“How’s the arm?” Ivan asked, sounding like he couldn’t care less about the answer.
Sascha winced, his pinky finger all pins and needles around the warmth of the coffee cup. He didn’t like thinking abouthis arm, or the lingering nerve damage. Thinking made him remember, and remembering made his stomach hurt. It was easier to pretend his pinky finger just…fell asleep sometimes. “It’s fine,” he grumbled.
“You’re doing your exercises?”
“Maybe.” Sascha did a little roll of his shoulders. There, did that count?
There was a long, dangerous silence. “You will answer when I call from now on.”
“Of course I will,” Sascha drawled, adding a cheeky, “Sir,” just to be a dick.
Ivan tsked at him. “Did you ever think I might worry?”
“The thought never even crossed my mind,” Sascha answered truthfully.
Ivan’s sigh was heavy, like he had the whole weight of the world on his shoulders. “Everything I do for you is in your best interest.”
Sascha rolled his eyes as dramatically as possible, almost wishing Ivan was there just so he could see him do it. “You wouldn’t even let me tell Alexei I’d been stabbed.”
“Because he would have come to coddle you, and then I would have had to kill him. And then you would have sulked endlessly. So, as I said—in your best interest.”
“When can I come home, then?”
“Not yet.”
“Don’t you already know who ordered it? Can’t you just…deal with it already?”
“IbelieveI know who ordered it,” Ivan corrected him, in the same tone beleaguered adults used with overly curious children. “And the man who stabbed youhasbeen dealt with. But he was a disposable pawn—he didn’t have the intel about the cameras in the elevator. I doubt they expected him to escape. It’s the person giving the orders we need to worry about, and I can’t just starta mob war because you’re getting antsy in your rustic paradise, zaychik.”
Sascha suppressed a shiver. He knew he’d been the one to lead the conversation in this direction, but he didn’t like thinking about people being “dealt with,” even if theywereassholes who’d stuck a knife in him. He didn’t like thinking about the family business at all, if he could help it. And why should he? Their father had made it clear from the beginning Sascha wasn’t expected to participate. Too delicate.
Too weak was what he meant.
But Ivan, in his rampage after Alexei had tanked a business deal and fled into the night, costing them millions, had apparently pissed someotherfamily businesses off, and now Sascha was caught in the crossfire.
Someone was trying to make a message out of him.
He, who had never even held a gun. Some mistaken asshole seemed to think his death would actually put a damper on Ivan’s day. And now he was stuck in this town until Ivan deemed it safe to return. He was concerned he had a mole in his operation, someone who’d spilled the beans on the timing of Sascha’s arrival to his office.
Of course, Ivan could always decide he was better off with Sascha out of the picture entirely and keep him there indefinitely.
And would that be so bad? Alexei escaped it all, and he’s happy enough.
But Alexei had found love and purpose and all that jazz. All Sascha had found so far was a too-large house desperately in need of renovation and an overly friendly teenager who thought cross-country skiing was a legitimate pastime.
He sighed loudly into the phone. “I’m hanging up now.”
“Pick up next time.”
“Ta-ta.” He slid his phone back into his pocket and sipped his coffee. It was surprisingly good—dark and rich. What was a fetus doing making such good coffee?
Sascha stared out at the restless ocean, shivering as a breeze hit him. The joggers he’d thrown on were too thin for the changing weather.
But they were comfortable.
Sascha grinned as he took another sip. That was one thing a life in hiding had going for it, he supposed.
No fucking suits.
