Perfect Opposite (36 page)

Oh, that’s so like him!

“You know, this is my first confession of any kind, so I hope you’ll forgive me if I don’t do it quite right.”

Deciding to ignore him, I took a deep breath and did my best to keep my mouth shut.

“Don’t you have anything to say? I’m surprised. Earlier on it would have taken a pillow in your mouth to shut you up, but OK…”

I bit back the insults h
overing on the tip of my tongue and forced myself to stay silent.

“Firstly, I want to say that I’m sorry
and...” he sighed wearily, “This bathroom door confession’s harder than I expected. I feel kinda stupid, you know.”

I am the stupid one here, I wanted to say, but didn’t.

“Well, I guess I did follow you. I know it sounds weird, but I had to know you were OK. So I tailed you. Not all the time, but sometimes.”

“How did you know where I was?” I asked without thinking.

A muffled huff of amusement came from the other side of the door. He was evidently pleased that he’d urged me to break my silence. Mad with myself, I scraped my knuckles against the paint flaking on the wall.

“It was your necklace. We made a replica with a chip inside, so we could track it. It was safer than any cellphone, I mean
. We knew you never took it off. I switched it with the real one not long after I moved in.”

Well, that explained a lot. It was no longer a mystery
how he’d found me at the concert or that he’d come to my rescue when Khalil’s guy snatched me. It seemed so obvious now.

I reached both hands round to the back of my neck and flicked the clasp on the chain, releasing the
pendant I held so dear. Flipping it over in my palm to look more closely, the inscription and everything else looked the same as it always had. Finding nothing to suggest any kind of tracking technology, I opened the bathroom door a crack and tossed it out.

“Hey, do you have any idea how much one of those costs?”

“I don’t give a fuck about your spy shit. Where’s my necklace?”

“I have it, but if you want it back you’re going to have to come out of that bunker. I’m not going to toss it through the door like you just did.”

“I’m not opening this door.”

“You’re staying inside forever? Well nothing doing then. Guess I’ll
keep it. My bulldog needs a new chain, anyway. Little Dixie sure would like it…”

“Alex. You don’t have a bulldog.”

“OK, I don’t. But if I had one, she’d be a Dixie. It’s a great name.”

“Are you sure you haven’t been shot in the head recently?”

“I’m pretty sure I wasn’t. But maybe I missed that. I don’t keep track so well.”

He was trying to be funny, but his answer didn’t make me smile at all. Memories of him lying motionless on the ground were still fresh in my mind, like it all happened yesterday.

“Alex?”

“Yes?”

“Are you really OK?”

“Well I’m not bad, thanks for asking. Just this floor, it’s so damn hard. Next time I come to chat with you, I’ll have to bring a cushion. I have to point
out, by the way, hospitality’s is not your strong suit.”

“You know what I’m asking.”

“You can’t get rid of me that easy, you know.”

“Then why...” I started, but I didn’t have the courage to finish the question. I realized I was afraid to hear his answer.

“Say it.”

“Why didn’t you come? Why did you let me think you were dead? I don’t understand...“

“Princess... I almost put your father in prison for life. It was only because my boss was so stupid and fucked up big time that didn’t happen. How could I show my face after that?”

I brought my knees up to my chin and hugged myself. He was right. No normal person would want to see him again. In a different reality, it would have made sense to be glad
he’d got what he deserved. For me though, the only thing I could feel at that moment was an overwhelming desire to open the door and jump into his arms.

“
In the end, I decided to leave things as they were. I thought it was for the best for all of us. Nikolai could go on believing his main man had been killed, without needing to know the truth. You could come to terms with the fact that you’d been lied to, taken to bed and made a fool of by someone who got his just deserts in the end, and then, most important of all, you could go on living that normal life you always wanted. And me, well I’d get reassigned, as always. And that should be that. Everyone should be satisfied.”

“
Everyone...” I repeated softly.

“Unfortunately, my perfect plan turned out not to be so perfect after all. The first cracks appeared when I got back to my empty apartment. God knows why, but it seems like I actually got used to you being around. Who would have thought I might have missed your nagging, eh?”

“Oh yeah? Well I’d be surprised if anyone could miss a sullen brute like you!”

“Nobody in their right min
d would, of course.” he agreed, “Does that mean you missed me?”

“
Sure. Every time the bulb went and I had to climb up on a chair to change it.”

“Well, alright. I’m useful sometimes I guess. Mike’s not the practical kind then I take it?"

“Last time he tried to fix the power outlet we almost got blown up.”

“You’re
right, electrics never were his strong suit.”

I heard a rustling sound some seconds later, then a click. Soon the smell of cigarette was wafting through the cracks in the door. I was about to get up and start searching through pockets and drawers to find some of my own stash when the door opened very slightly.

“Mike told me you turned into a heavy smoker. You know how bad for you that is?”

I stared at Alex’s hand, which had appeared behind the slightly open door, a pack of cigarettes gripped loosely between his fingers. After a moment’s hesitation, I reached for it
. Suddenly, Alex let the pack fall and closed his hand around my fingers.

“Hah
! Gotcha!” he cried enthusiastically, bringing his face to the crack to look me in the eye.

“Let go of me!” I hissed, tugging at my hand.

Ignoring my protests, he turned my hand over to study it, his eyes focusing on the wedding ring still on my finger. Before letting me go, a smile seemed to flash on his lips.

