Page 149 of Rise of the Queen

Ivan looked like he’d made a connection. “That’s what she was worried about,” he said. We all looked at him, waiting for an explanation. “The last time Viktor had a ‘moment,’ when she broke down—you were downstairs talking to him. I could feel her worry about Viktor, but then something else came up. I asked her about it. She admitted there was something else, but she didn’t want to talk about it then, so I let it drop. She’s been really happy since, so it slipped my mind.”

“It’s been on her mind for a few weeks now. She feels guilty that you can feel everything she can feel, especially when she falls apart like she did that night. She doesn’t know how to turn it off to spare you from having to feel what she feels. She thinks she’s condemned all of you to constantly be in turmoil with her,” I said.

They were quiet for a few moments, mulling over what I’d just told them. I could actually feel their own inner turmoil, trying to find a way to reassure Sephie that she was wrong.

“I think she’s been living with the emotional turmoil for so long that it almost feels like a burden to her sometimes, especially when she can’t turn it off or struggles to get her emotions under control. She doesn’t realize she’s giving us a gift to be able to feel that along with her,” Stephen said. “Especially for me. I spent so many years just completely numb to feeling anything, just trying to survive. Being able to feel what she feels reminds me I’m alive and that there’s something to live for.”

“Same,” Ivan said.

“I don’t think she realizes that she’s also showing us how to get control of our emotions when she shares what she’s feeling with us,” Andrei said.

“You can feel that too?” I asked.

Andrei nodded his head. Misha agreed with him as well. “It’s gotten clearer more recently. It wasn’t that way in the beginning, but the more connected we are to her, the more it feels like she’s showing us how to control everything. Even when she fell apart that night. It wasn’t overwhelming like she thinks it was. At least not for me. Every time, it feels like she’s showing me how to handle it when it happens to me,” Misha said.

“I’ve tried to tell her all of this before, but I think she’ll believe it if it’s coming from all of you, so make sure you tell her. Shewants you all to be happy and to have what she and I have,” I said.

“She’s still showing us how good it can be when it comes to that too. We all see how special your relationship is. It was painfully obvious how different it was, even in the beginning, when I was with Tori. I couldn’t help but compare. Maybe that wasn’t fair to Tori, but I couldn’t help it,” Andrei said.

“Maybe it wasn’t fair, but you were already at a disadvantage with that hot mess,” Ivan said, which helped lighten the mood. None of us missed having Tori around, especially not after what she’d done.

“But that’s my point though. She’s showing us how much better it is to just wait until the right one shows up. Along with how to stay grounded while feeling as intensely as she does. She thinks she’s burdening us, when in reality, she’s making us all better for when the right ones do show up for us,” Andrei said.

Chapter Forty-Five

Sephie

I slid my arm throughViktor’s as we walked around the pool. I stopped to inspect the rose bushes at the edge of the gardens as we passed, noticing the tiniest of little buds starting to appear. It was a sign of warmer days ahead, which made me quite happy to see.

“I’m going to be counting down the days to when I can stop wearing a coat outside now,” I said, as we continued toward the woods.

Viktor laughed quietly. “You would struggle to live in Russia during the winter,” he said.

“You are not wrong there. I wouldn’t have survived. I would’ve frozen to death. I know it. I was not cut out to be that hardy,” I said.

He squeezed his arm around my hand. “I think you’re more Russian than you give yourself credit for, Sephie. You’ve survived more than most people I know. You’re hardier than you think,” he said, looking down at me. The look of pride on his face was unmistakable. I couldn’t help but grin at him.

We walked in comfortable silence for a while, before my curiosity got the better of me. “How does Ilya like working for Vitaliy?”

A wide smile stretched across his face. “He’s very happy. He gets along well with the other guys, even though they’re much older than he is. Aleksei is catching up his training, which makes them both happy. Ilya is happy to learn more, Aleksei is happy to teach more. Vitaliy is happy to be rid of his little flowers.”

“And once again, we saved the world,” I said wistfully. “So how likely do you think it is that he’ll call the girl from the fundraiser last night?” I asked. I tried to sound innocent, but he knew this was likely going to make an appearance on the whiteboard.

“He’ll call. Ilya struggles to be single. I think it’s the baby in him. I’m not that way. Sasha is not that way. I think Ilya likes having someone to fuss over him,” he said.

“As long as he reciprocates,” I said. “Nobody likes a selfish dude.”

“Oh, he does. I think that was part of the problem with the last girl. The one that almost broke him. He kept giving, thinking it would fix everything. She kept taking,” he said.

“My offer still stands. I’ll happily kick her ass,” I said.

“I don’t think you need to worry about her. You have enough to worry about without fighting Ilya’s battles for him too. He got away from her. That’s what matters.”

I scoffed. “You’re so reasonable. It’s soooo boring,” I said as dramatically as possible, getting a belly laugh out of him.

“I think both Ilya and Sasha would agree with you on that one. I’ve always been the serious one,” he said. We came out of the woods and walked to my favorite spot by the lake.

“I can believe that. You’re the oldest and always have been. Makes sense that you’d naturally fall into the father figure role for everyone. You’re so good at it. You’ve had plenty of practice.Remind me to thank Ilya for being irresponsible when you were kids,” I said, grinning at him.

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