A wet, drizzly snow was falling from an overcast sky as I stood on Dmitri’s front porch. My canvas tennis shoes had gotten soaked as I walked from my house to his, and now I was shivering, both from the chill and from my own nervousness over what I was about to do.
Shari had been right. After reading those letters, there was no question that Jimmy Novak was running from the law, and the photos left little doubt in my mind that Jimmy Novak and Dmitri Krushnic were one and the same. I knew with certainty that taking the letters to my father would be the right thing to do, but I just couldn’t. Dmitri was his friend, too, and my father would be shocked and embarrassed, and he’d feel betrayed. I couldn’t let that happen, so Shari and I had agreed that I’d talk to Dmitri. Jimmy. And hear his side before taking any further steps.
My hand shook as I lifted it in front of his cheery red door. His house was small. Instead of one of the Victorian cottages, he lived in an area of the island called Southville, where the woods were thick, and the homes looked more like log cabins. I could hear him whistling inside, and I thought about turning around and going back home. I didn’t want to know the details of his life before he came here. I didn’t want to know if he was a criminal. That wasn’t the man I knew. Then again, it seemed maybe I didn’t really know him at all.
I swallowed down my anxiousness and rapped on the door with one knuckle. The whistling stopped, and seconds later the door opened. No beekeeping hat. I guess he didn’t wear it at home. His hair was loose, and he was wearing cargo pants and a dark green shirt with a mosquito embroidered on it. Underneath the bug were the words BITE ME. Typical Dmitri.
“Brooke? Hello. Come in. What are you doing out in this dismal weather?”
I gave him a wan smile and stepped inside onto a well-worn rug. A few dozen jars of honey sat on his counter, with some labels next to them, and a small television sitting on a tiny entertainment center was turned to the home and garden channel. I’d been here before, lots of times, but had never paid much attention to the décor. Surely a jewel thief would have expensive tastes, but as I surveyed the room with a critical eye, nothing I saw looked remotely expensive. The couch was beat-up leather and had a hollow in one cushion where he must normally sit. The artwork, if I could even call it that, was faded prints of ducks and moose and snowcapped mountains. His watch was an old Timex, and his boots were standard issue. The same kind just about every other guy on the island wore. If he was rich, he sure knew how not to flaunt it.
“Hi, Dmitri,” I said as I peeled off my wet wool coat. He took it from me and hung it on a hook near the door. I had a canvas bag with me, too, with the letters inside, and fortunately I’d had the forethought to put them inside a plastic bag. That’s all I needed: to present Dmitri with a bunch of wet, smeared letters that he couldn’t read and some ruined photographs.
“Sorry to drop in on you unannounced, but I’ve got something pretty heavy on my mind, and I was hoping you had time for a chat.”
He nodded at me knowingly and patted my shoulder. “Is this about the kid?”
“The kid?” I gasped. Had Shari told him?
“Yeah, the bartender. Leo. Is he not behaving himself?”
Oh. The stress of this made me giggle, then giggle some more. If I didn’t get control of myself, I’d be hysterical in a second.
“No, Dmitri, this isn’t about Leo. It’s about . . . something else. Can we sit down?”
“Sure. I just made some coffee. You want some?”
“Coffee would be great.”
We sat down a few minutes later, each with a hot mug. I took a sip then set mine on the pine coffee table.
“Okay, let’s have it. What’s on your mind?” he said, stretching out his legs. He looked so casual and comfortable. Dmitri was like home to me, and I was about to take everything and throw it into an emotional blender.
“You know I consider you one of my closest friends, right?”
“Sure.”
“And I’d never do anything that might hurt you or get you into trouble.”
A frown creased his forehead. “Is this about the pie I took from Gigi’s house after Thanksgiving? I know I should’ve asked her, but she was knee-deep in a conversation with Gus, and I knew she’d tell me I could have it.”
“No, Dmitri, this is not about you stealing a pie.” I sighed. “It’s about you stealing . . . jewelry.”
His face turned white and then just as quickly flushed pink. He half coughed, half laughed. “Jewelry? I’m not much of a jewelry wearer, honey. I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”
“Are you Jimmy Novak?”
He seemed to grip his cup more tightly even while his gaze remained steady. I knew him well enough to know I’d struck a nerve.
“Who is Jimmy Novak?” he said.
