Page 151 of Deceitful Vows

Has he slept at all in the past two weeks?

I step closer, crossing over into the danger zone before asking, “Are you ok?—”

I’m interrupted by the ding of the elevator announcing we have arrived at Mikhail’s floor.

After tightening his jaw like the gesture pains him as much as his disheveled appearance hurts me, Andrik gestures for me to exit the elevator first.

I do, albeit hesitantly.

We don’t need a code to enter Mikhail’s apartment. The door has been left wide open, and it smells like someone crawled inside and died many days ago.

“I’ll open some windows while you check the bedroom.”

Andrik takes my bossiness in stride. He veers through the penthouse living room that looks worse than a frat house after a raging party as I open a window in the kitchen before moving for the massive Constantine doors in the dining room. They open out onto the balcony and the city lights.

I spin to face Andrik when he says, “He’s not in there, though he’s been here recently. The shower is wet and there are towels on the floor.”

“Has anyone checked the Broadbent?”

He nods. “I just came from there. He isn’t there either.”

“Someone has to be buying all this.” I wave my hand over numerous boxes of takeout on the dining room table. “And from what Mikhail told me, that person isn’t you. And don’t say it was because we kissed. You cut him offbeforethat happened.” Now isn’t the time for this, but I truly don’t know if I will ever get the chance again, so I run with it. “If you wanted to backtrack on your promise, you didn’t have to make Mikhail your scapegoat. You could have told me that the sex was a good distraction from your son’s health battles, but that was all you wanted from me.”

“Good?The sex was good?” He laughs like he needs a trip to the psych ward. “The sex wasn’t good. It wasgreat. Blistering. So fucking unreal I can’t get it out of my head.” He jabs two fingers into his temple so furiously I have no idea how his brain doesn’t ooze out of his ears. “Do you have any idea how hard it is to live with that? To act like I didn’t destroy everything I’ve been working toward for the past thirty-five years? You didn’t just fucking destroy me, Zoya. Youruinedme.”

“You had an affair. It isn’t the end of the world. Men cheat. It’s almost second nature, or your family?—”

“I didn’t cheat!” he roars, scaring the living daylights out of me.

I’ve never been subjected to so much anger and pain that I’m lost on how to reply. I would take away his pain if I could. I’d accept it in an instant. But since I feel like that means I would have to give him up permanently, I don’t know if I can do that.

“Andrik—”

“Go home, Zoya!” He pulls away from me with a sneer and peers out the window before proving he has mind reading capabilities. “If you want to help me, go home and pretend we never met, because that may be the only fucking way I willeversurvive this.”

My words wobble when I say, “Mikhail?—”

“Is not your problem. He’smine! He has been mine for years, and I’m not willing to give him up for you. Not now.” His next two words are whispered. “Not ever.”

I keep my reply short with the hope it won’t display my heartache. “Okay.”

I shouldn’t have bothered to hide my disappointment. Even the briskness of my reply can’t conceal my devastation. I’m not solely upset about losing Mikhail. I am shattered by the words I must speak next for the sake of a child I will most likely never meet.

“Goodbye, Andrik.”

Glass smashing sounds out of Mikhail’s apartment as I rush out the door and into the corridor. When multiple jabs of the call button fail to open the elevator doors, I toss open the emergency exit stairwell door and then commence a multiple-floor descent. I don’t give up this time. I need sweat to hide the tears streaming down my face. Otherwise I will break the only promise I’ve ever made to myself.

I’ll never cry over a man who doesn’t want me for me.

“Hey.”

I curse myself to hell when Ano greets me with a grin in the foyer of Nikita’s building. My visit to Chelabini had a dual purpose. I was meant to check in on Mikhail before making a dreaded trip home so I could see if Stasy had kept Aleena’s Polaroid camera as stocked with film as she did mine during my teenage years.

I wanted to back up my claims that Ano is Bayli with physical proof, but I was so upset after my exchange with Andrik, I drove straight home.

I must have gotten a hundred fines because the speedometer barely dipped below a hundred.

“Are you all right?” Ano asks, eyeing me suspiciously. It is understandable. I also gave him the line that I was going home to help Aleena with her wedding. “You’re looking a little frazzled.”

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