The Debt

by Sara Hubbard

  He grips my wrist and stops me. “Patience.”

  “I’ve been patient for too long,” I say, panting. I push off of him and move to my feet. I slide off my leggings and stand naked in front of him. Stripped down and bare. Vulnerable. I cross my hands over my chest as he watches me.

  Shyly, I smile. “What?”

  “My angel,” he says before he stands. Gripping the hem of his sweatpants, I slide them down over his strong, muscular thighs. When I straighten up and look into his eyes, I take him in my hand, slowly stroking him. His eyes roll back before closing, and then he releases a primal growl from somewhere deep inside of him. I thought I couldn’t want him more, but I’m wrong. His lips crash down on mine with brutal, desperate force, and he backs me up until I’m pinned between his warm, hard body and the cool wall.

  I arch my back, driving myself in tight against him. I feel pain again, and I’m sure I’ll be bruised and sore in the morning, but it’ll be worth it. He bends at the knees so we’re nearly eye to eye, and it brings the tip of his cock to my entrance. I feel it and reach for him before rubbing him against me. Panting and covered in sweat, I’m ready, and so is he. Will he take me now? I can’t wait much longer.

  He doesn’t enter me but clutches my waist and forces me to spin around. With splayed fingers on my back and a hand on my hip, he forces me to bend over. He likes it like this, and I’ll admit I do, too. Just not now, not after all this time.

  “No, I want to see your face,” I say between ragged breaths.

  He pushes against my entrance, straining me as the tip penetrates. I moan, still willing, but also disappointed. Then he stills. His hand slides down my back in a sweet caress before he steps back. I don’t feel him anymore, so I turn and look up at him. His eyes are closed, and his chest noticeably moves in and out with his deep breaths. I wrap my arms around him before touching his cheeks.

  His eyes open as much as they can, and he traces a line over my cheekbones and my lips before whispering something to me in Russian. I have no idea what it is, but it sounds beautiful. I kiss his lingering thumb and then I smile.

  He picks me up, and I wrap my legs around him. He carries me to the bed and gently lays me down. I open my arms to him and wait, impatient for his warm, muscular body on me. He spreads my legs and crawls up the bed to settle in between them. He’s heavy, but he keeps most of his weight on his elbows, and I like how secure I feel with his body on mine.

  “I’ve never wanted anyone but you,” he says. His words are so quiet I’m not sure he meant to say them out loud.

  I press my forehead to his and sigh. “Be careful with my heart.”

  “It’s a beautiful heart,” he says as he drives himself deep inside of me.

  I whimper, caught between sheer bliss and pain. My body is ready and willing, but I feel myself stretch as I adjust to his size. I feel him everywhere. With my back arched, I ride a wave of ecstasy, nearly driven to the point of no return. He drives in and out of me slowly at first, as if preparing me for his size. I want all of him, so I grip his hips and force him in as deep as he could go, bucking my hips to allow it.

  “Fuck,” he says as he stills.

  “More,” I beg.

  And he delivers, driving in and out of me with punishing force as he unleashes two years of unmet needs on me, and me onto him.

  * * *

  I wake some time later when the world is still quiet and dark. I smile softly when I realize where I am and what’s happened. All of my muscles are relaxed, and my heart is full and getting fuller by the second. I almost don’t notice how sore I am between my legs. Not that it matters, I’d gladly take that and more to have him inside of me again.

  The lights are off in his bedroom, but it’s light enough that I can see he’s not still sleeping next to me. I roll over and find him standing by the window, naked, staring outside.

  “Maxim?”

  He looks over. There is something different about his face. Yes, it’s badly beaten, and it makes me cringe to think of him in pain, but that’s not what’s different. I expect less tension, but he looks worse than before. It’s all in the set of his shoulders and the tilt of his head.

  He struts back to me, completely unashamed. I wish I had his confidence. He sits on the edge of the bed beside me, his head turned to face me. One of his hands reaches out. With his thumb, he strokes my cheek before running it over my bottom lip. It’s easy to forget everything that’s happened when he’s near me like this. It’s also easy to forget about everything that makes our relationship difficult, if not, impossible.