I’d kind of hoped he’d spill the beans right off the bat. It hurt to have him staring right at me while being deceitful. I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, but the letters were too convincing.
“Jimmy Novak used to be in a relationship with a woman named Alice Williams, and in 1988, Alice Williams had a baby girl who she named Amelia, after Jimmy’s mother.”
The color in his cheeks drained away again, and the cup in his hands wobbled, splashing coffee on the table as he sat forward to set it down. He rubbed both hands over his knees as he stared down at the floor for a minute. Then he looked back up at me.
“Where would you hear such a thing?” The pain in his voice shot straight through my heart.
“Alice wrote you letters,” I said softly, and pulled the banded stack of envelopes from my bag. “Shari and I are the only two people on the island who know about these. We haven’t told anyone, and I want to give them to you, but first, please tell me the truth. Who are you, and what did you do?”
He stared at the letters like a desert wanderer desperate for a glass of cool water. Longingly, and with disbelief. Maybe it was cruel of me to make him wait, but if I was to keep his secret, if I was to become complicit in his deception, then I had to know exactly what he’d done.
“I’m going to need something stronger than coffee,” he said after a pause. He stood up slowly, as if all his bones suddenly ached, and he walked into the kitchen to pull a dusty bottle of whiskey from a tall cupboard. “You want some?” he asked. It was only about two o’clock in the afternoon, but he was right. This conversation called for something other than coffee.
“Sure, but put some water in mine. I’m not much of a whiskey drinker.” Judging from the dust on the bottle, neither was he. He got a couple of glasses, added some ice, then filled his glass nearly to the brim. Mine had a healthy shot, too, but he topped it off from the faucet. I watched him as he moved, wondering what could possibly be going on inside his head. I hoped he’d tell me.
He came back to the sofa and handed me my glass, then he sat in his chair, fast and clumsily, as if all the strength had suddenly left his legs. His head turned as he gazed out the window. Then he started talking, slowly, carefully, as if pulling fragile old keepsakes out of a box.
“I guess I ought to start at the beginning.”
I leaned forward, breathless.
“Remember how I told you I’d grown up dirt-poor in a rough part of Philadelphia?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that part was true enough. All the stuff I’ve shared about my childhood was true, and my mother did pass away when I was twenty. My sister took off with a boyfriend, and my stepfather was only interested in his two best pals, Jack Daniel’s and Johnnie Walker. He didn’t much care what happened to me. I guess I didn’t care that much, either.”
He took a slow sip from his glass, his hand still not entirely steady.
“So, when my buddy Mick suggested we head down to Florida, maybe hit Daytona Beach, get a tan, it sounded pretty good to me. At the time, we had about sixty bucks between the two of us, and no hotel reservations, but we just figured we’d drive down there, sleep on the beach or in the car.” He got lost in a memory for a second before coming back to me.
“For some reason, not sure why, we ended up going all the way to Miami, and after a few days we found a beach full of kids our age willing to share their weed and their beer. That’s about as elaborate as our plan was. Then I spotted Alice Williams. She was a beautiful girl. The love of my life, honestly. Honey-colored hair, big blue eyes, and the tiniest bikini I’d ever seen.” He offered up a wistful smile, but it wasn’t for me. It was for Alice.
I took a sip of the drink and let him continue, thoroughly fascinated.
“There was a bonfire that night, and she sat next to me. Somebody had a guitar, so we all sang. She had the voice of an angel, and she could kiss like—”
He stopped mid-thought and looked at me as if suddenly remembering I was there. His cheeks turned red. “Well, you get the idea. She was my dream girl, and so far out of my league, but she seemed smitten with me. We spent that night together, and I told Mick I was never going back to Philadelphia. He was fine with that. He didn’t want to go home, either.”
The wind whistled outside the windows of Dmitri’s cozy house. Anyone seeing us would think we were just enjoying a drink on a lazy afternoon, but inside, it was so much more than that. Dmitri was rewriting everything I knew about him.
“Alice was in college at the time, but she lived at home. We kept seeing each other, which her parents were not happy about.” He took a gulp of his drink and looked over at me. “They were rich. Not outrageously rich, but certainly well-off, and I was a bum. A moocher. All her father’s instincts about me were completely accurate. He should have stopped her from seeing me, but you know how it is. She and I were determined to be together, and I think he figured if he could just wait it out, Alice would realize I wasn’t good enough for her and dump me. That was my motivator. I was determined to make as much money as I could, as fast as possible, to prove I could take care of us, but I had no college education. I worked as a busboy and a cook. Not much money in that. Sometimes I’d wait tables, but there wasn’t much cash in that, either.”
