His words hit me like a punch in a face. And the warm, happy feeling I woke up with completely disappears.
“Okay, that’s really rude. Why would you even say something like that to me?”
Cheslav sneers. “Luckily, I am paying for you to put up with my rude. Now come back with me to bedroom. I would like to forget about hockey for a while.”
His dismissive words feel like barbed wire squeezing around my heart.
He reaches for me, but I push his hands away. “No.”
His eyes narrow. “What did you say?”
“I said, no!” I repeat. “I’m not weak. And I’m not going to just lie back and let you fuck me like some kind of object after talking to me that way.”
He goes very, very still. “Perhaps you forget our deal.”
“Perhaps you forget that I’m a human being with feelings,” I shoot back.
“Three hundred thousand.” He crooks his head to the side. “That is enough to pay for any and all feelings, da?”
“Nyet!” I answer, not realizing how true that word is until it comes flying out of my mouth. “That money doesn’t buy my feelings. If you had any, you’d understand why.”
He sighs like I’m getting on his nerves. “I do not want fight. Forget what I said. We will eat quickly, and then we will stay in bed until it is time for you to leave.”
Time for me to leave….
The languorous desire that had hung over our days together like a heavy fog dissipates. And suddenly, I can see this situation clearly. See Cheslav clearly.
He doesn’t respect or even like me. He was just using me. Just like my brother used me to sort out his debt. Just like all athletes use women as far as I can tell.
A horrible shame crashes over me as I say, “Actually I…”
I do a quick calculation of how much money is left on my brother’s debt, then decide out loud, “I think the time for me to leave is now.”
He looks at me, the sneer morphing into confusion. “What do you mean?”
It’s like the Instagram filter has dropped from this entire situation. How could I have let sex get in the way of my good judgment? I can’t believe this hockey asshole had me so far gone that I actually agreed to a date with him even though our so-called relationship only began after he blackmailed me into having sex with him.
“I don’t… I don’t think you’re a blackmailer who turned out to be nicer than I expected. I think you’re an awful Russian blackmailer who was acting nicer than I expected. But it was just acting.”
I know I’m right in my assessment when his eyes go dead at my words. “You still owe me a day, krasotka. Or did you forget?”
“No, I didn’t forget…” Tears of shame and disappointment threaten to descend, but I blink them back. Because I’m not weak. I’m a strong black woman, and I did not claw my way into a better life to let some hockey player demean me.
And I prove it by striding out of the kitchen and back to his bedroom.
There I yank open a few drawers until I find something I can work with—exercise clothes. I throw on a plain grey tee, and I’m pulling on his basketball shorts when he follows me into the room.
“You look silly. And this is a violation of the good pet rules. Take off my clothes.”
“I’ll pay you back for the outfit. And for the day,” I answer. “I’ll put a check in the mail as soon as I get home.”
With that, I charge forward to push past him.
But he steps in front of me. Like a big Russian wall.
“Get out of my way!”
“Krasotka…” he starts.
“What does that even mean?” I demand.
He rubs a hand over his closely cropped hair. Like he’s having a hard time being patient with me. But he answers. “Beauty. It means beauty.”
A day ago, even a few minutes ago, I would have found that meaning complimentary. But now… “No! Don’t call me that! I’m not a beauty queen or an animal or a pet or whatever you wanted me to be for these five days. I’m an accountant—a boring accountant who got in way over her head with you.”
I try to sidestep him again. But he steps in front of me again.
And I just lose it.
“Get out of my way!” I scream at him. “If you keep me here, that’s kidnapping on top of blackmail!”
He grits his chiseled jaw, but after a heated beat, he steps aside.
I rush past him and grab my phone off the table with the chessboard which I set back up after his temper tantrum about me leaving on Saturday. He’s still playing himself, I see. A few more pieces have moved on both sides of the board.
Whatever, I’m done here. So done. I continue toward the exit but stop again when I find Vlad in front of the elevator doors.
“No leaving,” he reminds me. “You still have one more day until your time is up.”
Before I can answer, a voice behind me says something in Russian. Harsh and short.
I look over my shoulder to find Cheslav. His hands are loose at his side, and his expression is shadowed over with fury.
I brace, prepared to fight my way out of this penthouse if that’s what it takes.
But then Vlad says, “I will take you to your home now, Princess South Carolina. Sorry for mistake.”
So in the end, I don’t have to fight my way out of the Russian’s penthouse. Vlad takes me by the elbow and escorts me into the elevator.
I’m relieved. Or at least I should be.
But for some reason, it feels like my chest is cracking as I step into the elevator. And my eyes immediately find Cheslav again when I turn to face forward.
I look at him, wondering what parts of our time together were real and what parts were just his game.
He looks back at me, his eyes green ice.
Then the elevator closes.
Chapter Eleven
When I get home, I find my brother gone. There’s a hastily written post-it stuck to my door: Sorry, sis. Talked to Nat, and she said I can move back in.
I don’t know if he’s sorry about the position he put me in or for moving out. Either way…
I crumple up the post-it and toss it in the very smelly trash he didn’t bother to take out before leaving. Why do I have the feeling this is the last I’ll see of Clemson too—at least until he needs something else.
