Page 68 of Hateful Vows
“She was just fine. You saw how she took those men triple her size?” I ask incredulously. If anything I’d have thought that adrenaline and all the stress this life can cause would almost suppress her cycle, but my knowledge of the topic is limited at best. I pick up my phone and add ‘learn more about menstruation’ on my Irina-task-list portion of my notes app.
Aleksei looks at me quizzically. I don’t miss his eyes darting to the elevator; I don’t give him the chance to flee, yet again. If I have a say in it, he’ll even live here permanently, but my plan requires a little more finesse.
My protective instinct rears its head and I invite him to our bedroom. “Let’s see what our girl needs.”
But Irina isn’t in our bedroom. Or in our bathroom. I come back out into the corridor. To my left is the living room Aleksei is now standing in the middle of.
“I was talking to you,Lyosha. Not to the cat.”
“Oh.”
To my right are two doors. One of them open, one of them closed.
Oh, she fucking didn’t.
I barrel through the closed door into the guest bedroom, cat in arms, ready to give my wife a piece of my mind, but what greets me stops me in my tracks. Irina is burrowed under a mountain of blankets despite the summer heat, her head barely visible under the cocoon she’s made for herself.
Percy jumps out of my arms and onto the bed, climbing the blankets and disappearing into a tiny hole where my wife is. “What are you doing here, Perceval?” she asks softly before hugging the creature to her chest and giving him head kisses.
I’ve never seen her like this. Even with her pet, she isn’t so affectionate as to give kisses so freely like this.
“Yeah…” Aleksei simply says behind my shoulder. “You’re gonna need a hot water bottle, maybe a heated blanket just to be safe, and a weighted one. Panty liners, no pads; she hates them. Tampons. Large and Medium. No small ones. Without applicator. And After-Eight.Lotsof After-Eight.”
I grimace. “The granny’s chocolate?”
“Yeah,” Aleksei chuckles softly, sending a delighted shiver down my spine all the way to my groin. “She loves them. She will down an entire pack in an hour when she’s on her period. Let’s go,malysh. We have some shopping to do. And I have the keys to her flat for the fundamentals.”
We left Tino and Ilia to guard the flat and take three bodyguards with us. They look at each other like they would rather eat shit or die but tough luck, my wife needs me and thereis very little I wouldn’t do for her. Including raiding the local supermarket for all the tampons and panty-liners they have.
An hour later, I tentatively enter the space Irina has elected as her safe spot and crouch by the bedside.
I remove a lock of hair out of her face and place it behind her ear, letting my fingers linger on her cheek. She looks so soft like this. But I don’t know if she’s in pain and the anxiety is driving me mad.
“Go away,” she moans with a flare of annoyance and pain.
“I don’t want to,cuore mio. And I come bearing gifts.”
“If it’s not After Eight, I don’t want them.”
“Good thing itisAfter Eight, then. And a hot water bottle.”
Her bright brown eyes open and her suspicion melts away when I present her with the chocolate she loves, and the bottle. She takes them from me, unwrapping a chocolate and putting the entire thing in her mouth in one go.
“You should be in bed,cuore mio.”
“I am in bed.”
“I meantourbed.”
She frowns and averts her gaze. Taking hold of her chin, I bring her attention back to me, urging her without a word to tell me what’s wrong.
“I didn’t want to be a burden,” she whispers and my heart breaks into a million pieces. I kiss her forehead, then her delicate finger where my tattoo has healed.
“You are never a burden,vipera. You can stay here if you want. It’s up to you. But then I will be here, too. Because there won’t be a night I’m married to you that I won’t spend holding you, do you understand?”
She bites her lips but nods. “I think I want to be here. For this time.”
I kiss her lips, the mix of chocolate and mint and something undeniablyher,more pleasant than I thought. I close the door on my way out and meet Aleksei again in the living room.