“Where did you live?” I asked. “In your car?”
He shook his head. “No, Mick and I found a couple of guys looking for roommates. The place was a dump. We didn’t care, though. We’d swipe leftover food from people’s plates from whatever restaurant we were working at. We’d shower at the outdoor beaches because our bathroom was so small. It’s surprising what you can put up with when you don’t have many options. And I was willing to do all that so I could save as much money as possible. Then one night, Alice tells me she has an idea. She wants to stage a robbery at her parents’ house.”
He looked at me as if to gauge my reaction. I’m sure I looked surprised, because that’s not at all the direction I thought his story was going. Actually, I have no idea what direction I thought his story was going, but all the photos of Alice, and her tearstained letters, made her seem so sweet and innocent. Was she the mastermind behind his life of crime?
“She wanted to rob her own parents?”
He nodded, and a big sigh escaped. He took a hearty swig from his glass, and the ice clinked.
“Naturally, I thought it was a crazy fool idea, but I went along just for the adventure of it. She always wanted to do crazy shit like that. I think her parents were so strict, she just wanted to act out. I didn’t realize that at the time. Needless to say, I’ve had lots of time to reflect on the chain of events. Anyway, a few nights later, when Alice’s folks were gone, she packed up a bunch of her mother’s jewelry, her dad’s cuff links, some sterling-silver candlesticks—all sorts of random things. I stood outside and smashed through a window so it looked like somebody had broken in, and we knocked some things over inside the house, left some drawers open. Then we took all that stuff to a pawnshop for cash.”
“And her parents didn’t realize it was you two?” That seemed kind of shitty, but I guess him being a burglar was going to have some shitty elements to it.
He shook his head and looked remorseful. “They didn’t have a clue, and why would they? I mean, they sure wouldn’t have suspected it of her, and even though her dad didn’t like me, I don’t think he ever thought that I’d pull something so incredibly stupid. Somehow, Alice and I were able to justify it to ourselves. Her father was kind of an asshole, and her mother liked to complain and criticize. What we did wasn’t okay, but at the time, we thought it was kind of a joke.”
“Nope.”
“Okay, so if you didn’t get caught, what happened next?”
“Ah, you see, that’s the rub. It was supposed to be a one-and-done kind of thing. Steal a few baubles and trinkets. Just enough to have money for beer and maybe go out to dinner. But we discovered there’s a rush to stealing something. It was exciting. We felt superhuman. It’s like gambling. Like an addiction. We had fun that night, and we didn’t get caught, so, like the dumbass kids we were, we decided to try it again.”
“You robbed her parents twice?”
Dmitri chuckled. “No, we weren’t that stupid. Just stupid enough to rob her friends’ parents. Alice knew garage codes and where people kept their keys. She knew people’s schedules and whether or not they had a dog or an alarm. She was wickedly good at it. By this time, all her friends had met me, and I was accepted into the group. I had a whole backstory about how I’d ended up in Miami and painted my background as a little more well-to-do. Most of her friends didn’t even know where I lived, and no one thought to question me, because why would they?”
As captivating as his story was, I was bothered by it. This was sweet, thoughtful Dmitri talking. A man I’d trusted all my life. A man who came to the island school and talked to the kids about different kinds of geological formations, about how lightning happens, and how butterflies form a chrysalis. He could have just as easily been explaining to them how to pick a lock or outmaneuver an alarm system. It was so incongruous to what I’d always known about him. Well, not known, I guess. It was different from what I’d believed about him.
He continued with his tale, and I continued to listen. Like watching a car crash in slow motion. I had to stay and see what happened next.
“Mick started working with us, and we’d usually hit houses that I’d been inside of. Alice and I would go to a party or hang out with some friends. One of us would make sure to unlatch a window or unlock a service door. We’d wait a few days, and make sure that one of us could be an alibi for the other two. I have to say, despite it being illegal, we really did have an impressive system worked out.”
“I’m having trouble wrapping my head around this, Dmitri. I just can’t believe you did any of this stuff. I feel bad if I borrow something and forget to return it, so how is it that the guilt didn’t eat you up inside?” I sounded judgmental, and there was just no way to avoid it.