No matter what…
I know I promised my mother on her deathbed, and I love my brother. But sometimes it feels like I’m a doormat. Something that only gets used when he needs to wipe his feet.
After taking a shower and changing into my own clothes, I find about a thousand messages from my boss when I sit down at my laptop to check my work email. My firm has called a company-wide meeting about whether to switch to a remote work model into the foreseeable future. So even though I’m taking a sick day, I’ll have to go into the office.
Okay…
First, I do some funds shuffling between my personal savings account and the one I made to hold the money I set aside for my brother. Then I write a check for forty-three-thousand dollars to Cheslav Rustanov and I drop it in one of my pre-stamped envelopes. After that, I pick up everything I’ll need to work from home.
“You don’t look sick to me, beauty queen,” my boss says when I show up at the office.
That’s one of the things I wish I had known before another cheerleader convinced me to enter the Beauty Queen of America state pageant with her—or as most folks call it, Queen America. Back then, I’d just thought it would be an interesting way to earn some scholarship money. I had no idea I’d actually win.
But the thing about winning something like that is it comes to define you. So many people at work still call me Princess South Carolina, it’s not even funny. And just because I paraded across the stage in a bikini a couple of times, people think they can say anything they want to me. Because in their eyes, all I am is a title without feelings or a soul.
The memory of Cheslav sneering about how weak I am hits me again.
“
Luckily, I’m pretty recovered,” I answer my boss, working hard to keep the resentment out of my voice. “If I was still too sick to work, I wouldn’t have been able to come into the office.”
“Everyone’s making too big a deal of it if you ask me,” a senior associate says later in the meeting. “Hey, Princess South Carolina, you think they’ll cancel the Beauty Queen of America pageant because of this flu bug going around?”
I shrug and sink down further in my seat. It’s crazy to think that just a few hours ago, I was in some rich hockey player’s penthouse having sex so good, it felt a little bit like love.
But it wasn’t. I force the memories of the four days with Cheslav to the back of my mind. Then I vote along with the majority of my co-workers to switch to a remote work model. And after work, I drop the letter I pre-stamped into the post office’s drive-up mailbox on my way home. It feels pretty dang formal.
Bye, Cheslav.
Bye, Illusion.
I’m back in the real world now.
And I’m done with Cheslav Rustanov.
Chapter Twelve
Except I’m not done with Cheslav Rustanov. Almost a month and no period later, I buy a pregnancy test along with all the food items I’ll need for the week on my Sunday grocery run.
I bury the test with frozen ravioli and ice cream I managed to find in the freezer aisle, but the cashier still pauses when she sees it. “Good luck, hon,” she says before scanning it through.
“Thank you,” I mumble even though I’m not sure if she’s rooting for me having a baby or not.
With COVID cases on the rise across the state, there were all sorts of rumors swirling that South Carolina was going to get hit with a stay-at-home order too.
Either way, less than an hour later, I know for a certainty that wishes of good luck don’t affect final outcomes. Two lines stare back at me from my bathroom sink. Two lines that mean I’m definitely pregnant.
All the cuss words go off in my head. What am I going to do? How am I going to handle this?
I stare at the test, totally paralyzed. I’m not weak like Cheslav called me. I’ve gone out of my way to be strong since my mother died.
But life feels very overwhelming right now. And it’s hard not to break down and cry after finding out I’m pregnant with a baby I didn’t plan for—in the middle of a pandemic. And the athlete who blackmailed me into having four days of hardcore sex with him is the father!
For a few moments, panic threatens to overwhelm me, but then I remind myself…strong black woman. I’m not going to freak out. I’m going to think and logic my way through this.
Okay, first question, am I keeping it? The answer to that question comes back a quick yes. I’m twenty-eight and at a point in my life where I can see myself being a good mom. And I have way more resources than my mom did.
The panic starts to recede as I run the numbers on my 2021 with a child in the mix. I can do this. At least I think I can.
I think about calling Cynda. But she has enough drama in her life. Some bitter doctor she used to date became her boss for, like, a whole minute before he fired her. Then he moved in with her—well not with her exactly. He’s living in the back house of the home she grew up in—but the point is, her life is a big old mess, and I feel bad adding my drama to it.
Not for the first time, I wish I could get in contact with Gina. She has a way of being encouraging, even when the odds are stacked against you. And I could use some encouragement right now.
But Gina sent Cynda and me a short email a couple of weeks ago, saying that she was visiting some aunt in Canada. To say we’d been surprised to read this was an understatement. We’d known her mother was Canadian—that had been all over her Queen America package.
But as far as we knew, she’d never actually been to Canada. And she’d never mentioned an aunt. It would be great if we could confirm that she’d made it to her destination okay. But she hadn’t answered any of our emails or texts. And her phone had gone straight to voicemail when we tried to call her.
So not only is Gina not available to talk, I’m worried sick about her.
Okay, I decide, setting the pregnancy test on the counter, no CPA study for me today.
I spend most of the day eating pizza, cookies, and Jeni’s Gooey Butter Cake ice cream and binging Tiger King on Netflix.
