It was constant.
She ached in her bones.
The pain wasn’t something anyone else could see because it was invisible and tailored just for her. Like a thousand little papercuts just under the surface of her skin. She didn’t want to feel them, but she didn’t get any choice.
She was a leaf in the wind.
Twisting.
Falling.
Dying.
In the cupboard, just above her head, two bottles of medications taunted her. She didn’t even have to see them to know they were there. Despite being adamant on the fact that she didn’t want to take medications to get this under control, her therapist went ahead and wrote the prescriptions anyway.
Viktoria didn’t know why she decided to fill them when she knew there was no way she was going to take the anti-depressant and Xanax. Still, she’d done it, and now every single time she had another one of these moments—usually a couple of times a day on a good one—she felt like the medications there fucked with her head.
She was reminded that someone was still at her door when another knock echoed throughout the bottom level of her house. She didn’t know who in the hell would be at her door at this time of night, and she had a good mind just to ignore it altogether. It wasn’t like she planned on letting whoever it was come inside.
No way.
Then, she remembered that it could be one of her brothers. Occasionally, Konstantin did make his way by her place to check on her before he went home to his wife. He always tried to act like he was in the neighborhood, but she knew better. And Kolya, well, he didn’t try to pretend anything. He outright told her when Maya would send her husband over to check on Viktoria.
If it was one of her brothers, she would be able to tell by peeking out the window on the other side of the kitchen and looking toward the stoop. She crossed the kitchen to do just that, expecting to see either her brothers, or someone else she wouldn’t bother to go and answer the door for. Instead, she found someone else entirely waiting on her front stoop.
Pavel.
Viktoria blinked.
Surely, she wasn’t seeing what she was seeing.
Right?
She’d had a moment with him earlier at the baby shower—a weak moment, perhaps. It certainly felt like that when after it was done, the only thing her mind could really focus on was all the ways it could have gone bad for her. Although, a part of her was still humming hours later, too, unable to forget the way his warm, calloused hands felt exploring her curves, or the way his mouth tasted as it devoured hers.
Viktoria had too many issues to name.
Sex was a big one.
How could she be both terrified of a man, and also want to fuck him? That didn’t make sense to her. Sure, her therapist had explained that was something that would likely happen once she was ready to be intimate again, but she had laughed that off. At the time, she’d never thought there would be a time when she wanted to jump into bed with a man again.
Except now she did.
Because of him.
Why did it have to scare her, too?
Had that been another man waiting at her front door, Viktoria probably would have turned off all the lights, and headed upstairs where she had a gun hidden under her pillow. Not to mention … all the other weapons she had stashed throughout her house. For whatever reason—likely a few she didn’t want to face—she headed out of the kitchen and down the main hallway to answer the door.
Pavel didn’t look the least bit surprised when Viktoria opened the door just a foot and peeked out to look him right in the face. He also didn’t seem like he was getting ready to leave, either. Like he’d known she was inside, and he wasn’t leaving until she answered.
“What are you doing here?” she asked him.
He shrugged. “In the neighborhood.”
“I don’t believe that for a second.”
To his benefit, Pavel’s neutral expression didn’t change. “Someone dropped me off, actually. I thought …”
“What?”
“That you might like to finish what we started earlier, Viktoria.”
She blinked.
That was forward.
She hadn’t been ready.
“Have you not noticed that I am a complete fucking mess?”
Pavel’s gaze drifted to the side, and he watched the quiet, dark street as he replied, “I’m more concerned with why you feel that way than the fact that you have a few issues.”
She scoffed.
His gaze came back to her.
“What was that for—that noise?”
Viktoria sighed, and shook her head. “A few issues? I am certifiable. I know because my therapist has told me so.”
Pavel didn’t look like that bothered him, and maybe Viktoria liked that a little too much. She wasn’t the only strange and broken person standing at her door. She felt something familiar in this man, like maybe he understood her fractured mind a little too well. It drew her in—it was the same thing that made her curious about him time and time again, even if every single one of her instincts screamed at her to run far, far away.
“Are you going to let me in?” he asked.
“What happens if I say no?”
Pavel’s brow dipped. “Then, I’ll leave.”
“But will you?”
He could lie, she wasn’t stupid. He could tell her whatever she wanted to hear, and that would be the end of it. People lied all the fucking time. The thing was … Pavel just didn’t seem like the type. He was honest to a fault and his intentions always seemed clear to her.
Seemed being the keyword there. A person could change in a blink. Viktoria knew that better than anyone.
“If you tell me to leave tonight, then that’s
