Ekaterina (24 page)

Vadeem looked up and met Pyotr’s gaze. The pastor had his hands folded, elbows on his knees. He leaned forward, earnest. “I am the Resurrection and the Life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies.”

Vadeem glared at him, not needing Pyotr’s religious rhetoric at the moment. He needed reassurance, not platitudes. He struggled for breath in his constricting chest, unable to find a comeback.

“Vadeem, why did you come into the church tonight?”

He winced. “You saw me.”

Pyotr nodded, face expectant.

“I was tricked by a
babushka
.”

“I saw your face.” Pyotr said. “You were listening,”

Vadeem ran a circle around the back of Kat’s hand with his finger. “Yeah, I listened. I’ve heard it before. The resurrection of Lazarus. My parents were believers.”

Pyotr sighed heavily, paused. “What happened, Vadeem? You have the look of a man with secrets.”

Vadeem pushed back the hair from Kat’s face then entwined it in his fingers. She looked so vulnerable, it was all he could do not to gather her in his arms. He’d been fighting that urge for the past two hours, and if Pyotr didn’t leave soon, he’d do it in front of the pastor, not caring what the man of God thought. In Vadeem’s wildest dreams, Kat woke up, nestled in his embrace, touched his face with those beautiful hands of hers, and assured him that she hadn’t tried to ditch him, hadn’t tried to push him out of her life.

No, in his wildest dreams, Kat simply woke up. He’d unsnarl the truth later.

What was she doing out in that road?

“Have you ever heard of Wreckers, Pyotr?” Vadeem said, not looking at him.

“Of course. Enemies of the state. Wreckers.”

“It was a convenient term used to destroy anyone who disagreed.”

“Of course.” Pyotr’s voice was low. “We lived in a dangerous time. No one could trust anyone.”

Vadeem touched his forehead to Kat’s hand, the feel of it cool against his hot skin. “I was a member of the Pioneers, did you know that?”

Pyotr sighed, deep and sad, like he’d heard this story before. “Most people were. The Communists had a way of making a child want to belong.”

Vadeem nodded, afraid of Pyotr’s perception. He couldn’t look at the pastor as he continued. “I wanted to be a Pioneer more than anything when I was eight years old. I joined up, against the wishes, and counsel of my parents.”

“Because they were believers.”

“And they knew the Pioneer party line was atheism and selfishness.”

“Yes. But eight years old is hardly an age of reason, Vadeem.”

Vadeem shook his head. “I believed in the Motherland, in the Pioneers. I believed what they said. I believed in my comrades. I should have known better.”

Pyotr leaned forward, clasping his hands, as if in prayer. “Your faith was just misplaced.”

Vadeem harrumphed, acknowledging the truth of Pyotr’s words. “I’ve learned the hard way that faith is empty. It’s for fools.”

“No, faith is a gift from God. It’s also a choice. You must put it in the right place. In the New Testament book of Second Timothy it says, ‘If we are faithless, God will remain faithful. He can not disown himself.’ There is a friend who sticks closer than a brother, and this friend is Christ, Vadeem. He’ll never betray you.”

Regret tasted like acid in Vadeem’s mouth. He rubbed his thumb over Kat’s limp hand, touching her blue veins through such perfect, translucent skin. His voice came out wretched. “Pyotr, can you leave me alone, please?”

He felt the man’s gaze searing through him. He counted time with his heartbeat.

“I’m not going far, Vadeem. Something in my gut tells me you need that Friend, and I’m going to be out in the hall praying you choose to put your faith in Him.”

Vadeem didn’t look up as the pastor left the room. The door closed with a whoosh, and suddenly all the emotions he’d piled up erupted in a wretched moan. “Kat, why did you run away?” he whispered. Without thinking, he pressed his lips to her forehead. It was cool, and her skin tasted of sweat.

Come back to me Katoosha. Please, Kat, open your eyes. Look at me with those beautiful eyes.
He stared at her face, willing his words to come true, eerily aware of Pyotr’s voice, like a hum, in the hall.