  “I have to go soon,” he says.

  “Where?”

  “Work.”

  “You’re hurt. Can’t you take a day off?”

  He quietly chuckles at that. “No.”

  “What’s going on in that head of yours? You look deep in thought.”

  He clears his throat and leans down to press his lips gently to mine. “I’m always deep in thought.”

  I frown at him. “You won’t distract me with a kiss. Not today.”

  He smirks at me.

  “Talk to me.” I sit up and hug the sheets to my bare chest. “I don’t know what’s happening between us, but I know we won’t work if you keep me at an arm’s length. I’m not an enemy, Max. I’m someone who cares for you…a lot. That means something.”

  “It does. More than you know.”

  “You said you don’t know how to be close to me, and I’m telling you how. Right now. Let me in. You just need to decide if that’s something you’re willing to do.”

  “Willing?” he says.

  “Yes.” I smile at him. “Just open your mouth and speak. That’s it. It’s easy, right?”

  “For you.”

  I release a breath and drop my gaze.

  “Give me time.”

  “Six months?” I say, grinning. “Or less? How long have I been here?”

  He makes a face. “I’m surprised you’re not counting the days.”

  “It’s hard. All the days just kind of blend together.”

  He nods, lines appearing in his forehead.

  I take his hand and squeeze it lightly. “It won’t be easy to leave you now. I want you to know that.”

  “Well, maybe you don’t have to.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “You let me worry about it.” He touches his thumb to my lips and meets my gaze before his hand is gone and he’s walking away. While he showers, he leaves the door ajar. I sit, listening to the music of the water spraying his body and the tile. And I ruminate. This man forces so many emotions on me, and they are often in conflict. Pain and joy. Hope and despair. Love and hate. Sorting through them should be a difficult task, but it’s not. In fact, it’s relatively easy. Because no emotion I feel is as strong as my need to hold him, love him, and help him learn how to trust.

  If this were our only obstacle, I think we could manage, but it’s not. Far from it, actually. I want to go back to my old life and have him stay in it, but how is that possible? There’s no way his father or anyone else at that warehouse that night would let that happen. My stomach clenches, and tension builds in my chest. He thinks he can fix this. How could he possibly convince them to trust me when he still struggles with it? I have a painful feeling I know the answer, and my heart breaks again.

  Chapter 18

  Maxim: I’ve always been good with numbers and details. Though I don’t have a photographic memory, it isn’t far off. So, sitting at my desk in the club and reviewing the books is usually easy and boring. Tonight? I can’t seem to add two numbers together, let alone make it through an entire ledger.

  Before I brought Luna into my home, and even when I dated her before, I could walk away from her and turn off my feelings and thoughts. I could focus and keep my life—this life—and my time with her separate. And now I can’t stop thinking of her for five minutes, let alone hours.

  She consumes me. And though I’ve just had her, I want her again. In every way. I
want to claim her as mine and have her confirm it by saying the words out loud. I want to feel it in her words and know that it’s true.

  I meant what I said to her: I don’t know how to be close to her. Truth is I don’t know how to be close to anyone. A safety mechanism I learned as a child when I wanted love and affection and only received it from, Yara, a woman who had no reason to give it. Even then, it was uncomfortable because my parents had always frowned on it. So I withdrew from Yara over the years to keep her safe, knowing if they couldn’t make me avoid it, they’d make her.

  I shift in my seat and toss my pen onto the wooden desktop before leaning back and looking up at the ceiling. There’s a water stain I haven’t noticed before. I’ll have to take care of that. I’m still staring up at the ceiling when Yuri strolls in, whistling, while tossing an orange up and down in the air. He flops down on the faded leather couch in front of the desk. There’s a shit-eating grin on his face.

  “You look worse than last night. I didn’t think that was possible,” he says.

  “Thanks.”

