“Why am I taking you to the gym again, Kisa?” Serge asked as I met him on the sidewalk shortly after Alik dropped me off at my papa’s house. Papa was already out entertaining the Georgian mob that had brought Goliath tonight and Alik was en route to join them, so I knew I would have all night free.
It was always like this when the championship was on. The mob bosses had to get business in all avenues done. But tonight just seemed different, my stomach swirling with nerves like something bad was going to happen. I knew it was a combination of both Alik’s strange mood and Raze’s strange reaction after he won his fight tonight.
Alik had been furious that Raze had won. So furious that he hadn’t even used my body post-match as was his usual M.O. He’d just dropped me off at home and coldly ordered me inside.
Alik was fearful. I’d never seen him fearful before. But him seeing Raze beating Goliath tonight with such incredible skill and strength had taken him to a state I’d never seen from him before: introverted, quiet, pensive.
It scared me more than his aggression. It didn’t know what to make of a non-expressive Alik. Of a distant and non-possessive Alik.
But right now, I tried to push all thoughts of Alik from my head. I needed to see Raze. Alik had forced me to watch his fight, trying to assert his dominance over me. And, my God, Raze had nearly died. But something was wrong with him afterward. He didn’t look pleased by his win. He couldn’t get up, like he was shell-shocked, staring down at Goliath with a devastated expression. Viktor had to lift him from his knees to get him out of the cage, support him as he walked down the hallway. And worse, I couldn’t go to him. Instead, I had to go with Alik.
I resented Alik for that. For once, I completely resented him.
I looked to Serge, Raze’s cutting face prominent in my mind. “Please, Serge…” I begged, and he stood stoic in front of me before opening the back door of the Lincoln and gestured for me to go inside. I slipped into the backseat and Serge got behind the wheel.
He turned around. “Kisa? What’s going on? You sneaking out like this is putting us both in danger. I’m not doing it unless you start giving me some answers.”
I dropped my eyes to the sidewalk outside and warred with what to do. I looked to Serge again and my eyes filled with tears.
“Kisa, are you in trouble?” he asked, but I shook my head. “Are you … have you been seeing someone else? Behind Mr. Durov’s back? Are you meeting him at the gym?”
“It’s not like that, Serge.” I sniffled and wiped the tears from my eyes. “It’s more than just ‘seeing’ someone.”
Serge’s face paled. “Kisa! You are seeing someone else? Do you have a death wish? Mr. Durov will kill you both if he finds out. That man is unstable at the best of times, but about you? He’s beyond insane.” His gaze fell but then focused back on me. “Who is it?”
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you. I can barely believe it myself.”
“Kisa, you’re not making sense.”
My stomach rolled with the words I was about to say, the secret I was about to confess. Serge sat farther forward, and I whispered, “You won’t believe me if I tell you.”
“Try me,” he said curtly.
“It’s … it’s … Luka…”
Serge stared and stared at me like I was a moron. “Luka?” he asked. “Luka Tolstoi?”
“Yes,” I replied in a barely audible voice and clutched the purse on my lap. It was filled with photos and mementos from our childhood. Tonight I was going to try and make him remember. Tonight I wanted him to remember me … us … everything.
I just wanted my Luka back … at least I wanted as much of him back as was left. I’d have any part of Luka at all, I’d take any tiny scrap of him that remained.
“You’re being unfaithful with Luka Tolstoi?” Serge said dryly, confusion lacing his Russian accented voice.
I nodded, and he stared at me like I’d gone insane. “Kisa, Mr. Tolstoi died years ago in an accident. His body burned to death. What’s really going on? Who are you trying to protect?”
“Raze—”
“The new fighter?” Serge interrupted. “What the hell has he got to do with Luka?”
“He is Luka, Serge. Raze is Luka.”
“Kisa, I don’t know what—”
“He got sent away to an underground prison after Rodion was killed, off the grid, and he was forced to become a fighter. A death match fighter, Serge. I know it sounds unbelievable, but it happened. He has no memory of who he is, where he’s from, or who we all are to him. He was tortured and abused. He’s like an animal, just fighting and surviving, no humanity, but the fleeting glimpses I get when he looks at me…” I swallowed hard and said, “When he’s with me…”
“Kisa, this is all—”
“His eyes are the same as Luka’s, brown with a smudge of blue in his left iris. His mannerisms are the same. He tilts his head and purses his lips, his full lips that are the exact same shape … And he has these dreams, vivid dreams. They’re memories, Serge, not just dreams. I’m sure of it. Being back in Brooklyn, he’s remembering more and more. It’s Luka. He’s come back to me.” I looked up into Serge’s shocked eyes and said, “And he needs my help. I’ve got to make him remember. I need to know what happened all those years ago. We all do. There’s just so much pain. So many unanswered questions that have been swept under the rug.”