Faith was a choice…either you bought into the veritable helplessness of man and clung to the unseen Source, or you trod your own path. Alone. Vadeem had no doubt exactly what choice he’d made as he heard his mother’s screams and saw his father’s blood seep into the thawing soil. Even if he wanted to turn around, run back, and throw himself at the feet of the Almighty, faith in God—or anyone else for that matter—had dwindled to a drip in his life. If he were to admit that he needed a friend, and frankly, only God knew how desperately he longed for one, God would have to slap down some pretty vivid proof that he wasn’t going to leave him in the lurch again before Vadeem cast his vote in the Almighty’s favor.

Then again, Kat lay there, breathing in and out, prognosis positive. So maybe God might have heard his desperate gasps for help.

But she wasn’t awake yet.

Even if Vadeem did possess the slightest urge to glance back over his shoulder at the God of his father, faith wasn’t going to rush over him like a flood. Not after twenty-plus years of parched soil.

Perhaps, however, the trickle of faith could start with gratefulness. Yes, he could choose to be thankful.

He shadowed his eyes with his hand. “Thank you, God.”

Like the whoosh of oxygen to a dormant fire, his words raked across his heart, and he gasped against the rush of pain consuming his breath, clawing across his chest. His throat began to close as he rasped it out again, “Thank you for saving Kat.”

Tears burned his eyes and he clutched his hand to his head.

Then he wept for the emptiness that roared through his soul.

-

The top of her head felt like it was coming off. Kat groaned as she clawed her way to consciousness. She ached everywhere, feeling like she’d been mauled, then dragged by a car about a mile. What happened? She scrabbled to the last clear moment. Headlights. Her heart pumping through her chest. Sour breath on her face.

Her backpack, her Bible—the picture! Gone.
Oh Lord, no, please.

She was suddenly aware of a thumb moving across the back of her hand. The movement sent a current of warmth through her.

She opened her eyes, blinked in the glare of the room, and heard muffled snuffling, unsteady breathing.

Hand over his eyes, breathing in raggedly, shoulders slightly shaking, Vadeem was. . .crying.

Her breath caught as she stared, horribly, wonderfully mesmerized. This man, who tackled everyone who got near her, who made her feel safe just by being in the room, who’d admitted that he wanted to kiss her and then held himself back, was crying. For her?

If she questioned it before, she didn’t now. FSB Captain Vadeem Spasonov had serious feelings for her. And, as she watched him suffer, she knew she’d never felt this way about a man. Ever. Matthew had never stirred such feelings of anger, or delight. He never made her want to hide inside his embrace, or hold him, desperately, back.

Vadeem’s name stalled on her lips just as he looked up. A tortured look ringed his eyes, and he didn’t even try to hide it, but let his pain pulse between them, spilling out everything. . . Fear. Worry. Love? She found his name in the back of her throat, and whispered it. “Vadeem.”

“Oh, Kat, I thought—” He looked away then, releasing her hand to wipe his face. “Why did you run?”

Kat blinked at him, unable to comprehend the question.

He turned back to her, his eyes now ablaze, something dangerous in them that made her weak. “Don’t you know me well enough by now that I wouldn’t—”

“I was attacked.”

The blood left his face. He opened his mouth to speak but no words emerged. His eyes closed, and in his expression she saw anguish.

It was worse than blaming her for running away.

He blamed himself.

Vadeem opened his eyes, and fury pulsed in them. “Who was it?” he asked tightly.

“I don’t know.” She tunneled back to the bulk in the forest, scraping for identification. It seemed his voice had been familiar. “I don’t know,” she repeated.

He pushed the hair from her face. His gaze gentled, his caress telling her exactly how he felt about what had happened. “I’m sorry.”

She squeezed his hand. “Am I okay?”

“For now.” He leaned his forehead on hers. Stress or weariness had streaked his eyes red, and she felt his breath, so close, so unsteady, as if he was still wrestling with emotions. His smell embraced her, leather and sweat and strength. Almost unconsciously, she reached up and traced the hollow of his neck, where dark hair peaked out from his black shirt. He drew back, his eyes in hers. His gaze traveled to her cheeks, her jaw, her mouth and came back to her face. “Kat.”

