Page 126 of Essence of Fear

Kolya glanced up at her, calm and unaffected. “Oh, I don’t gossip. Shut the hole in your face, and let’s get back to the tattooing, Vik.”

“You’re such an asshole.”

“I really am,” Kolya replied, smirking.

• • •

Viktoria paced the length of the living room in the new apartment. Part of her mind continued to drift to Pav, and what Kolya had told her earlier. Another part of her mind kept glaring at the hardwood floor and thinking she needed to go out and buy a rug to make it look less … boring.

The brain was a funny thing.

“Why do you look like a little mouse hiding from the cat?”

Viktoria spun around so fast that the rest of the room was nothing more than a blur. She wasn’t the least bit surprised to see Pav leaning in the entryway of the living room with his arms crossed over his chest like he’d been standing there for a while.

He probably had been.

The man could move without making a sound. If he didn’t want her to know he was around, then she wouldn’t know. It was as simple as that. She had become accustomed to it now, or as much as she ever would be, anyway.

It was his thing.

What could she do?

“A scared mouse?” she asked, arching a brow and giving him a look. She even bared her teeth in a bit of a smirking sneer just for good measure. She was so far from a frightened little mouse now. “Is that really how you see me, Pavel?”

He grinned right back. “See, now you look like the cat waiting for the mouse.”

“Who do you think the mouse is?”

“Is it me?”

“It might be if you keep calling me the mouse.”

His laughter colored up the apartment, and Viktoria relaxed a bit. She knew things were difficult for him sometimes.

He’d spent so much time hidden away from the rest of the world that he didn’t always know what to do … or what he should do, rather. He was still getting accustomed to being free, in a sense.

He was learning the world.

With her.

“You went to see Konstantin today, huh?” she asked.

Pav’s expression melded into calm nothingness. “I did.”

“Why?”

“I work for him, Vik.”

“Is that the only reason?”

Pav shifted on his feet and tipped his head down so that she couldn’t see his eyes. She didn’t like that—all of his truths always shined back in his gaze, and like this, she couldn’t tell if he was trying to hide something from her, or not.

“And what if it wasn’t the only reason I went to speak with him?”

“Care to tell me what or why?” she returned.

Pav chuckled. “You won’t drop this?”