his back. But his eager steps slowed down when he saw her face clearly. She was sure she looked as tense as she felt.
The momentary slowing turned into urgent strides that had him catching her by her shoulders in an anxious grip in seconds. “What is it, moya dorogoya? You’re not feeling okay?”
Gripping his hands she tried to stem his anxiety, what could soar at the slightest provocation. “I’m fine, really. Don’t start worrying. I just...wanted to talk to you.”
His face emptied. But in the blankness she could see one important fact. He knew what she was going to talk about. And if he could have done anything to stop her, he would have. But she’d cornered him this time, and he could do nothing to escape the subject. And he hated it.
It made her almost back down. How she hated to force this confrontation, too. But it had to come, sooner or later. And now she knew it would, she could no longer postpone it and live in this progressively debilitating suspense.
Gathering all her strength of will, trembling inside in apprehension at the possible outcome, she said, “I’ve tried to bring it up before, but you clearly weren’t ready to discuss it. I let it go as long as I could, Ivan, I really did. But I can’t do it anymore. Even after what happened, the condition I was in when I first came with you, being with you here has been the most magical time of my life. But...”
His hands caught her arms again. “There shouldn’t be any buts. It is magic, being together. And I never want anything to break the spell.”
“I’ve thought about it long and hard from every angle, and now that I’m healed, inside and out as much as I ever will be, I’ve changed my mind. I won’t sit back and let you pull strings to honor Alex’s memory. I will do that. I owe it to him, to our parents and to Cathy and the kids. I owe it to myself. Only then can I get closure and change my path.”
His jaw muscles bunched, but he finally nodded. “Very well. If you will let me orchestrate this to the best outcome, you can be the one to make the final steps and announcements.”
Grabbing his hand, she planted a fervent kiss in his palm. “Thank you...” He started to protest and a finger on his lips silenced him. “Just let me thank you, Ivan, please. I need to give you my thanks far more than you hate receiving it.”
He gave another reluctant nod, before his eyes lightened, as if with relief. “If this is why you want to go back...”
She had to stop him. “No, it isn’t. I do have a life back in the States, Ivan, a life I want to go back to. But I need you to tell me what going back would mean for us. I know you thrive on solitude, but I don’t. I needed it for a while, to regain myself and my stability. But I can’t continue being with you in such isolation from the rest of the world.”
“Why not? It has been perfect that way.”
“It has been more than perfect, but it has also been like a pocket universe, an alternate reality. We can’t exist in this bubble forever. You have friends who’re as close as family to you, and I do have a family. Two families.”
At her last words, something dark and terrible filled his gaze. Something elemental. Bleakness? Revulsion? Even despair?
When families had been mentioned at the beginning of their relationship in the past, he’d only said he was orphan, adopted and abandoned again at an early age. It had been her cue never to mention family to him again, avoiding mention of her own in deference to his sensitivities.
But did it go beyond sensitivity? Did the scars of his childhood go way deeper than what she’d ever estimated? Did he abhor the idea of family, especially one that would invade his life, as hers would, through her?
If this was true, where would this leave them?
Heart pounding with trepidation, she ventured a direct gaze into those grim eyes and broached the subject that had been an unspoken taboo between them. “I realize family isn’t something you consider kindly, and rightfully so, but my experience with family is nothing like yours. I—I love my family. I need them.”
The sheer pain that came into his eyes made her hate herself for causing it. His next words, forlorn and agonized, hit her even harder.
“I thought you needed me.”
“I do. Oh, God, I do. But needing them, too, wouldn’t make me need you any less, wouldn’t interfere in our relationship.”
His whole face twisted as if unbearable bitterness had just flooded his mouth. “It will. And I can’t abide something coming between us.”
Dreading his answer, she knew she could no longer dance around the subject, had to ask him pointblank.
“What will you do if—when—I go back to my life, the life that includes my family? Will you disappear again?”
This time he said nothing, his silent rejection far harsher than if he’d spoken it. A dozen emotions seethed in his eyes as they fixed on hers. It felt as if he was trying to bend her to his will, to make her relinquish this intention. And she had to face what she’d long avoided facing.
Ivan was incapable of leading a life among others. He was the wolf she’d once jokingly accused him of being. A lone wolf. If she wanted to be his mate, it would be either him or the rest of the world.
But though it would have been a terrible choice, knowing the nature of his scars, she would have chosen him over anything. If she didn’t fear his inexplicable moods, what stemmed from his unknown and not-to-be-known past. If she didn’t dread his future abandonment.
But there was so much she didn’t know about him, and about the reasons he’d left her in the past. With so many things she couldn’t understand about him, so much he hid from her, she couldn’t bet her heart, her life and future on him.
It felt as if her heart broke for real, and, her chest was tightening over its jagged pieces, until she couldn’t stop herself from crying out with the pain.
Her desperation released some shackle that had been holding him back and he caught her in a fierce embrace.
“Don’t leave, moya dusha. Don’t leave me.”
She sobbed her desolation. “I never want to leave you. But I can’t remain here where I have no life outside of you.”
“Then I’ll make you a life. Anything you want.”
“I only ever wanted you. Going back doesn’t make this any less true. It’s you who’s putting an impossible condition on being with you. You don’t have to be involved with my family in any way if you don’t want, but you can’t expect me to just cut them off, too. You don’t have to come back with me. Just say you will be back for me.”
Again, his oppressive, horrible silence in the face of her entreaty, where all doubts mushroomed, shrieked for her to cut her losses. To go now, before leaving him became impossible, or even worse, before nothing much of her survived leaving him.
Feeling like she was reaching inside her chest and ripping her shattered heart out, her shaking hands undid his grip on her arms. “I want to go back to the States now, please, Ivan. You are free, as always, to do what’s best for yourself.”
* * *
Ivan
