In the Beginning (Volkov Bratva #1)(47)

Mishca took Amber’s place in the doorway, his expression unreadable as he watched her. His hair was pushed back out of his face, the unruly strands slightly damp from the falling snow outside. He stood quite stiffly, hands tucked into the pockets of his black coat.

“I was worried,” he said after some time. “I wanted to make sure you were okay.”

Lauren pushed up into a sitting position, still holding the picture frame. “I’m fine.” The lie she had told since she fully grasped what this day signified slipped from her lips with ease.

He nodded, but didn’t look convinced. “Are you really?”

She met his gaze, a battle of wills ensuing. He didn’t say anything more, wasn’t pleading for her to answer if she wasn’t ready, and she appreciated that. But what he didn’t say in words, his body spoke in volumes. No, he wouldn’t force her to answer, but he wasn’t leaving until she talked to him.

But what could she say when their thoughts were in turmoil? “I’ll be fine in the morning.”

A muscle ticked in his jaw, but it wasn’t in anger. “Do you want me to leave then?”

Lauren watched him. Mishca watched her. She made up her mind before he could take a step back.

“No, I want you to stay.”

Stepping further into the room, he shut the door, shrugging out of his coat, laying it across the back of the chair at her desk. Shifting over, she gave him space to sit, checking to make sure there wasn’t any used tissue still on the bed.

He toed off his boots, climbing onto the bed and sliding backwards until his back was against the headboard. Then, he opened his arms.

She smiled, feeling the tears well in her eyes. In this moment, she wouldn’t trade him for anyone in the world. How could she turn down what he was offering? She curled into his side, resting her head on his shoulder, his arms coming around her.

She could feel the coldness of his hands through her sweatshirt, but the rest of him was surprisingly warm. She listened to the steady cadence of his heart, letting the silence stretch between them. But he seemed to notice the change in her as his hands swept up and down her back, the tears slowly falling.

It was the comfort, that was her undoing. She had kept this, all of the hurt, the anger, the frustration, bottled up inside, too afraid to truly confront it all. Mishca didn’t complain as she held him tight, his shirt soon growing soaked with tears.

His phone rang insistently, but he merely pulled it out of his pocket and turned it off. After some time, Lauren was sure that her sobbing had subsided enough that if she tried to talk, she would sound reasonably understandable.

This wasn’t a conversation she had looked forward to having, not wanting to see that pitying look cloud his eyes. It was inevitable, and Lauren could understand how it made people turn to that, but there was a difference between empathy and pity. It was the pity that she hated to see.

Inhaling and exhaling for strength, she held up the frame she still held tightly in her hands, showing him the photograph inside. It was an old polaroid, one of the last pictures she had ever taken—to her knowledge—with her father. They were on the beach, her sitting on his shoulders. She was holding a bucket full of seashells up in the air triumphantly, grinning while missing both of her front teeth. He was smiling as well, sandy brown hair in disarray, gold eyes that she had inherited staring back at her. They looked so happy, so free.

“My father. He di—” she swallowed the lump in her throat, stumbling over the word. “—died when I was little.”

Mishca’s hand briefly stilled on her back and he seemed to grow tense beneath her as he tilted the frame back to get a closer view. He might have been shocked by her proclamation.

“I’m sorry.” And he truly sounded it, unlike the familiar faces in Michigan who cringed whenever they saw her, thinking that she wanted them to apologize every time she saw them.

She nodded against his chest. “Today’s the anniversary.”

He sighed, resting his chin on top of her head, murmuring soft words in Russian. This wasn’t how she pictured telling him. She knew the topic would come up eventually, had already planned what she was going to say—recycling her conversation with Amber—but the difference was now it was all coming out instead of her tiptoeing over the subject.

“They said it was a robbery gone wrong or something. The men that did it were never caught, but there was never much evidence anyway.”

Despite Ross’ promises to find the guy that did it, over the years, leads dried up, and they were left with nothing more than speculation. There were times when Lauren went screaming down to the precinct, demanding answers, shouting at anyone in sight to do something, anything to catch the bad guys, but there was nothing more for them to do. One of the detectives would always call Ross and he would take her home, comforting her as best he could as she cried in his passenger seat.

After a while, Lauren felt guilty. Since her father had died when she was five, if there hadn’t been a new suspect in the following eleven years, there wasn’t much see for Ross to do. He continued to work tirelessly, though, all hours of the night, wanting to give her answers because he felt like she deserved them. She had finally asked him to stop when he began spending more time in the precinct looking over the files instead of enjoying his off days at home.

“I was only five at the time and don’t remember much of anything.” She stared down at a button down the front of his shirt. She didn’t remember the night or the time before it.