  “My pleasure.” He’s still grinning, still ear to ear.

  “You gonna tell me why you look so happy?” I ask him in Russian.

  “You obviously didn’t see the news this morning.”

  My curiosity is peaked, and I pray it’s a big enough distraction to keep my mind where it needs to be. “Spit it out.”

  “They found a body down by the docks. The name’s not been release yet, but I hear it’s Trevor.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “That was fast.”

  “What do you mean?”

  I stare at him for a moment.

  “Did you know this was coming?”

  I reach for my phone and discover it’s dead. “Fuck.” If Yuri knows Trevor is dead, then my father likely does, too. A paranoid person by nature, he’s going to be on high alert, and he’ll want his sons close by to figure out what’s going on. He’s likely already tried to call a dozen times, and I’m about to get screamed at for being unavailable.

  “Hey? Maxim?”

  “What?” I root through the drawers and find a cord to plug in my phone.

  “I said, did you know this was coming?”

  I crack my neck and remain silent.

  “Was it you?” He makes a face and shakes his head. “No way it was you. You don’t kill people and leave them to be found. That’s not your style.”

  “You’re correct. I didn’t kill him.”

  “But you know who did, though, don’t you?”

  My phone beeps as it gets enough juice to turn on. I pick it up and find a half dozen texts and some missed calls. All from my father’s phone except for one. That one is from Andrei. It says, “You’re welcome.”

  “We need to get over to the house,” I say.

  “Do we? Because I’m pretty comfortable letting this unfold from a distance.”

  I push out from the desk and stand. By the wall, there is a coat rack. I snatch my bomber jacket from it before approaching Yuri. “I have a feeling things are going to get messy,” I say.

  “How messy?”

  “Andrei wants to be king. I’m not sure how far he’s willing to go to get there. Or how long he’s willing to wait.”

  “You think he’s going to make a move on your father? Or you?”

  I shrug. “I don’t know, but I wouldn’t put either past him.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  He sits up straight and scoots to the edge of his seat. “What’re you gonna do?”

  “If he comes at me? I’ll kill him.”

  “And if he goes after Sergei?”

  I hold my hands out and say nothing, but I’m sure my face says it all.

  “You’ll let him.” He lets out a long whistle.

  “It’s not what I want, but I have to say it serves a purpose.” I clear my throat and meet his eyes. “I want you and I to be the only two left alive who were there the night that thief was killed.”

  “This is about the girl.” He runs his hands over his chin. “Man, I never saw that coming.”

  “Neither did I.”

  “What do you need?”

  I saunter over to him and lay a hand on his shoulder. “I don’t think I need to say it.”

  “Ritchie, Allan, and Mark? All of them?”

  “We make choices in life. This is mine. I’ll understand if you can’t. No hard feelings at all. This isn’t business; it’s personal. But I need a certain amount of distance to keep this from coming back on me.”

  “You’ve done this for me and more,” he says with a hoarseness to his voice.

  And I have. “You don’t owe me,” I say. “Never feel like you owe me. This is family helping each other. There is no debt between family.”

  As much as I say this, I know it falls on deaf ears. Because once upon a time, someone badly hurt someone he cared for. She wasn’t the same after. In fact, it was only about three years ago that she killed herself because she couldn’t get past it. The police could never find the person who hurt her, but I did. I made it my mission for months until I finally found him. And then I gave him to Yuri.

  He nods, and a weak smile crosses his lips. It falls quickly. “I’ll make it quick.”

  I tap his shoulder and slowly walk away. I should feel guilty for what I’m proposing. Although I’m not willing to have a role in killing my father, I’ll take a role in killing the others if it means Luna gets her life back. She’s an innocent; they’re not. That’s how I see things. And seeing things in black and white makes what I do that much easier. To be able to easily put people into neat and tidy boxes. Good and bad. Deserving and undeserving. Because I truly believe if you live this life, you deserve what you get. My time will come one day, and I’ll accept it no matter how easy or difficult. Peaceful or torturous. I won’t beg for my life.

