She sighs and looks at me. “The men are furious this happened. It’s my fault. I was the one to tell him to take you.” She shakes her head. “I love it there, and I wanted you to have a lovely memory of Paris.”
Oh, I do. A few lovely memories, and then some truly awful ones too. Life with Konstantin is a constant rollercoaster of ups and downs.
“It’s not your fault,” I say.
There’s movement beyond the curtain, and it’s pulled back again as Konstantin steps into the room with Andrius. When did he get to Paris? How long have I been asleep?
“Why didn’t you shout at me when she woke up?” Konstantin demands angrily of Maya.
“She literally just opened her eyes,” Maya retorts.
“How are you feeling?” Konstantin comes to my side and takes my hand.
I shrug, out of words right now.
“You need surgery,” he says. “But you’re lucky. The knife didn’t get any vital organs. The surgery is more precaution than anything, they say, to clean the wound and prevent infection. Sew it up nice and neat.” He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes.
“Can you give us a moment?” he asks Andrius and Maya.
Andrius nods, and Maya gives me a smile before leaving too.
Konstantin sighs and sits heavily on the small plastic chair by the bed. He opens his mouth, closes it, scrubs a hand over his jaw, and then looks at the wall.
He’s going to end this.
I know it’s the right thing. This knife incident has shown me he’s right. I can’t live in his world. It’s too violent. Too dangerous. This is still going to hurt, though. I brace myself. If I can take being stabbed in the guts, I can take being stabbed in the heart.
“Cassie, I don’t know where to begin.”
Here we go.
“I’ve let you down, but more, I’ve let myself down.”
“It’s okay,” I say. My voice sounds like a dehydrated frog.
“No, it’s not.”
“Yes, it is. And you’re right. I can’t stay with you in this world once this is sorted. It won’t be safe. There’ll be another enemy sooner or later, and more trouble. Once you’ve dealt with the Armenians, I’ll go back to my normal life, and you can be the big bad K again.” My heart is tearing apart, but I push on. “It’s for the best.”
“What?” He stares at me. “No,” he says. “I can’t believe we’re here all over again.”
“Where? In a hospital because your way of life has impacted on me again.”
He flinches. “Well, you’ve made your feelings perfectly clear. I’m feeling pretty stupid since I came in here to tell you I fucking love you. Something I’ve never said to any other woman; other than Yulia, and that was in an entirely different way.”
My breathing becomes erratic at his words, but I shake my head.
“You don’t love me, Konstantin. You’ve spent enough time telling me you don’t love me. You only think you do because you thought I was going to die, and you had a guilty moment.”
“Oh no, sunshine. My come to Jesus moment came before your attack.”
It did? “When?”
“When I saw you looking at the sculptures with such awe, it hit me how much I wanted to show you the world. How much I wanted you with me when I went to Rome or to Moscow. I was thinking all those things and watching you, and it hit me. I’ve been a fucking coward.” He spits the words out. “I knew in that moment, I loved you. And then…” His voice breaks, and he clears his throat and swallows hard. He looks away and when he looks back, I’m shocked to see tears in his eyes.
“Then you bent over, and I saw the blood, and I knew I couldn’t bear to lose you. If you’d have died, I swear Cassie, I’d have ended myself.”
I can’t speak. I don’t know what to say.
“I love you, sunshine-jailbait. I’ll let you go if that’s what you want, and I’ll do that because I love you. It’s not what I want, though.”
He watches me, and his face is vulnerable. It’s an expression I’ve never seen on him before. God, I want to fall into his words and say yes, yes, yes. I can’t, though. I can’t live like this. Always terrified someone is after us, could harm us. I’m terrified that someone might come after my grandparents. Or kill Konstantin, leaving me bereft.