Serge sat in silence, and I knew he didn’t believe me. I didn’t care, because I knew the truth, and it was up to me to save Raze. It was up to me to make him realize his feet had found their way home.
“Just take me to the gym, Serge. And please wait because I need you to drive us to Brighton Beach later on.”
Serge went to argue, but I turned my head and leaned against the window, ending the discussion.
* * *
I entered the gym and headed to Raze’s training room. The whole place was mostly in darkness, but for a single light hanging from the ceiling. Raze sat against the far wall, his head hanging low and his torso covered with black and red. His legs were stretched out in front of him. I’d never seen someone who’d just won a match look so defeated.
“Raze?” I said in panic and rushed over to him.
Dropping to my knees, I grabbed a nearby towel and pressed it against a long fresh tally mark on his torso, twice as long, twice as deep, and twice as aggressive as his other kill tattoos.
“Raze, what have you done?” I asked and tried to look into his lowered eyes. He didn’t speak, didn’t even flinch when I applied pressure to his sliced torso. He sat gripping a broken pen and bloodied razor blade in his hands.
As I checked the rest of his ripped and scarred body, I noticed a huge stitched-up slash on his arm and stitches along the bottom of his throat.
I remembered the exact moment in the match when he’d gotten them—the moment I thought he was going to be taken from me. Having that happen only made me more desperate to teach him about who he was. He was to fight Alik tomorrow night, the two of them having progressed to the final, and tomorrow night, I would be losing one of the only two men that had ever meant something to me. But I knew who I wanted, who I’d only ever wanted, and right now, he was lying down on this hard floor like his world had just been torn apart.
Luka needed to come back to me. Finally, after all these years in captivity, he needed to be freed. He needed to know he was loved.
“Raze, please look at me,” I ordered in a gentle voice, fighting back tears, and Raze slowly lifted his head. His eyes were rimmed with red and he had the most haunting, devastating expression on his face. My heart lurched at the sight. I reached out and laid my hand on his cheek.
“Lyubov moya, what’s all this? Was it the fight tonight? Was it because you were hurt? Because it was a close match?”
I caught Raze’s hand lift from his side, and the razor blade fell to the floor. His rough, bloodied palm laid on the back of mine still on his cheek, and I froze.
“I killed my only friend,” Raze rasped out, and his fingers wrapped around mine. His grip was so tight … so telling of his internal emotional turmoil.
My breathing caught in my throat and my thoughts immediately went to Rodion. Did he remember? Did he remember that night? Was he talking of my brother? Had he remembered his past?
My hand began to shake with the gravity of what this could mean.
“What friend? What are you talking about, lyubov moya?” I asked, trying to keep the quivering nerves from my voice.
Raze’s gaze took on a blank stare, and he replied, “362.”
I blinked at his answer and immediately thought back to our conversation last night. “362? From the Gulag?”
Raze nodded slowly and his hold on my hand tightened. “Goliath…”
Suddenly, everything made sense. It wasn’t Rodion’s death he was remembering; it was the man tonight, the Georgian Goliath. “The man you killed tonight was—”
“My friend.”
My bottom lip trembled upon seeing this strong, untamed, and harsh man reduced to a hulking body of muscle filled with nothing but guilt and remorse.
“Raze … I’m so sorry,” I soothed.
“He was recaptured when we escaped, by the Georgian mob. He told me if he’d won tonight, they were granting him his freedom. And once free, he could get his revenge on the people that sent him to the Gulag. After all those years surviving, teaching me how to survive … He was innocent. He deserved that revenge, but…”
Raze’s eyelids fluttered, and I leaned in to press a kiss to his forehead, his cheek, and to the back of his hand fixed upon mine. “But what?”
“But so am I…” he whispered, and my blood cooled to ice in my veins.
“You are what?” I pushed.