Before her common sense could catch up with her, she gripped his shirt and pulled herself up to him, brushing her lips on his, gentle, like a whisper.

He made a sound at the back of his throat, something that made her warm from head to toe, and moved into the kiss, tasting, testing, with a controlled urgency and a devastating gentleness that curled her toes and erased every ache.

“Kat.” He drew back, close enough to touch her, far enough to look in her eyes. “Kat, you kissed me.”

She nodded. “I caught that.” She ran a hand down his face, thick with dark whiskers. “I wasn’t sure I’d see you again.” She saw the echo of her words in his wretched expression. “But God saved me.” Oh, yes, God had saved her. Her racing pulse testified to that fact. She was very alive, and perhaps even falling in love. She ignored a sharp stab of guilt, and clung to the feeling of joy that swept through her. “Think you can get me out of here anytime soon?”

A smile creased his face, and tease came into those blue eyes that held so much mystery. “Promise you’ll kiss me again sometime, maybe when I know I won’t hurt you?”

She felt a blush start at her toes and work its way up. “It didn’t hurt, and. . .maybe.”

He ran a finger tenderly along her jaw line. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there to protect you.” The look of grief in his beautiful eyes made her want to cry.

“It wasn’t your fault, Vadeem I—” she couldn’t tell him she’d seen him outside the church, wrestling with some unseen anger. Her abduction had already stripped him down to his feelings. She couldn’t dig deeper when he looked so raw. Instead, “He wanted Anton’s book.”

Vadeem sat back, disbelief in his blinking eyes.

“That’s not all. He told me he’d killed that monk. That young one we met at the monastery.”

Before her eyes, Vadeem’s face changed, darkened. He swallowed, and the hardness she’d seen on the train from Pskov entered his expression. She tensed, and let go of his hand.

“Yeah. I’m going to get you out of here. You just sit tight.”

Why did she have the feeling his
here
meant farther than the Blagoveshensk hospital?

Chapter 16

“Were you followed?” Dog-tired, Ilyitch turned up the collar on his coat. His eyes burned, and he was achingly aware that someone could be watching him destroy the cover he’d erected for the last decade.

Grazovich gave him a glare. “Hardly.”

Ilyitch had to admit, the glitzy casino, eerily aglow with disco lights and packed with gyrating bodies, seemed perfect for a clandestine face-to-face. A dull haze of cigarette smoke and the odor of too many sweaty bodies had his head swimming. The thought that the general probably had a dozen or so bodyguards on the payroll, watching their backs gave little comfort. Ratting out his comrades in his own backyard never made the beer settle in his stomach.

He slapped the book onto the bar table and slid it across to Grazovich. He had to shout over the din of a Russian rapper. “I’m tired of chasing all over Russia. It’s your turn.”

“This is the journal?” Grazovich’s reached out and fingered the worn book like a gilded Ukrainian egg. It looked newer than Ilyitch supposed, but perhaps Timofea had taken good care of it.

Ilyitch shrugged. Like he’d read it? That was Grazovich’s job. He was the rare art dealer, the one who knew how to dig up Russia’s treasures. Ilyitch ran the money.

“What happened to the girl?”

“She got away.” Ilyitch glared at the General, just daring him to comment.

Grazovich met the look without flinching. “I see.” A bleach blonde wearing less than a simple black dress sashayed up to them and leaned on Grazovich. A sick smile crossed the general’s face as he snaked an arm around her. Ilyitch looked away, preferring the sight of a couple clenched on the dance floor to the general’s gruesome habits.

“Refill?” A barkeep sliced through Ilyitch’s disgust, indicating the spent beer bottle. Ilyitch passed him a ten-ruble note. “A bottle of Smirnoff.” Tonight, he’d celebrate the sweet victory of a job nearly completed. The bartender screwed off the top and handed him the bottle. Ilyitch took a swig right from the bottle, just getting started.