“I should have felt guilty, I agree. All I can say in my defense—which really is no defense at all—is that we did it as kind of a lark. We were taking things from people who could well afford to replace whatever was stolen. We convinced ourselves that we weren’t hurting anyone. Looking back now, though, I realize how wrong we were. We took more than things. We took away people’s sense of security, and that’s not okay. If I had my life to do over again, I wouldn’t have done it. At least, I’d like to think that.”
I’d like to think that, too. “I’m pretty curious, then, if it was all going so well, how did you end up here under an assumed name? In the letters, Alice mentions Mick going to prison.”
Dmitri blanched at that, and despite the irony, I felt bad for saying it so casually. Mick had been his friend. He paused for a minute before answering.
“Like most aspiring criminals, we got a little bolder with each successful score. We got comfortable and we got impatient, and those are two things that prove to be the downfall of many a crook.”
I thought about downing the rest of my drink and asking for another because I suspected his story was about to get more complicated.
“We’d been playing at burglary for about a year. The rush was still there, but we’d run through just about everyone that Alice could get us access to. Then Mick suggested we all get jobs at this upscale hotel. Miami was a pretty happening place during that time, and lots of celebrities would come and stay. He figured if we could work in maintenance or housekeeping or security, we could take advantage of our clearance to roam around the hotel. And we did. In fact, he got a job in security, I worked in maintenance, and Alice got a job as a housekeeper. She told her parents she was working at the college library. We made some decent scores over the first couple of weeks, worked out some kinks in our system, but then we came up against an opportunity we just couldn’t resist. Have you ever heard of Marian Singer Wellington?”
“No.”
“She is an heiress. Her grandfather was a lumber baron, and her father invented something huge, like the disposable cigarette lighter or VCR players or something. I can’t remember exactly, but whatever it was, it made them rich as hell. She was coming to stay at our hotel for some highbrow charity event, and the temptation was just too much. We started working on a plan. Mick was in security, remember, so he adjusted the cameras in the hallway away from her penthouse suite door. Then he made sure he was working that night, just to keep an eye on things. The plan was that I’d use a housekeeping key to get in the room, stash as much stuff in my toolbox as possible, then stroll away. In and out. Alice had to sit this one out because she was with her parents at the country club, and I was glad. I didn’t want anyone to see her at the hotel. This was before cell phones, so Mick had arranged for me to borrow a radio from security so he could keep me up to date in case anyone was in the hall. I didn’t need it. Everything went off without a hitch. It was seamless.”
“So, what happened?”
“Mrs. Singer Wellington called security the next morning when she realized her jewelry was missing, and because of the extraordinary dollar value, the head of security called the Miami police. The first thing the police did was look at the security footage from the hallway.”
“And they saw you?” My heart fell on his behalf. Even though I shouldn’t be rooting for Jimmy Novak the common criminal, I couldn’t help but feel something for my friend Dmitri.
“No, I was in the clear. They didn’t see me because I wasn’t on the tape, but Mick wasn’t always the sharpest tool in the shed. When he repositioned the cameras right outside her door, he put his damn face right up to them. He was on the surveillance tape. The cops could see him as clear as day.”
I pressed a palm to my cheek and actually felt sorry for the guy. The poor, dumb guy. I shouldn’t because he was a burglar, but so was my dear friend Dmitri, apparently.
“They accused him of taking one of the security radios, so they figured he had an accomplice. I didn’t know if he’d keep our names out of it. He and I had agreed beforehand that we’d never rat on each other, and that we’d definitely keep Alice’s name out of everything, but we also never figured we’d get caught. So Alice and I were scrambling. We didn’t dare take the stuff to the fence we’d formed a relationship with, because the robbery was all over the news, and then Mick’s face was all over the news, too. Only a handful of people knew that Mick and I were friends, but all it would take was one tip and we’d be arrested, so Alice and I took off. She dyed her hair brown, I bleached mine blond. Not a good look for me, in case you were wondering.”
I caught myself smiling. “I’m going to need a splash more of that whiskey.”
“Sure.” He freshened our drinks and was back in just a few minutes. “Where was I? Oh yeah. Alice and I were on the run, even though we had no idea if anyone was looking for us. Because we had all the stolen loot with us and we were terrified about being stopped and having the car searched, we did the most logical thing.”