His eyes widened as something in his mind clearly hit home and his torso tensed as though in shock. “I’m innocent,” he whispered, clearly unable to speak louder. “Kisa … I’m innocent. I didn’t do what I was imprisoned for. I didn’t do what I was accused of.” Raze’s hand now fully encompassed mine, and he looked down at our clasped fingers. “You’re shaking, Kisa-Anna. Why are you shaking?”
A sob escaped my throat and I released my hold on the towel to plant it over my mouth. The tears of relief poured from my eyes. He hadn’t done it. Luka hadn’t killed my brother. He was innocent. I always knew he was innocent.
“Kisa? I don’t understand why you’re crying.” Raze’s head tilted to the side and I dived to his chest, breathing in the heady scent that was all him, not caring if my clothes became soiled by blood and ink.
Raze’s strong and comforting arms wrapped around my back and he kept me close. “Shh, solnyshko,” he whispered, and my crying stopped and I lifted my head and stared into his eyes.
“Solnyshko?” I questioned, and Raze looked up in thought before glancing back down at me.
“It means ‘little sun,’” Raze said matter-of-fact. “In Russian, I think.” Then his forehead creased and his eyebrows pulled down as if he didn’t understand why he knew that piece of information.
“You called me ‘my love,” he suddenly said, watching me, studying me like I was a problem he was trying to solve. I nodded and fought to keep my bottom lip from quivering. “Lyubov moya,” he said, repeating the words slowly, sounding out each syllable before his eyes widened. “It means ‘my love’ in Russian. You called me ‘your love.’”
“I did … lyubov moya” I replied and pulled out of his embrace, I caught his stuttered, shocked inhale, but just let him sit thinking of my old term of endearment for him.
Quickly wiping my eyes, I then ran my finger around his new tattoo. “Why is this so much longer than the rest? So much more pronounced than the others? You’ve really damaged your skin.”
“Because 362’s death was honorable where the others weren’t. He died proudly. He died like a fighter should.” Raze ran his fingertips over his scar and added, “He died before gaining his revenge. He was cheated out of retribution on those that wronged him. But he never gave up until the end. His recognition on my skin needs to stand out because he, as a fighter and a friend, stood out in my life.”
My heart shredded hearing him speak, and I realized no matter how far I delved into my imagination, into my worst nightmare, I would never fully understand what he went through in the Gulag. He was a child. A child forced to be a killer, and amongst that hell, he’d found someone to care for … and he’d just been forced to kill his friend in cold blood.
Sorrow made me feel sick to my stomach. I couldn’t help but be grateful that 362 was dead and I still had my Raze.
“I thought … I thought for a moment he was going to kill you…” I trailed off, my voice catching in my throat at the thought of losing my soul mate twice in my life. No heart could sustain that.
“He was winning,” Raze confessed.
I gasped, and Raze leaned forward and ran his fingertips down my neck. “But then I saw Durov forcing you to watch me die and it fueled me. Gave me the strength to fight back and overpower my friend.” Raze’s gaze dropped to my lips, and he murmured, “I have to protect you, Kisa-Anna. I believe I was made to protect you.” His face screwed up like he was trying really hard to remember something, and he added, “I had to protect you from Durov … again.”
My heartbeat drowned out the noise of the air conditioner whirring in the main gym. “Again?” I questioned, and his eyes crinkled with confusion.
“Yes. I think … I think I’ve protected you from him before…” Taking my hand, Raze pulled me forward, searching my face up close, and asked, “Have I? Have I protected you from him before?”
I nodded, nerves stealing my voice.
Raze swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing, and he croaked out, “Did I…? Did I know you before?”
Stifling a threatening sob with the back of my hand, I cried, “Yes. Yes, you did. You knew me very well.”
Raze’s bare muscled chest began to rise and fall and lines framed his scrunched-up eyes. He was trying to remember, but by his held breath and frustrated exhales, I knew he couldn’t. Something was blocking him, preventing him from fully embracing who he was before.
Releasing myself from Raze’s hold, I reached into my purse and pulled out the old silver frame of two young children smiling for the camera and handed it to Raze, who looked down curiously at the picture.
He was like a caveman seeing the world’s treasures for the first time, unsure what to make of the strange world he had been suddenly thrust into.
I watched his face with fascination as his brown eyes studied the children. He pulled the frame closer to his eyes and scrutinized the snapshot while my heart fluttered as fast as a hummingbird’s wings.
