Dmitry's Closet (11 page)

     Dmitry lifted his brow.

     "But I didn't," she assured him.

     He ran his finger down the side of her nude frame and sighed. He was horny again—aching to be inside of her one more time.

     "I'm sure that you could've picked someone.
anyone
better, but I would not have been happy about it," he said, pulling her closer to his large chest.

     She nuzzled into him comfortably.

     "Change of subject." Royal said, abruptly. She looked up into his eyes. "What do the tattoos mean, man?" She had been waiting since he disrobed to get an answer.

     "Well, each of them means something different. Pick one, and I'll tell you."

     "What do the stars mean?"

     Dmitry rubbed his hand across his chest. "It means that I'm apart of very elite organization. In my country, it takes a lot to get these stars across your chest. The ones on my knees mean I kneel before no man."

     "What about a woman?" she snickered suggestively. "You
kneeled
before me."

     "What I do in the bedroom does not count. And if I recall, you kneeled before me as well." His eyes glimmered. He was rock hard again.

     Royal nodded. "Point well taken. What does the Madonna mean?"

     "That I've been a thief since I was child, and the crucifix means that I've mastered the art of thievery."

     Royal smirked. "Dmitry, you don't steal."

     "Oh, I used to. Now, I just take what I want."

     "And the beautiful butterfly?" She traced her finger around the wings.

     "That I can maneuver very easily in many complicated situations."

     "Maneuver? "

     "It's how I got out of prison as young man."

     "I don't even want to know," she said, laughing.

     "Enough about me." Dmitry pulled her up on the pillow and snuggled his head in her breasts. He closed his eyes and sighed. "What about you?"

     "What about me?"

     "Tell me something that no one else knows?"

     "Only if you do."

     "You first."

     "Umm. I keep empty picture frames in my dresser drawers, hoping to put family pictures in them one day."

     "Tell me something important," he said, scoffing at her light response. "There has to be a secret that you keep from everyone, something dark that you don't want anyone in the world to know." Dmitry spoke as if he had many.

     "Okay, okay," she sighed and looked up at the soft linen above her in the canopy swaying under the force of the ceiling fan. Her carefree smile turned into a frown. "Some secrets are meant to be kept though."

     "What could you have done? You're just a girl. I'm sure it couldn't have been too bad."

     "Don't be so sure," she replied solemnly, forgetting to sneer at the
girl
statement.

     "Well, I would hope that if you gave me something as precious as your virginity, you could trust me with a secret—no matter how big it is."

     "It's really awful, actually," she said, wiping her face quickly. "Horrible, in fact."

     "If you tell me that you were born a man or that you were once a whore, then it'll be horrible, because I'll be forced to kill you."

     "Of course, I was born a girl." She laughed a little in between the sudden sorrow. "And the proof my virginity is by the door." She motioned over at the comforter.

     Dmitry looked over at the comforter. "Speaking of which, are you hurting still?" He rubbed face. "I could give you hot bath. It would make the aching go away."

     "No," Royal yawned. "I'm just tired."

     "Well then, back to your secret then."

     Royal hesitated. "I've never told anyone."

     "Then, I should be the one to know. Go on," he said, urging her.

     "Fine. I...shot a man once." She held her breath as the words fell clumsily out of her mouth. It was strange for her to hear, even after years of living with it. She waited for him to say something, anything.

     Dmitry's eyes opened. Shifting his long body a little, he looked up at her. "You'd better explain that one to me," he said in a deep raspy voice. His crystal blue eyes beamed through her, waiting. A small smile crept across his full lips. Could it be that he was amused?

     "When I was fourteen, one of my foster parents' friends used to come over a lot. He was a truck driver, and when he was in town, he would always stay at their house. He was a real...funky looking guy, wiry beard and looked like he never washed. My foster parents would let him sleep in the den on the couch. He'd watch porno while everyone was sleep. He was a real dirt bag.

