The first nicest thing had been his kiss.
Chapter One
IT DIDN’T hurt as much as everyone said that it should.
His leg, fractured and mangled in a road accident, would, he had been told, mean six months of extensive rehabilitation—and then perhaps he might walk with an aid.
Four months to the day since the accident that had almost taken his life, Aleksi Kolovsky waded through the glittering Caribbean ocean unaided. The doctor had suggested two fifteen-minute sessions a day.
It was his third hourly session, and it was not yet midday.
Whatever he was advised to do, he did more of it.
Whatever the treatment, he headed straight for the cure.
After all, he had done this once before—under circumstances far worse than this.
He had been a child without doctors, without physios, without this stunning backdrop and the cool ocean that now soothed his aching muscles. He had rehabilitated his fractured body himself—first in the confines of his room till the bruises had faded, and then, without grimacing, without wincing, he had walked and returned to schooling. Not even his twin, Iosef, had been aware of his struggles; Aleksi had privately continued his healing behind the closed walls of his mind.
Iosef—his identical twin.
He smiled a wry smile. He had watched a show last night on the television. Well, he hadn’t exactly watched it, it had been on in the background, and he had not paid it full attention. His attention had instead been on the skilled lips working on his tumescent length to raise it to its splendid glory. It had been a different attention, though. Normally he switched off, sex the balm—not any more. The television had been too loud as it spoke of telepathic bonds between twins, and the woman’s sighs had been grating. Since the accident, chatter annoyed him, conversation irritated him, and last night her lips had not soothed him. He had hardened, but it had been just mechanical, an automated response that, despite her delight, had not pleased Aleksi. Though he’d yearned for relief, he had realised he wouldn’t get it from her. However, there was a reputation to be upheld, so he’d shifted their position.
He’d heard her cries as he did the right thing, pleasuring her with his mouth, and then had feigned reluctance at the disturbance from his phone.
His phone buzzed regularly.
There had been no need to answer it—except last night he had chosen to. Chosen to make excuses as to why she must leave, rather than give that piece of himself to her.
Was even the escape of sex to be denied him?
The sun beat on his shoulders—his skin was brown, his body lean and toned, and he appeared a picture of health above the water. But the scars stung beneath as he stretched his limits and made himself run in the water.
Now it hurt.
It hurt like hell, but he pushed through it.
Could his brother in Australia feel this? Aleksi thought as he sliced the water and forced himself on. Was Iosef, working in an Emergency ward in Australia, suddenly sweating and gripped by pain as he went about his day?
Aleksi doubted it.
Oh, he had no animosity towards Iosef—he admired that he had broken away from the company and gone on to study medicine. Still they chatted, and met regularly. Aleksi liked him, in fact. But there was no telepathic bond, no sharing of minds, no sixth sense…
Where had the twin bond been when his father had beaten him to a pulp when he was only seven years old?
Where had the sixth sense been when a week later his brother had been allowed in to see him?
‘Some fall…’ Iosef had said, in Russian of course—because even in Australia the Kolovskys had spoken in Russian.
‘Dad is getting you a new bike.’ Iosef had come to sit on the bed, laughing and chatting, but as the mattress had indented a white bolt of pain had shot through Aleksi and he had gone to cry out. Then he had seen the warning in his mother’s eyes.
‘Good,’ he had said instead.
There was no special bond Aleksi realised.
You did not ache, you did not bleed just because your brother did.
He ran faster.
Riminic, Riminic, Riminic.
Even the gulls taunted him with the name.
A brother whose existence he had denied.
A brother he had chosen to forget.
There was no end to his shame, and his leg wouldn’t let him outrun it.
Sprint over, he was spent, and glad to be exhausted. Maybe now he could get some rest.
The nurse had his pills waiting when he returned to the lavish chalet, but he refused them. He drank instead a cocktail of vitamins and fresh juice and headed for his bedroom.
‘I’m going to rest.’
‘Would you like me to come in?’ She smiled. ‘To check on you?’
He growled out a refusal of her kind offer—could he not just recover? Could he not have some peace?
He lay on the silk sheets, the fan cooling his warm skin, yet his blood felt frozen.
The pain did not scare him—it was the damage to his mind. He had passed every test, had convinced the doctors that he was fine—could at times almost convince himself that he was—but there was a blur of memories, conversations that he could not recall, images that he could not summon, knowledge that lay buried.
The phone buzzed.
He went to turn it off.
Tired, he needed to rest.
And then he saw her name.
Kate.
Aleksi hesitated before answering. Kate was one of the reasons he was in the West Indies recovering—he had grown accustomed to her by his bedside, looked forward rather too much to her visits in the hospital and started to rely on her just a little too heavily. And Aleksi had long since chosen to rely on no-one.
‘What?’ His voice was curt.
‘You said to tell you if…’
Her voice came to him over the phone from halfway around the world. He could hear that she was nervous and he didn’t blame her. Nina would go berserk if she found out that Kate was calling. Aleksi was not to be disturbed with mundane work matters—except Aleksi had told Kate that he wanted to be disturbed.
‘Tell me what, Kate?’ Aleksi said. He could picture her round, kind face, and was quite sure that she was blushing. Kate blushed a lot—she was a large girl, surrounded by