I end up falling asleep on the couch, which means I miss the buzzing of my usual radio alarm. So I’m more than a little discombobulated when I wake up to the sound of my Ring device informing me that there’s someone at my front door.
Who could it be? I don’t think I have anything coming from Amazon.
When I check my Ring’s feed from my Amazon Show, all I can see is a badge being held up in front of the camera.
“Ma’am, if you can open the door. I have some questions about the disappearance of Gina Bryant.”
My heart rate spikes. Oh no, Gina had disappeared, just as I suspected, and now the police were here to question me about it. I rush to the door, eager to be of assistance.
But I stop when I get a good look at the man standing on the front step of my condo. I’ve never met him before in real life, but I recognize him immediately from the pictures Gina posted on Instagram since he’s not wearing a mask.
It’s Tommy. Dressed in a short-sleeved black police uniform, he looks way more official and a lot paler than he did in the vacation pictures Gina posted on Instagram last summer. I guess you could call him handsome. He has wavy red hair that sort of puts me in mind of Prince Harry and an affable smile to match. I can see why Gina mistook him for a prince charming when he asked her out after her shift at Magic Peaches. But what’s Gina’s Georgia police sergeant boyfriend doing at my front door?
“Hi, Billie, it’s so nice to finally meet you. Although I wish it had been under better circumstances. Can I come in?”
Chapter Thirteen
Tommy has an accent, but it’s not Southern. I vaguely remember Gina saying something about him having transferred down to Atlanta from somewhere else. She’d thought it was so cute that he was an Irish American cop with a thick Boston accent?
But right now, I don’t find him nearly as charming as Gina did.
“No, you can’t come in,” I answer. “Wait here please, while I go get my mask.”
I leave the door open and turn to the bookcase where I keep all the cloth masks I’ve been using for grocery store runs.
I hear the screen door creak open behind me just as I get the mask on, and when I turn around, there’s Tommy standing inside my townhouse like I invited him in.
“I told you not to come in,” I say, every alarm instinct in my body going off.
“I’ve just got a few questions,” he answers.
His tone is technically reassuring, and the door’s still open, but I don’t like this. I don’t like it at all. “You can ask me anything you want from the other side of my door.”
He continues as if I said nothing at all. “You and Cynda were calling Gina non-stop until all of a sudden you just stopped a few weeks ago. That was only a few days after she disappeared.”
He looks genuinely distressed, but I have to ask, “How do you know we’ve been calling?”
Tommy shakes his head like what I’m talking about is neither here nor there. “She took her car but left her phone behind, which is why I was real scared after she disappeared.”
“Did you file a missing person report?” I ask him.
“Our department is overstretched with all this COVID talk. People are acting crazy. They can’t give a missing person’s case the time it deserves, so I’m handling this one myself. That’s why if you know where she is, you’ve gotta tell me. I’m worried sick about my girl.”
Worried sick…those were the exact words I’d used with Cynda last Saturday during our monthly call. But as worried as I am about my friend, something in my gut is telling me that if Gina didn’t even send him an email like she did Cynda and me, that’s because she doesn’t want Tommy to know
where she is.
I think of all the suspicions I’ve had over the years. Cynda had been calling him controlling from the start of his relationship with Gina. And there was something really off about the way he’d made her quit her job. I also didn’t like their couple photos. Instead of awwing over their pics, I often found myself noting how he didn’t put his whole arm around her, but kind of half-hugged her. Gripping her shoulder tight like she was a perp he was afraid would get away.
“I don’t know where she is,” I answer carefully.
But I guess I don’t sound convincing. In a flash, his face goes from concerned to angry. “You’re lying. You know where she’s run off to. You better tell me. Tell me now.”
“Run off to,” I repeat with all the alarm bells going off in my head. “I thought you were afraid she disappeared.”
Tommy glares at me.
And I’m so scared. For both Gina and myself. But I stand my ground, refusing to back down.
Our standoff is interrupted by the loud creak of my screen door once again opening.
Both Tommy and I look up to see Cheslav coming through my front door.
My chest fills with a strange relief at the sight of him, tall and towering in a blazer and jeans. At least he’s a known quantity, and unlike Tommy, he’s wearing a mask.
“What is going on here?” he asks, looking between Tommy and me.
And even though he’s wearing a mask, I can tell he’s not happy. Not happy at all.
“Chess? Chess Rustanov! Whoa, I can’t believe you’re here!”
Tommy recognizes Cheslav immediately, even with the mask.
Cheslav tilts his head at Tommy. “You are hockey fan?”
“Boston born and bred!” Tommy answers with pride in his voice. “I was at Game One of the series when you and Keane won the Stanley Cup.”
Cheslav nods. “That was good series.”
Then he says to me, “I played for the Boston Hawks at beginning of my career.”
“Yeah, shame about Keane losing his leg. Team wasn’t the same after you lost him, huh?”
Billie and the Russian Beast: An Enemies to Lovers Russian Hockey Player Sports Romance [50 Loving States, South Carolina] (QUARANTALES Book 2) Page 6
