Page 3 of Ascendent
I will follow you to your room and help you, and then walk you to my limo.An irrational part of Sergey wanted to watch over Sasha like a prisoner, capture him and keep him in the bonds of his love.Stay, stay, stay! We are enough!
“I’ll wait for you in the lobby,” Sergey whispered instead.
If you love somebody, let them go, for if they return, they were always yours.Words of a poet, something he’d read out of a Western book, something new and exciting and thrilling thirty years before as he smoked and drank cheap booze in the arms of his first wife. They’d been so painfully young, navigating the fitful adolescences of their own lives and of their nation. Their marriage and their country’s new birth were the same age.
He’d thought he would have it all, for all time. Happiness and a bright future at the cusp of a new millennium: the new country’s first free presidential elections were held and they’d elected a man the Russian people finally believed in. What could ever go wrong again?
Irina left and didn’t come back.
President Putin was nothing new. In 2000, the Russian people were battered, exhausted, and disappointed in their rulers. Yeltsin’s election the decade before had given everyone hyperinflation, food shortages, and an oligarchy that robbed the nation of her money, her pride, and her future. Hungry for security, for the certainty that the sun would rise again tomorrow, that there would be food on the table, the people had turned as one to the promises made by Putin: Russia would be strong again. Real change was coming.
Faced with the reality of the crumbling baby Russian Federation––a bitterly fractured, poverty-stricken, and weary former superpower, forever looking backward at the glory days––Putin had dug into his own past, to his own fevered remembrances of might and power. In the heady rush of exhilaration for the new millennium and the collective weariness over the collapse of the Soviet Union, no one paid enough attention to the power grabs Putin made, the laws that slowly pushed choice, security, and safety out of reach of the people, and that created a totalitarian, authoritarian regime out of shadow puppets and decrees.
Change ended up looking a lot like the old ways. The KGB was now the FSB, but they still ran the country.
If you love somebody, let them go, for if they return, they were always yours.Did that apply to nations and politics, too? Did a people’s hunger for security equal a love of control, a welcoming of totalitarianism, of the blinders fitting over their eyes?
He didn’t go after Irina.
He’d never chased anyone, except for Sasha. But did Sasha truly want this? What would he freely choose?
Sergey could feel, in his hot Russian blood, the temptation of control. Of grabbing on and holding fast, of never letting go. Of never allowing Sasha the chance to leave.If he can’t escape, he can’t leave.He was the president of Russia. Nothing was outside of his reach.
He kissed Sasha’s nose and dropped his hands. Stepped back.If they don’t return, they never were yours.
Sasha nodded, his head jerking like he was a broken marionette as he took a shaking step and then another, and another. He backed his way out of the ballroom, staring at Sergey the whole time like he couldn’t bear to turn around, couldn’t bear to look away.
And then he was gone.
Sergey drifted to the lobby and perched on a velvet sofa, his fingers playing over the ruby folds, the gold painted arms until he pulled out his phone for distraction. Tweets and news and emails scrolled by in a blur. He saw nothing.
Sasha would return or he would not. And Sergey would have his answer.
It would be easier if Sasha ran now, stabbed him in the heart––again––when he was still guarded and unsure. Hopeful, yes, but he hadn’t put all his chips on black just yet. Being with Sasha still felt like a dream, a dream out of reach. Let it end now, for good. The slow death, the bleeding out of his hope and his love for months would hurt worse than the quick end.
The elevator doors dinged.
He held his breath. Looked up.
Sasha stepped out, clutching a ratty duffel, his fist so white it looked like a ghost’s hand. All the blood had been squeezed out, and his arm trembled, his bag shaking ever so slightly in his grasp. Over his other arm, he held his tux. His eyes were wide. Sergey could see a ring of white wrapping around his perfect cobalt irises.
He rose, joy and relief crashing inside him. Sasha came back. This once, he came back.
He smiled, his grin spreading until his cheeks felt like they were going to tear in two.
Sasha awkwardly held out his tux. “I don’t know what to do with this.”
“Keep it. You will need it again, I’m sure.”
Sasha looked away.
Sergey beckoned Sasha before him, heading for the front doors and his limo waiting outside. His security team stood back, giving him and Sasha a bubble of privacy. Ilya had handpicked them, replacing his former team, who had all died in Sochi, with the best of Ilya’s men from the FSB. They bled the Russian flag and had fought for Sergey’s insurgency, or fought side by side with Ilya. They had been willing to die for Sergey.
Would their loyalty remain so steadfast if they discovered his love for Sasha?
Security agents were closer than the president’s own shadow. They saw all the demons a president tried to hide. They knew where all the bodies were buried, exactly how many skeletons were in a president’s closet. Was it any wonder Jack and Ethan had fallen for each other, living practically inside each other’s lives?
Now he was bringing Sasha into his private existence. His team would see. Wouldknow, if he wasn’t careful. Would he have to hide their love from his own shadows?