“It wouldn’t come off!
” I lied, pushing the door closed and locking it securely this time.

“Sure.”

“You bought one that’d be real tight so I’d have to keep it on, admit it.”

“Whatever you say, sweetheart.
Whatever you say.” he was doing his best to stifle laughter.

I grabbed the pack that was now lying on the bathroom floor, put a cigarette between my lips and lit it, inhaling deeply. His ability to read me like an open book never failed to drive me nuts.

“Princess...”

“What?”

“Open the door.“

“Nope.”

“Gonna kick it down...”

“No, you won’t!
” I yelled. “You animal!”

“There you go. You’re insulting me again.”

“It’s the truth.”

“I’ll try to kick it down in a sophisticated way, if it makes you feel better. But down it’s going to go.”

“I don’t think Mike’s gonna like that.”

“I don’t give a shit whether Mike likes it or not. He should count himself lucky I didn’t strangle him today.”

“You should get some counseling for that temper of yours.”

“I’m not naturally aggressive, you know. It just gets to me when someone wants to take something that’s mine.”

“I don’t remember Mike taking anything of yours.”

“Oh really?
I guess I was being silly then. And there I was convinced that it was my wife locked in his bathroom.”

His comment
left me catching my breath. It was the first time he’d described me that way. Neither of us had ever spoken about how we felt, maybe because we were both afraid, but now he seemed to be telling me something, even if he was being clumsy about it.

Somewhere deep inside me a telltale glimmer of hope flared, and just as quickly as it ignited I felt it
start to burn away my resolve.

Should I dare to believe him? And
do I want to take a chance like that after all he’s done?

I
slowly lifted my head and looked at the doorknob, while my heartbeat resounded through my body, its thudding so loud in my ears so that it seemed it might actually jump out of my chest.

“I’m not a bone, Alex. You can’t just bury me when you’re done and then come back to dig me up when you feel like it.”

“I thought I was doing right by you, Princess. That you’d be better off without me. I didn't think you’d ever want to lay eyes on me again.”

“Well then you thought wrong.
” I whispered and bit down on my lower lip.

“You know, there are plenty of things I wish I’d done differently since we met.”

“I suppose stepping in front of a bullet’s one of them.”

A loud thud came quickly from the other side of the door and the doorknob started to rattle.

“Sasha!” his voice was calm but forceful, “Open the fucking door.”

“No.”

“Open it or I will have to break it off its hinges. This very moment.”

I shuddered at the prospect of the door splitting in two, so I rose to my feet and turned the key to unlock it. In a fraction of a seco
nd it flew open to reveal Alex, standing up straight on the other side, a troubled expression on his face. Taking a single step towards me, he took hold of my arm and looked at me.

“I never want to hear you speak like that again. Ever.” his quiet voice seemed not to match the seriousness on his face. “If there’s one thing I’ll never regret in this life, it’s taking that bullet.”

“Alex...” I sniffed, trying to hold back the tears.

“Shut up!” he gave me a significant look as he cupped my cheeks in his hands. “Even if you don’t want anything more to do with me, I swear that as long as I live nobody’s going to hurt you. Do you understand? If anyone so much as looks at you the wrong way, no matter
who it might be - Mike, that idiot Tyler, any fool associated with your father, they’ll wish they’d never drawn breath. That’s a guarantee.”

Judging by the look of concentration on his face, he meant every word. Spreading the fingers of one of his hands through my cropped hair, he narrowed his eyes, shaking his head faintly.

“And the one who gave you your latest makeover just made it onto my hitlist.”

“I think you did enough to traumatize Jo-Jo last time.”

“Obviously, it wasn’t enough.” he took some strands of my hair between his fingers and screwed up his features, “This is a disaster. Jesus... You look like a bleached Pekingese.”

Suddenly,
I started to laugh, wiping away the tears that had started to moisten my eyes, realizing that I was crying and smiling at the same time, my emotions overflowing. As always, Alex brought out all the mixed up passion in me.

His image rising up through my tears, I focused as well as I could on his features. Even after all the lies, I loved him more than I’d ever thought it possible to love another human being.

He reached around my waist and drew me closer to him, squeezing. Not caring whether I ended up bruised or squashed, I savored the feeling of being so close to him.

“C
ome back home with me, Princess.” in a barely audible voice he whispered in my ear.

“Why?” I asked as quietly as he had.

“I bought new glasses. And plates. There’s nobody there to throw them at me.” he kissed my hair gently.

I started to say something, but he quickly
put his hand over my mouth to silence me. Moving away just a little, he looked me in the eyes and took a deep breath.

“I know that the man who now stands before you is not exactly an image of perfection, but baby, you should know that whatever else he is – he’s totally crazy about you. And if he has to spend just one more day without you, he’ll probably lose that little bit of sense he has left.”

With my eyes shut tight, I grabbed his shirt and pressed my face against his chest. In his own awkward and roundabout way, Alex had just told me - “ I love you.”

“But just so you know - if you
are going back home with me, it’ll have to be with a bag over your head. There’s no way I’m having people see me on the street with you looking like that, they’d all be pointing at your hair and snickering.”

Of course, it wouldn’t be Alex if he didn’t go and ruin everything in the end.

Epilogue : Single Red Tattoo

The blanket flew away from my body, and a moment later a strong hand gripped my ankle as I felt myself being pulled towards the foot of the bed.

“Go away...” without opening my eyes I launched a pillow in his direction
.