Page 7 of Vasily the Hammer

Fuck.

Me.

“Ana,” I whisper.

Chapter 3

Ana

When Sasha toldme Vasily Baranov would be flying in from Los Angeles, I asked him how I knew Vasily. He told me he’s my husband, although there wasn’t a lot of confidence in his voice. I asked if he knew when we got married, and he didn’t know. I asked how well he knew Vasily, thinking it was a loose, professional acquaintance, perhaps even by reputation only, but he said they were childhood friends.

I feel like people usually know when their childhood friends get married, but maybe they don’t. I don’t even know if I have childhood friends.

I have a husband, though.

I asked Sasha if he had a picture of my husband, of Vasily, of Vasily Baranov— and I’m apparently Mrs. Baranov, which doesn’t sound right at all— but he didn’t. He did say, “He’s veryhandsome, though. Please don’t tell him I said that, or I’ll never hear the end of it. Don’t tell Gigi either. He’ll get all self-conscious.”

I smiled then, and the one comfort I’ve had in this whole thing is the fact that the first man who helped me in that shuttle, the one I thought of as the Marlboro Man, is Sasha’s husband, and Sasha grew up with my husband. It feels like fate.

Sasha is blocking the peephole when he knocks late in the night. I don’t think it’s intentional, but I can’t see Vasily Baranov until he can see me.

And he is giant.

Not quite so tall as Sasha, who’s solidly six and a half feet tall but slender. The two of them make a daunting pair, both dressed in dark suits, Sasha sleek and dark-featured while Vasily is broad with pale skin and hair so light I wonder if it’s bleached. His brows are barely brown, though. And his eyes are...

I want to say they’re a blue more vibrant than I’ve ever seen before, but I suppose I’ve seen them many, many times.

“Ana,” he says softly, his voice lighter than I would have imagined from so dense a man. He speaks it on a breath, as though it’s come unbidden from him.

“Is that my name? Sasha said—”

“You never told me her name,” Sasha says, a mild reprimand.

Vasily acknowledges this faux pas with only a terse nod.

Ana.I let it sit in my mind for a few seconds, trying it out. It doesn’t fit. I’ve held onto this hope that once I heard my name,Ana Baranov,everything would start to click. But it doesn’t make any better sense than Barbara or Veronica did.

And he’s no more familiar to me than Sasha or Gio or anyone else.

“A-are you my husband?” I stammer, realizing that I’m still holding the door like a shield over my body. I haven’t allowed him to enter this tiny space as empty of character as I am, but it’s still mine more than anything else in the world is. But then, he hasn’t done anything to enter. He just stands there, his hands in his pockets and his eyes burrowing into me.

There’s another terse nod from him, and I swear those eyes intensify on me.

I can’t look away from him. I feel like he’s pulled the very air from my lungs. I have this strange urge to melt into him, to just slam my weight into him with enough force that he has no choice but to wrap his arms around me and take my burden on, to hold me as I fall apart within him and vanish from the world.

Instead, I sink back into the shadow of my room. I’m tired, and I just want to hide in anything that will hide me, and actually, this room was doing a pretty good job of that. Before the knock on my door, I’d been comfortably curled up in the dark silence of the barren room and the ever-hiss of the central air conditioning.

“Did you . . . bring me clothes?” I whisper.

Vasily and Sasha exchange a glance, and then Vasily tips his head to the side, I guess to look behind the door at my body.

“She’s in scrubs,” Sasha explains. “We thought she’d be fine in those until you got here.”

Another nod, which I feel like has far more weight than most people’s nods, and then Vasily snaps a finger. A slightly smaller but no less intimidating man with short brown hair and a deep scar on his neck steps forward. I have no idea who he is— of course— and his smile looks banal enough, but I dislike him. It’s the first time I’ve felt so strongly and so sure of my feelings. A sick feeling settles in my gut over the fact that this man is clearly a friend or assistantto my husband, who didn’t summon nearly as much of a response from me.

I’d hoped everything would start to come back once I saw my husband, but now I’m starting to question why I was on the opposite side of the country from him to begin with. He didn’t even bring clothing for me.

The corners of my eyes prickle. I wasn’t found with a wedding ring. He has an air of wealth despite having scars comparable to the other men, so I’m guessing my ring was stolen, but I wish I had something of my own. An object. Some sort of an anchor right now to assure me that this is reality.

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