Page 87 of Ivory Ashes

Just a few months ago—and for the last six years—I had some image of Mikhail in my head. Some idea of the man he was. But nothing I imagined could have come close to doing him justice.

“You’re different than I thought you’d be,” I find myself murmuring. “Nicer.”

“What did I tell you about falling in love with me, Viviana?”

I laugh, but the idea isn’t as ridiculous as it was the day we got married. “Would that be so bad?” My face feels warm, but I say it casually. It’s just a thought. Not something I’m going to turn over and over in my head while I toss and turn in bed tonight. “I mean, if we’re going to be married, we might as well try to be happy.”

“Which is why you can’t fall in love with me.” There’s a hard edge to his voice now. He gathers up our plates and piles them on the plastic tray.

“You really think love makes people unhappy?”

“I think letting your emotions dictate your life is the quickest way to losing control. And I have no interest in losing control.”

He walks the tray to the trash can, dumping the food and stacking the dirty tray on top of the others. On the way towards the door, he casually slips a hundred-dollar bill into the tip jar.

I’m not sure Mikhail will ever let me close enough to understand exactly how he operates.

Maybe that’s for the best.

Sometime in the last half-hour, it started raining. Pouring, actually. Rain pounds on the red awning above the door and flows down the pavement in sheets.

Without a word, Mikhail slips out of his jacket and slides it over my shoulders. It smells like mint and citrus. I pull it tighter around my shoulders even as I ask, “What about you?”

“It would take far more to hurt me.” His eyes dip to the neckline of my white shirt for a beat before he turns back to the deserted sidewalk. Then he grabs my hand and pulls me after him. “Come on.”

We run out into the rain and instantly, I’m soaked. Rain drips down my back and over my eyes. If my makeup wasn’t already ruined from what we did in the car earlier, it would be destroyed now. Mikhail’s jacket is heavy and waterlogged. It hangs down into my eyes until I can’t see.

Maybe that’s why I don’t notice Mikhail stop on the curb.

I’m staring down at the ground as I jump over the overflowing gutter and into the street. Then headlights blind me. A horn blares. A car hurtles toward us.

I don’t have time to react or panic before Mikhail yanks me back. I smack against his hard chest, his arm banded around my back like iron.

His jacket has slipped down around my shoulders. Rain pelts my face, plastering my hair to my face.

But I barely feel it.

Mikhail is breathing heavily. His eyes are wide. He strokes a warm hand over my cheek, brushing wet strands of hair from my face.

“You almost died.”

He says it so softly I’m not sure how I can even hear it over the pounding rain—over my pounding heart.

“But you saved me.”

It’s becoming a trend: Mikhail saving me. I could almost get used to it.

His thumb presses gently to the corner of my mouth and I turn towards it. I exhale against the calloused pad of his thumb, pressing the barest of kisses there.

His arm tightens around me, pinning me to his body.

“What are we doing?” I breathe.

The question shatters the moment. Mikhail jerks back, putting a safe distance between our bodies. But as he looks both ways to make sure no more cars are coming to splatter me against the asphalt, I hear him whisper a confused response.

“I have no fucking idea.”

31

---