Page 119 of Sinner's Sacrifice

“I understand why you’re confused. I wouldn’t believe me either, and I’ve been living this strange life for a long time.” He kissed her temple. “We’ll take it slow, and when you have a question, ask me. I will answer, always.”

“Okay, how about...what am I going to do once we reach Slovenia? I don’t have a passport.”

“About that, we’re going to have to create a new identity for you.”

“Just like that?”

“We’ve been doing this sort of thing for—”

“A long time,” she finished for him. “Okay. Are we going to a city? How long will we be there?”

“No, we’re going to a property in the countryside. Bazyli owns it. It was pretty rundown when he left a few years ago to go to America, but my aunt renovated and improved it.”

“Your aunt did,” she said slowly. “The one who looks like she’s on the precipice of taking over the world?”

Yvgeny laughed. “Yes.”

“This should be interesting, then.”

He laughed again. “Did you know that wishing someone an interesting time is an old insult in Slovenia?”

“Maybe you should stop talking. Every time you open your mouth, you say something a little bit weirder than before.”

He leaned closer again. “I would love to have my mouth busy doing other things, but we’re in too public a place.”

She sighed. “I still can’t believe that I’m the one you want.”

“Why?”

“I’m plain, Yvgeny. I’ve got a hair-trigger temper, and I’m not discreet at all.”

He tilted her head up so she had to look at him. “You’re not plain and I love that you don’t hide your feelings about anything. I love knowing that if you’re angry, you’ll tell me. If you’re happy, you’ll tell me that. You call me on my bullshit, and that’s very sexy. You trust me with yourself and your friends and your future. After all these years of having no one I can rely on, no one who wants me for me, no one who looks at me like you do...” his voice trailed off and he swallowed hard. “I’m yours,” he finally choked out. “Yours.”

He bent and kissed her. A chaste thing, at first. It wasn’t long before his tongue teased her mouth and he sucked on her bottom lip. “I love you,” he said in between kisses. “You are my world now.”

She began to cry. “If this is a dream, don’t wake me up.”

“This is our lives now,” he said.

She fell asleep in his arms and woke when the plane touched down on the runway. She expected to see a busy airport, but there were only a few buildings, hangars, and people in view.

“How close to Bazyli’s place are we?”

“We’re on the property, actually. This airstrip was put in a couple of years ago. It’s on the edge of some of the land used for growing crops.”

“A private airstrip?”

“My aunt decided we needed one.”

As they spoke, the plane came to a stop inside a hangar. The staff onboard with them seemed excited to be on the ground, and she and Yvgeny were encouraged to move toward the main cabin door.

Yvgeny carried her and refused to let her go or put her in the wheelchair the staff provided until they were on the ground. A small van waited for them and it was only a minute before they were inside and on their way to Bazyli’s house.

Only it wasn’t a simple house. The narrow road was bumpy with cobblestones, and it wound around a hill covered in dense trees. When they finally emerged from the woods, a stone castle loomed above them.

It had two turrets and even a drawbridge. The van drove across the drawbridge and into a courtyard surrounded on three sides by the castle. It looked incredibly old and oddly modern at the same time.

The stone of the building looked like it would take an act of God to move or destroy, yet modern lights glowed in the darker corners, along with wooden and metal finishes that did not show the same age.

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