he’d lost both his parents.
Pavel blinked, and peered over her shoulder at Sam’s now sullen bullie. “That’s a strange name, Back Up.”
“Actually it’s kind of a joke from this TV show about a high school detective called Veronica Mars… ever seen it?”
Pavel shook his head.
“Yeah, it’s probably a little above your viewing level. How old are you again?”
“Eight,” Pavel whispered.
Another pang of regret on his behalf went through Sam. Two addict parents, and now he didn’t have any family left.
“Yeah, eight’s too young. Maybe when you’re thirteen.” Sam broke off and looked around like she was just now noticing they were in a house with the body of his last remaining parent dead on a sofa in the other room. “So it looks like some bad stuff went down with your dad before we got here.”
HER RUSSIAN SURRENDER Page 3