“Hid the loot?”
“Sort of. We wrapped it in a towel and then rolled it into a ball and stuffed it under Alice’s dress. We figured that way, if we did get stopped, they’d think she was pregnant.”
His eyes lost some of their gleam, and his voice went soft. “Sounds like she was. She didn’t tell me.”
“She tried to. It’s all in the letters, and you haven’t yet told me how you ended up here.”
“We drove north without much of a destination in mind. Then Alice suggested Wenniway Island. She’d heard about it from some Michigan snowbirds who lived at her grandparents’ retirement village. Seemed like as good a place as any. Then my name got linked to the crime. Mick had turned me in. I don’t really blame him. I might have done the same. And at least he never mentioned Alice. For that I will always be grateful to him. After just a few days on the road, she was done. She missed her parents, and the fear of getting caught had ruined all the fun for her. We were terribly naive.”
We sat for a moment, he lost in memory, me still trying to reconcile this story with the man I knew.
“What happened next?” I finally asked.
“I recall having a huge argument. She thought I should go stay on the island, and she’d take a bus back home. I wasn’t about to let her do that alone, so I drove her myself. That drive was miserable because we were so certain we’d get caught. And she was just as afraid of facing her parents as she was of facing the police. Even if they never realized she’d been involved in any burglaries, she’d still run away with me, an accused criminal on the lam. When we got to her house, her dad hauled me out of the car and punched me right in the face. He told me to never step foot near her again. I don’t blame him, either. If I had a daughter . . .”
He paused and I saw tears glistening in his eyes. He blinked them back and said, “Well, any father would have a right to beat the shit out of a kid who put his daughter in that kind of situation. I actually can’t believe he didn’t try to keep me there and call the police, but I think he was just so relieved to have Alice back. I took off like a coward, ditched my car, and stole another one. I’d never stolen a car before, but then again, I’d never been running from the law before, either. I guess I panicked. Looking back now, I realize the smartest thing to do would have been to just give back the jewelry, do my time, and start my life over, but I wasn’t thinking rationally. All I was thinking about was getting away.”
He got the lost look again.
“And a few days after that, I showed up here. By myself. I tried repeatedly to get in touch with Alice, but there were no cell phones in those days. I called their house about fifty times, but her father finally said if I called again, he’d make Alice confess to the police where I was hiding. Not sure if he was serious, but I couldn’t take that risk.”
“How did you come up with a new identity?”
“I figured if the police ever came here, they’d be looking for a Philly kid named Jimmy Novak, so taking a foreign-sounding name would throw off suspicion. I waited about a year and finally went to the secretary of state over in Manitou and managed to get a state ID. Not sure I’d be able to pull that off now, but record keeping was a little easier to manipulate back then.”
A sheepish expression passed over his face. “Did you ever wonder why I was such a gossip? Always telling stories about other people? It was just to keep people talking about other people, and not talking about me. I made up stories about anyone new to the island so they’d look suspicious. Hell, I made up that story about the housekeeper at the Imperial Hotel finding a bag of lockpicks and identification badges. Sorry about that.”
“You made that up?”
“Yes. I mean, I have slept with a few housekeepers at the Imperial, but the part about the bag of lockpicks was an embellishment. That’s also why I wear the hat.”
“The beekeeping hat?”
“Yes. I started wearing it ages ago so I couldn’t get caught in some tourist’s photograph. Probably a little paranoid of me. Now it’s just a habit.”
“You are making my head explode right now.” I should be angry, probably. Maybe insulted that he’d lied to me, to everyone, for all these years, but I was just drained, and fascinated. I was trying to sort through all the things I knew were true and figure out which things were false.
“The private detective from Florida said he’d talked to one of your associates who’d seen you within the last year or so. How is that possible?”
“I’ve mentioned my sister who lives in Pensacola, right?”
“Yes, a few times.”
“Well, when I go down to visit her, I’ll occasionally stop by to see my old friend at the pawnshop, too. The first time I went back to Florida, I’d been living up here for a couple of years. I thought alarms would go off as soon as I crossed the state line, but nothing happened. I went to the pawnshop, then I drove by Alice’s parents’ house. No sign of her. I stalked their house for a few days, and finally she showed up, with a guy and a couple of kids. She looked good. She looked happy. I couldn’t ruin that, so I just drove away.”