  Will I ever tell Luna how she got her life back? No. Never. Will I lie about it? If I have to. I want her to look at me like she looked at me this morning. Like I matter and with happiness in her eyes. I’ll kill to keep that look in her eyes. I’ll kill the whole world.

  As for my father? Maybe Andrei’s ambition is a gift. Maybe it’s the one thing that will let me live my own life and get me out from under my father’s thumb. He might not have any intentions on killing our father any time soon, but I don’t believe that. He was too quick to kill Trevor. You could almost say he was in a hurry. So, I have to believe he’s on a timeline for everything else, too. It’s what makes sense.

  And when everyone who was in that building is dead, except for Luna, Yuri and me, I will be comfortable letting her leave me. In whatever way she needs to.

  * * *

  Josef greets me at my parent’s house. “It’s good to see you, sir. Can I take your jacket?”

  “No, I’m fine.”

  I step inside and notice the new table in the center of the square foyer. It’s dark stained in mahogany, and there is a faint smell of paint in the air. My gaze roams over the walls. “Did someone paint in here?”

  “Yes, sir. The walls are now cream.”

  “Huh. What color were they before?”

  He clears his throat. “White, sir.”

  I smirk at Josef. “Right.” Leave it to my mother to change something without really changing anything. I never would have noticed the difference. In fact, I’m convinced the walls are almost the exact same color.

  “Your father is out back with your brother,” Josef says.

  “Thanks. How’s the family?”

  He lights up. “Good! Ariel just had twins.”

  “Congratulations, Grandpa.”

  He chuckles at that. I offer him a clap to the shoulder as I pass by him. From how he treated me as a kid, those grandkids will be fortunate to have him. I was fortunate to him. I continue to the backyard while he turns toward the kitchen. My mood dampens almost immediately. My father is going to be wild, and with little sleep, I don’t have the patience fo
r it today. Nor do I have the patience for my brother. I assume he’ll feign outrage, promise to find out who did it and take care of the murderer. He’s as skilled at keeping his cards as close to his chest as I am. It’ll be interesting to see how this plays out, though.

  My mother descends the stairs as I pass by them. I nod to her and keep walking.

  “Are you really not going to stop and say hello to your mother?” she asks. I hear the annoyance in her voice as much as I feel it.

  I sigh and turn around to greet her at the bottom of the stairs. She leans in, and I kiss her cheeks, one at a time.

  “Oh, look at what’s left of your handsome face,” she says with frown. “Does it hurt?”

  “No.”

  She clucks her tongue at me. “You played with him last night, and you let him get more shots on you then you should have.”

  I sigh.

  “Years and years of training, and from Niko, no less. I thought you were better than that.” She narrows her eyes. “Or maybe you’re distracted. I’m starting to think more and more that you might have a woman, after all.”

  “Are you done?” I ask her.

  She smooths her hair, lightly brushing her bangs out of her eyes with a single, slender finger. “No. Your father is on edge. He won’t say why.”

  I blink.

  “Are you going to tell me?”

  “I’m not sure I know what’s going on. I won’t know until I see him.”

  “Andrei has been with him for over an hour. They’ve been spending a fair bit of time together recently at the pawn shops. Andrei’s even taken to asking about his favorite toys.” She rolls her eyes. “They’re bonding over antiques and old clocks. How do you feel about that, Maxim?”

  “I can’t have this conversation right now, Mother. I’m already late.”

  “He’s like a viper,” she says quietly. “Whispering in his ear. I swear to God, Maxim, you need to nip it in the bud.”

  “Not now,” I say.

  “Fine,” she says, folding her arms over her chest. “Come find me before you leave.”

  Not likely.

  I love my mother, don’t get me wrong. But it’s hard to be near her when she’s hyper focussed on my life. Lately, that’s all she focusses on. I have enough on my plate without adding her concerns to the mix. Maybe I will get her a puppy. Something that needs a lot of energy and attention. But then…she’ll probably end up killing it.