     "One night when it was really late, while I was gone with some of my friends, he snuck in my sister's room and raped her. She was real quiet, you know. Plus, she was super skinny. It wouldn't have been hard for him to overpower her. She didn't tell anyone—probably thought no one would believe her. Then the signs started to show. You know... more weight, sick all the time, sleeping all the time. I got nosy and suspicious.

     "When she finally confessed to me what was going on, I was... on fire. You see, he would have never gone after me. I was the loud mouth, the bad kid. I would have fought. I always did," she smiled. "So I waited for him and the next time that he was in town, I followed him up to the truck stop and when nightfall came, I snuck into his cabin, seduced him and shot him to death with his own gun. I wanted to stab him; I even brought my own kitchen knife, but the gun was there. In a rage, I just grabbed it, when he had his pants down." She let the tears fall. "I donno. I wish that I could take it back sometimes."

     "Damn," Dmitry sighed. "I didn't know that you had any family." It seemed that the murder was not very exciting to Dmitry. He brushed it off. "What happened to her? Your sister?"

     "She killed herself a day after I killed him. She was pregnant at 12. We were only teenagers—barely that. She didn't know any better. The cops couldn't link me to it, but they did suspect my dead sister. Either way, I felt that I had avenged her."

     "And you did. Sometimes, what we do in this world is right but not legal and other times legal but not right. Plus, you will do anything for family, even when it makes no sense," he reasoned, justifying her actions and secretly his.

     "It doesn't change that sometimes, I feel hollow inside. What I did won't bring her back."

     "But your vengeance probably protected some other poor girl."

     "I miss her. My sister's name was Chloe." She said the name and for the first time felt the reminiscent feeling of family.

     "I am truly sorry for you, Royal. If I could change it, I would. Unfortunately, death is sometimes a part of life—whether it comes fairly or unfairly is often not left for us to decide."

     "You sound like a fortune cookie," she said wryly, trying to cut her emotions off. Royal didn't want to talk anymore about her sister, not tonight during something so important in her life. She tried to move on. "What about you? What's your secret?"

     Dmitry smiled a mischievous smile, one of deceit and enjoyable trickery. "Anatoly is my biological son."

     There was a long silence before Royal replied. She continued rubbing through his hair and looking at the top of the canopy. "I get that. It's his eyes, you know. They're like ice, like yours."

     "You
get
that, huh?" Dmitry expected her to be more shocked.

     "Yep... sure do," Royal said without looking at him.

     "Well, besides the blonde hair, he looks just like his mother. So damned short," he continued.

     "He's not short at all. You're just
too
tall. How old is he, anyway. He looks thirty?"

     "From hard life, I suppose. He's only twenty. He'll be twenty-one this year."

     "You had him early."

     "Yeah. I was on my way out of the country and stopped to see an old girl that I used to mess around with. He showed up in America three years ago. He was looking for work and new start. His mother had told him about me, and he used his last dime to get here."

     "No one knows?"

     "Not a soul. And no one can ever know."

     "Don't worry. Your secret is safe with me."

     "Everything that I tell you is secret, Royal. You can never repeat one word," he said, closing his eyes again.

     Royal bit her lip, thinking about what he was demanding of her. Who would she tell? She didn't know anyone.

     "Just promise to always be as honest with me. I can handle a lot of things, especially considering the things that I've done and where I come from, but I can't stomach a liar," she said sternly. "That's my stipulation to you
before I take you."

     They both smiled.

     "Lying is for people with no authority. I don't lie. I can't say that I'll ever tell you everything, but what I do tell you will be the truth," Dmitry said.

     "So, it doesn't bother you that I killed a man?"

     "No," Dmitry yawned. "You were just protective of what little family that you had, I suppose. I can understand that. Look at where I came from. I'm a gutter rat in nice clothing."

     "No, you're far from that," she said conversely. "You're the best man that I've ever known."

     He laughed. "You don't get out much, my love."

     "One more question, and then I'm going to bed?" Royal continued.

     "What?"

     "What did you mean by making a covenant?"