“I’m so sorry, Dmi . . . Jimmy?”
He shook his head. “Please call me Dmitri. I haven’t been Jimmy Novak in what seems a lifetime.”
“You’ve lived here for so long carrying these secrets around. Does anyone know? Does my father know?”
“No one knows, except you and Shari now. There were times I so badly wanted to confide in someone. The community here has been so good to me. Your family has been so good to me. I grew to love my life here, and I just couldn’t risk revealing my secret. The statute of limitations has run out on those crimes. I could go back to Florida and shout my name from the rooftops and there’d be nothing the cops could do about it, but what purpose would that serve? That was another life, and I was another person. A person I’m not at all proud of, but Dmitri is an honest, law-abiding citizen. Well, except when I go to Florida and fence stolen goods. I suppose that’s still criminal. A technicality, I’d say.”
“You still do that?” My heart fell a little.
“Only when it’s absolutely necessary. I make enough money to get by on around here, but every now and then I need a bit of cash. The jewels I have left are my retirement fund.”
“So you just have, what, diamond necklaces lying around someplace? In a nightstand or something?”
He chuckled. “No, in the base of my bee houses. Ingenious, yes?”
“I suppose, but if the statute of limitations has run out, why would a private detective be looking for you?”
Dmitri heaved a big sigh. “Because I don’t think he’s a private detective. I think it’s Mick.”
“Mick, your partner?”
“Yeah. He got sentenced to three years for the burglary at the hotel, but after his release, he tried to rob somebody else, and this time he had a gun, so it was straight back to prison for him. I think he may have just gotten released again, and he may think I owe him some jewels or compensation. If it’s not Mick, then I have no idea who it is.”
“Well, we have to make sure he doesn’t find you!” My concerns were all twisted around. I wanted him to come clean, and yet I wanted to protect him, too.
“Honestly, Brooke, if he did find me, I guess I’d give him what I have left and hope that satisfied him. He went to prison and I didn’t, so maybe I do owe him.”
“Is he dangerous? Would he try to hurt you or somebody else? Because maybe we should tell my dad.”
Dmitri’s face fell. “So many times, I’ve wanted to come clean with Harlan. I’ve hated lying to him. I’ve hated lying to everyone, but I’ve never had the courage to tell the whole truth. At first, I was just too scared about going to prison, but now I’m devoted to this island and to the people. I would hate to lose everyone’s respect. Brooke, I won’t ask you to lie for me, but I can’t deny I hope you’ll keep this secret for me.”
Dmitri had kept a secret for me. Did I owe him? Maybe, but my secret didn’t involve any illegal activity.
“I don’t know, Dmitri. It’s kind of a big thing. I’ll have to think about it, but I promise I won’t do anything without telling you first, and now that I know the circumstances, I can understand why you did the things you did. I mean, maybe not the stealing part, but the hiding out part.”
“Thank you. I know I’m not in a position to even ask this, but could I ask a favor? If you feel it’s essential that Harlan know, could I tell him myself?”
“Of course. Absolutely.”
“Thank you,” he said again. “Now, do you suppose I could see those letters?”
After all this, I’d practically forgotten about the letters. I pushed the plastic bag toward him. It had been sitting on the table that whole time. He could have just grabbed them at any point, but that wasn’t the kind of man he was. I set my empty glass down on the coffee table.
“How about I get out of here so you can read them in private. I’m sorry that Shari and I read them.”
His chuckle was rueful. “I think in the grand scheme of things, you had every right to. I’m honestly a little nervous to read them myself, but I’d . . .” His voice choked with emotion, and he cleared his throat. “I’d like to hear about this daughter you mentioned. God, if I’d known about that, nothing on earth could have kept me away from Alice.” He sighed again, as if the world was crushing him. “Maybe it’s better this way, though. If I’d gone back, I’d have ended up in prison and I would have been such an embarrassment to her. Alice deserved better.”
“She loved you. You’ll see that when you read the letters.” I stood up, a little woozy from the whiskey, and Dmitri helped me into my coat. Then I hugged him tightly. I’d gone there thinking I’d find out he wasn’t the man I’d thought he was, but that isn’t what I discovered. Yes, he’d lied about his past, but the Dmitri I knew was still standing right there in front of me.