THE SOLDIER

“Hold up.” His voice is soft in my ear. This man never raises his voice. It’s part of that perfect dommy charm, but right now, it infuriates me.

“Let go of me.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Oh, so you do know what you did?”

He holds me tight but is still. “What happened?”

“You told me we didn’t lie to each other. You asked for my honesty, but you didn’t give me yours.”

“I didn’t lie. I’ve never lied to you.”

“You let me believe I got this job based on a good audition. You didn’t tell me because you knew I wouldn’t like it, Pavel.”

“Kayla, he offered. We were sweating him, and he threw a job for you in the ring. How could I turn that down? You’ve told me your dreams, malysh. How could I possibly block an opportunity?”

“Let go of me.”

Pavel’s arm around me loosens slowly then eventually gives way, and I spin to face him. “It was wrong, Pavel. Beating him up-or whatever you did was wrong. That’s not the way normal people do business.” It’s a low blow considering I pretty much sanctioned it at the time, but everything seems different now. “I don’t want a job that I got because of my connection to the Russian mob. I wanted a job because I was good enough.”

Pavel spreads his hands. “You are good enough, blossom. You’re twenty times over good enough.”

I scoff and shake my head. “How would you know? You’ve never even seen me perform.”

“I just know.” He sounds so sure.

“No. You know absolutely nothing about my career.”

And that’s when Ashley’s words come back to me. The promise I made to her.

This relationship is interfering with my career. Big time.

It’s definitely clouded my whole life. Turned me upside down and inside out. And my career is far too important to me, far too fragile for me to not have my head in the game.

“I’m calling red on us.” The moment I speak the words, everything in me goes dead. Like the soundtrack to my life suddenly got cut off. “I can’t do this anymore.”

Pavel shoves his hands in his pockets. He doesn’t speak.

“You said when I was done, you’d let me go.”

Pavel’s throat bobs. “Of course.” His voice comes out raspy and hoarse. “Let me drive you home.”Please check at N/ôvel(D)rama.Org.

I want to refuse-to schedule a rideshare instead-but it’s dark out, and I know Pavel won’t leave me here alone. I nod, ignoring the tear that skates down my cheek.

A cocoon of pain wraps me on the drive home. White noise blaring in my ears, heaviness pushing against my chest. Neither of us speaks.

Pavel pulls up in front of my apartment and starts to get out.

“Let me go.” I’m surprised at how clear and firm I sound.

He shuts his door again.

I throw mine open and get out. “Goodbye, Pavel.”

He’s looking straight ahead, both hands on the wheel. He doesn’t answer. As I close the door, I see his lips move and hear the murmur of something soft in Russian.

Later, I would wish I’d listened. Asked him to translate. But by then, it was too late. He was long gone. He set me free as he promised, and he wasn’t coming back.

Pavel

It takes my housemates a couple days to notice that the lights are out inside my head. I’m still eating. Still speaking although not much.

It wouldn’t be hard to argue that I was dead inside before I met Kayla. Now, there’s no doubt. I don’t allow myself to think. Or to feel. Or to do anything but the most mechanical of actions.

After I dropped Kayla off that night, I returned the rental car. Flew back to Chicago.

Found Ravil and told him I was staying. And then I went out on the roof to let the cold bite of an April night soak into my bones. Freezing all my organs exactly in place.

It’s not until Sasha asks me how the apartment building hunting is going that anything even moves in my chest.

Not that my heart flopping like a fish on land is anything worth celebrating.

“The deal is off,” I tell her, without looking away from the television we are all gathered around.

She hits pause on the Game of Thrones episode. “Wait… what?”

Dima looks over from his work station, stopping his usual incessant clacking of keys.

“Turn it back on.” I lift my chin toward the television like I actually care about some dragon queen.

“Oh my God, what happened?” Sasha gasps.

Now everyone looks-Nikolai, Oleg, Story, Maxim. Apparently Ravil hadn’t shared my failure with the rest of the suite.

“Did she break up with you? She found out about the part, didn’t she?”

The pain I hadn’t allowed myself to feel seeps in through the cuts Sasha makes.

“Turn it back on.”

Maxim leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees.

“I’m sorry, Pavel,” Story says softly. Oleg circles his fist over his chest in the sign for sorry.

“Wait-what Kayla ended things? Is that why you flew back there Monday?”

I shake my head, shocked by the pain in my chest, my ribs, my gut. “I was wrong for her. It was a bad idea to move out there, anyway. This is for the best.”

Sasha stands and throws her hands out. “So what, you’re not going to fight for her? You quit just like that? Well, damn, I’m glad I didn’t go into business with you if that’s how you approach challenges.”

“Sasha,” Maxim warns.

“Pavel doesn’t quit,” Dima says quietly from his work station. “He’s stubborn as hell.”

“I don’t keep my women against their will, unlike you mudaks,” I snap.