     "When I was boy, my mother was whore. The only good thing good I had in my entire life was church down the street from our shitty little apartment. The priest was like my father. I learned to play violin there, and he taught me about sacred bonds between man and woman, a marriage of sorts through a woman's virginity. It is covenant between her, the man and God. The hymen is sacred—only to be broken by husband. It's ironclad. What we did is ironclad. No man or woman can take it away."

     "So, I have you forever then?" She asked smiling.

     "Yes... forever."

     "Like we're married without the papers."

     "For now, it is all that I can give you."

     "Wait. Are you saying that you can't marry?" The thought disturbed her. "But I want to get married one day. I don't want to stay single or shacked up my whole life. It's so
incomplete."

     Dmitry could hear the sudden worry in her voice. He didn't want to ruin their night together by explaining all the complications in his life. It was clear that she would not understand.

     "There is no other woman involved, if that's what you mean. It's just not as easy for me as it is for most. We'll save that conversation for another time, when you're sure that you want to marry me in the first place."

     Royal sat back in the bed quietly. She did know.

     "But it doesn't mean that I don't love you. I do... love you." Dmitry pulled her hair from her face and kissed her. "Let me show you how much I love you, now."

∞♥∞

     Nine o'clock had passed, and Royal lay in Dmitry's dress shirt slumbering in the comfort of her bed. She had been permitted to rest only a few hours, because Dmitry, in his cunning manner, had smuggled one more love session out of her, before he rocked her to sleep. She had gone to bed a little frantic of the hour, scared that she would oversleep. But Dmitry had assured her that he would take care of everything.

     The staff arrived just a few minutes before nine and was greeted by Dmitry. When they came in the back of the store, he was sitting behind the credenza reading
The New York Times.
While Royal suffered from wine and sex, he was a veteran of such affairs and had risen early in the morning to shower and have Anatoly run over to his home and bring back a fresh suit and his daily newspapers.

     In the month that both had worked for Dmitry and Royal, neither Renée nor Cory had ever seen Dmitry at the office early in the morning. He sipped on coffee now and talked to Anatoly, who stood listening attentively across the room and sending text messages.

     The two unsuspecting employees walked in chatting and laughing, but they stopped as soon as they saw Dmitry. He looked up from his coffee and set his newspaper down. A large smile came across his face, showing his pearly white teeth and long dimples. His cold, ice eyes were bright this morning.

     "Hello," he said, watching the two slip past him.

     "Hi. Is Royal alright?" Renée asked, setting down her lunch bag in the adjoining kitchenette.

     "She's fine, just resting upstairs. She'll be down soon enough," he said, crossing his hands together. "She said that you two would be here at nine, and here you are. This is good. I'm sure that she's given you a list of things to do."

     "Yeah, she gave us a few things," Renée said, looking at Cory.

     "Well, I'll start to set up everything." Cory excused himself from the small room.

     "I'll help." Renée followed anxiously.

     They both scurried up to the front of the shop and left Dmitry and Anatoly alone, where they resumed their conversation in Russian.

     Renée ran her long nails across the remote and turned the television on, while snickering to Cory. "I told you that they were sleeping together," she said in a half-whisper.

     "We still don't know for sure," Cory said, giving Royal the benefit of the doubt. "She could be sick."

     "Whatever. You saw the same thing that I did last night. You and I both know that a man doesn't look at a woman like he looks at her, unless it's something there."

     "I don't look at women like that at all, Renée. I'm gay, remember?"

     "You know what I mean," Renée said laughing. "Bless her soul, that big man probably wore her out with his fine ass."

     They both snickered again.

∞♥∞

     Royal finally rolled over and realized that not only was Dmitry gone, but the sun was up and the clock said eleven! She jumped up, terribly sore and ran to the bathroom. She was late, really late. She knew that Dmitry had told her that he would take care of everything, but it was her shop, her deal. She never meant to sleep so long. Jumping in the shower, she let the hot water cascade over her body, drench her hair and soothe those aching parts that had been excessively used in the last day.