Page 87 of The Fire Beneath the Frost

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The tram rattled along its tracks like an old dog refusing to die, groaning and yawning around every bend.Sunlight filtered in dusty gold through the scratched windows, painting the empty seats in sleepy stripes.Half the city was at their dachas, lounging in hammocks or burning their skin in vegetable gardens.A lucky few were even in Crimea, sunbathing on the Black Sea under the lazy eye of a Party-run sanatorium.

I envied them.Every last blissfully dull one of them.Not for the sea or the sun, but for the simplicity.For the ease with which they moved through life, never once questioning the shape it was handed to them in.They accepted everything.The rules, the stories, the slogans—with empty smiles and arms outstretched.I’d have killed to be that kind of man.A man with a wife at his side and no symphonies storming in his head.A man who didn’t need to lie with every breath he took.

Vera sat beside me, her shoulder brushing mine with every jolt.She was reading a flyer from the Ministry of Forestry about some new conservation push.I turned to her and whispered, “Hey.You think your parents could swing us a week in Crimea?Like a real vacation.Just us.”

She glanced up, one eyebrow raised.

“I mean,” I amended quickly, “I could bring Dimitri and you could… you know.Relax.”

I almost said Mira.The name got as far as the roof of my mouth before I swallowed it back.

Vera didn’t answer right away.Just shrugged.A very Vera shrug—measured, noncommittal, just enough muscle to keep the topic alive without committing to it.

The tram screeched to a stop.We both stood and moved with the trickle of passengers stepping down to the street.The sky had that pale bleached-out look it got when it forgot how to rain.

We joined the quiet stream of workers heading toward the factory gate, a row of gray shapes in gray clothes marching toward the roar of machinery and the scent of wool.

Then I felt a presence behind me.

“Good morning,” Dimitri said softly.

We turned.His hair was still damp from a rushed shower, and his eyes held that sheepish, crooked sort of apology I’d come to recognize like the back of my hand.He looked better than he had at the dacha.Not quite whole, but patched together.At least upright.

Vera gave him a warm smile.So did I, though mine nearly cracked my face.

God, how I wanted to have woken up next to him.With his arm flung across my chest and his weight anchoring me to something real.But instead, we stood there like coworkers.Like strangers.Faking our way through the choreography of morning greetings.

We filed into the factory building, where the air changed—denser now, full of dust and wool and the distant, unholy rhythm of looms that never slept.Vera peeled off toward her office with a parting nod, and I walked with Dimitri toward the lockers.Our boots echoed on the tiled floor in a hollow, offbeat duet.

No one else was in the room.

I opened my locker and leaned in, keeping my voice low.“I missed you last night.”

A pause.Then: “I missed you too.”His grin was quick, flickering.But when it reached his eyes, it hit me like sunlight in a dark room.

Impulsively, I blurted, “Can we hang out after work?”

ChapterTwenty-Six

Dimitri

The bus jolted over a pothole and I gripped the plastic handle tighter, trying not to fall into Petyr.Not because I didn’t want to, but because I was too tired for one of our usual dances.The kind where you lean a little too close and pretend it’s accidental.The kind that leaves you aching for more, even as you pretend you’re content with crumbs.

He sat next to me, smiling faintly, like whatever secret he was keeping tasted sweet on his tongue.I didn’t ask what it was yet.I was still trying to catch my breath from our lost weekend in the country.

When he’d asked me earlier, “Wanna hang out after work?”I said yes before I even thought about it.Of course, I wanted more time with him.But I’d known what that probably meant.A dark alley behind some gray-bricked building.An hour at Sanctuary, if we could sneak in unnoticed and find a private corner.And then the quiet unraveling afterward.When Petyr’s touch faded and the cold came rushing back in, and I’d walk home with guilt riding my shoulders like a soldier’s pack.

But I couldn’t say no.Not to him.

Night had fallen while we were still riding.Amber lights and shadows smudged the city outside the bus windows.People bustled past in coats too light for the lingering chill, heading nowhere fast.

I finally asked, “Where are we going?”

Petyr turned toward me, grin already blooming.“Somewhere different.You’ll see.”

That was his favorite kind of answer, something that made me both nervous and excited.The bus hissed to a stop, and we got off.I followed him through a narrow stretch of backstreets, past shuttered kiosks and peeling propaganda posters.His gait was loose, light.I wished I could walk through life like Petyr, like I wasn’t about to be swallowed by it.

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