His thumb ran across the girl’s face and he looked up, watching my face with the same intense attention.
“I’ve seen this girl in my dreams.”
“Yes,” I whispered, and he lowered his eyes again and reared back his head.
“And this boy too. I know him too.”
“Yes,” was all I could say in response, praying to God he gave Raze the gift of memory. That he remembered who both of those children were, and when he did, he still wanted me … and in some deep, hidden part of him, realized he loved me just as much as I’d always loved him.
“This girl…” Raze said and lowered the picture frame and crawled toward me, his sculpted shoulders rolling at the movement, his packed abs flexing. Once before me, Raze pointed at my eyes, his head tilting to the side. His mouth hovered just before mine and his warm, enticing breath made me close my eyes.
“No!” he ordered, and my eyes snapped open on a gasp. Raze brought the frame forward and placed it next to my face. A knowing expression washed over his sharp, assessing handsome features. “You … you are the girl in this picture.”
I felt tears trickling down my cheeks and I nodded, unable to speak, and he sat back, staring at me as though he were seeing me for the first time. “You’re the girl from my dreams…”
“Yes, Raze, yes,” I answered excitedly.
He exhaled a long breath like he’d just run a marathon, and he slumped back against the wall again, clutching the frame to his chest, just staring at me.
I held his gaze, willing him to remember more, but when a single tear ran down his stubbled cheek, it took everything I had not to fall apart.
I lurched forward and threw myself into his arms. “Lyubov moya! Please … no,” I whispered and wrapped my arms around his neck and straddled his hips, feeling his heart thundering in his chest against mine. “It’s okay. We’ll get you to remember who you are. You’ll remember everything in time. I promise.”
His body shook and his nose tucked into the crook between my shoulder and neck, and he hugged me back, so tight it was a struggle to breathe.
We were silent, quietly sitting and comforting one another, when he asked, “Am I … am I this boy in the picture? The one holding you?”
I stilled and so very slowly pulled back to face him. Raze’s eyes had darkened, glittering with questions, and when our gazes collided, I replied, “Yes. I think you are the boy in that picture. At first I didn’t know, but now I’m sure. It’s you…”
Raze didn’t show any reaction, but his hand abruptly cupped my cheek and his head tilted to the side. We stayed that way for minutes and minutes, until his lips parted and a rush of breath poured through, and he whispered, “My Kisa-Anna … my solnyshko … God put a piece of your blue eyes in mine so we would always know we matched…”
Like a dam breaking, relieved excitement washed through me like a river amidst a hurricane, and I sobbed and cried, “Luka … my Luka…” before pressing my lips against this man’s, tasting the essence of the boy I had been created and destined to love. Loving the lost man I now held in my arms.
Raze froze against my mouth, and I broke away to see his eyes shining, looking lost. “Luka?” he questioned, only for his eyes to widen, and he sucked in a sharp breath. “Luka … I was called Luka … My name was Luka?”
“Yes.” I smiled and peppered kisses all over his face.
His hands clenched the thick strands of my brown hair. “Kisa-Anna, my Kisa-Anna,” he kept murmuring over and over, and I was sure I would never tire of my name pouring from his perfect full lips.
“Yes! Yes, Luka. I’m yours! I was made for you.”
We stayed clutched in each other’s arms for what could have been an age, when I eventually pulled back, gave him a long sweet kiss, and said, “Would you come somewhere with me? I want to take you somewhere … somewhere special.”
Raze tilted his head to the side but, without question, replied, “Anywhere. I … trust you.”
He trusted me …
Rising to my feet, I took Raze’s hand, led him into the bathroom and, wetting a rag, cleaned the area around his new tattoo and laid gauze over his new scars.
Raze slipped on a sweatshirt and sweatpants. I couldn’t help but smile when I realized it was that same gray hooded sweatshirt that I had first seen him in, and I held out my hand.
Raze lifted the hood over his head—I assumed it was instinctive for him to hide as we were going outside—and came forward and cautiously took my outstretched hand. I wrapped my fingers in his and squeezed.
Raze’s brown eyes caught mine from under his hood, and without a word, I led him outside, his huge frame dwarfing mine.
As we slipped out the back door, I spotted the awaiting Lincoln, and Serge jumped out of the car, his tall broad body tense like he was prepping for trouble.
Raze pulled me to a stop and pushed me behind him as if Serge were going to be a threat. I jerked on his hand and Raze growled, “Stay back.”
I pushed my way around Raze and pushed on his solid chest with my hand until his eyes dropped to mine. “He’s a friend, Raze. Like 362 was to you. He’s my friend.” I cast a glance back at Serge and knew Serge could hear everything I said out in this quiet parking lot, but I knew I could trust him. “You used to know him too. He used to be like an uncle to you.”
Raze’s head tipped to the side, and I could see his eyes squint under the shadow of his hood as he stared at Serge. I lifted my hand, laid it on his cheek and whispered, “Let yourself remember, Luka.”
Raze’s eyes slammed to mine at the mention of his old name, and as he glanced up at Serge again, I saw the moment the memory fixed in place. His tense muscles relaxed and a labored breath exhaled from his mouth.
“Serge,” he hushed out quietly. “Serge.” Raze rolled the name around on his tongue, and as I glanced back to Serge, his face was pale and he looked to me in shock. I knew he’d started to believe me.
Taking Raze’s hand once more, I walked him over to Serge, who couldn’t take his eyes off my fighter, my long lost love.
“Serge,” I greeted, and Raze froze, his head dipped down, and his hood covered his entire face.
Serge was silent.
Looking up at Raze, I said, “Raze, pull back your hood.”
Raze didn’t move for a few long seconds, but he eventually lifted his hand and drew back his hood, his downcast eyes slowly lifting and fixed on Serge.
Serge’s eyes were assessing as he studied Raze up close.
“Sergei?” Raze said, and Serge blanched further at the use of his full first name. He looked at me in disbelief, just as Raze said, “I … I remember you.” Raze gripped my hand and pressed it to his lips, the action almost making me drop to my knees in happiness.
“You would drive me and Kisa to school … and to the beach?”
“Yes,” Serge replied, and I heard the clogging of his throat and saw the tears build in his eyes. “Christ! It is you! You look different, but … yes, it’s you.”
“I told you I’d found him. That he’d come back to us,” I said, and Serge shook his head, astounded.
“We thought you were dead. We were told you’d died in an accident.”
I felt Raze stiffen and I panicked. I’d never talked about the murder or his apparent death. I’d never told him of his family, of Talia, of Ivan, of his mother, who still to this day could not move past the loss of her son. Raze had never mentioned any memory of his family, so I didn’t want to push. I couldn’t bear losing him again if it all became too much and he ran.
“What accident? What death?” Raze asked tightly, and I could see the pain etching his face. It was like it physically pained him to remember his life before becoming a fighter.
Serge’s eyebrows pulled down, and I subtly shook my head, telling him without words to go no further.
Lifting to my tiptoes, I pressed my lips to Raze’s and asked, “Would you go somewhere with me now? Serge will drive us there.”
Raze pulled back and, without hesitation, answered, “Yes.”
Serge made himself busy by opening the back doors of the Lincoln, and we climbed inside.
Raze was tense as he sat in the car and I stroked at his arm. “Are you okay, lyubov moya?”
Raze cleared his throat and shifted on the seat. Placing his hand on my knee, he squeezed. “Cars make me nervous. I … I haven’t been in many, and I don’t like not being in control.”
Picking up his heavy arm, I laid it over my shoulder and cuddled into his waist. Raze’s thumb stroked at my arm, and I sighed. I’d never felt like this. Even as a child, and infatuated with Luka to the level I was, I wasn’t old enough to understand that your feelings can deepen even further with age. I didn’t know believing you had lost your soul mate and then having them re-enter your life made the word ‘relief’ too simple of an emotion, because the reality of having your heart fixed back together was too indescribable for words.
Looking up, I saw Serge casting the odd glimpse at the two of us, and a happy expression filled his face. He’d always loved Luka, and in truth, he’d always hated Alik. I knew that by the way he now looked at me safe in Raze’s arms. It filled him with happiness. I knew he worried what my life would be like with Alik. And tomorrow night, my true love and my fiancé would fight to the death. I almost couldn’t breathe at that thought of that fact, so I chose to block it from my mind and focus on being joined with the other half of my soul right now, right this second. Just living in the moment.
Raze pulled me closer to his side and ran his nose amongst my hair. “We used to sit like this, didn’t we? You under the protection of my arm, safe.”
I smiled against his abs. “Always.”
“I think I remember that.”
“Good, lyubov moya. That’s really good.”