Kostya stops short, right in the middle of the willow grove. I press my lips together, wondering if I’ve said something, or whether he’s changing his mind about taking some dumb American to his secret hangout.

Then he looks down at me, and I swear his serious, smoldering gaze burns a hole right through me, even as I’m half-convinced that I’m reading all his signals wrong. Every time that I’m sure that this tension between us is real, a moment later he’s Prince Serious again, and I’m wondering if I’m imagining things.

Right now, for instance. I almost can’t tell if he’s about to kiss me or reprimand me. Maybe both at once. It seems like something a Svelorian could do.

My insides start to twist anyway. I don’t break his gaze.

Just kiss me or say something or do something, I think.

I’m gonna lose my mind if this keeps up for a whole month.

Kostya slips his arm from my grasp, then slides his hand into mine, warm and rough. He half smiles.

I swallow.

Then he pulls me between the curtain made by two willow trees, their long green branches dragging over my hair as I duck. Behind them is a tall, dense green hedge. Kostya hesitates for a moment, scanning it, and then pushes into the small gap between two plants, still pulling me behind him.

Four feet of shrubbery later, we’re on a paved asphalt road, a green field on the other side of the black ribbon. I look left and right, trying to figure out where exactly we are, because this part of the palace’s grounds doesn’t look familiar at all.

“The back route to the garage,” he says, and we start walking down the road. He doesn’t take his hand away and I don’t either, even though we’re right out in the open now.

You haven’t done anything yet, I remind myself, over and over again. Not yet. Not really.

“I thought you didn’t have to sneak,” I say.

“I don’t have to sneak to the ramparts,” he says. “If my father caught me out in the gray district, it would be a different story.”

He looks down at me, and we come around a curve, the big stone building coming into view.

“Particularly with the Ambassador’s daughter,” he says.

I swallow and pretend very hard that we’re not holding hands, even though I don’t let his hand go.

“You’re just showing me some Svelorian hospitality,” I say.

That’s why you told me about your nightmares, and why you dared me to burn my shirt, why you gave me a nickname.

And why you still haven’t let go of my hand.

He looks over at me, his eyes dancing, his face serious.

“Yes,” he says.

He unlocks the garage, and once inside, he punches a code into a panel just inside the door.

The inside of the garage is huge, and it smells like grease and brakes, like rubber and new leather. We walk down the center of it, between rows of low-slung cars that gleam even in the dark, their headlights like the eyes of panthers, tracking us in the night. I wonder how fast they go.

Kostya hasn’t let go of my hand yet.

“Do we get to take one of these?” I ask, looking around. The massive space swallows my voice.

I know as much about cars as anyone, which is to say I know about Fords and Hondas, and I drove my friend’s Mercedes once when she got too drunk to drive herself home. But I think these are Porsches and Maseratis and Ferraris and I-don’t-even-know-whats. Cars so nice I’m a little afraid to even touch them.

Kostya laughs, a deep-throated chuckle.

“Not tonight,” he says. “I can’t imagine what would happen to one of those if I took it to the gray district.”

“So you’ll take me and not a fancy car,” I tease.

“I’m not planning on parking you outside and leaving you there,” he says. “You’re not leaving my sight.”

His voice suddenly has a hard, almost protective ring to it.

There’s a big part of me that wants to say I can take care of myself, thanks, but I press my lips together and swallow the words, because I know there’s a good chance they’re not actually true in a shady part of a foreign country.

“I wouldn’t want to trigger an international incident,” I say.

“Zloyushka, I’m not going to take you anywhere that I can’t keep you safe,” he says.

“I’m not worried.”

“Good,” he says, and we stop.

We’re standing near a big black SUV. Even in the near-dark I can tell that the windows are tinted. It looks exactly like something a monarch would be driven in.

“Is that bulletproof?” I ask, letting my eyes slide along it. It’s so well-polished that there aren’t even fingerprints.

Kostya frowns. Then he follows my gaze, looks at the SUV, and snorts.

“That is,” he says, nodding at the massive vehicle.

Then he points to an ancient-looking motorcycle, nearly hidden in the shadows next to the gleaming SUV.

“This isn’t,” he says.

“Does that run?” I ask.

He finally lets go of my hand and walks toward it, running one hand almost tenderly over the handlebars.

“It purrs,” he says, and then half-laughs. “Like an old, asthmatic tiger with a bad cough.”

It’s big and bulky, anything but sleek. The paint’s a little rusted, the headlight is so big it looks like it’s from a locomotive, and it’s got a sidecar that might have been riveted together from scrap metal.

“Soviet?” I ask.

He reaches into the sidecar, pulls two helmets, and hands me one. This, at least, looks new and not like it’s older than I am.

“Of course,” he says. “I found it in the back of an outbuilding when I was seventeen. My father wanted to scrap it, but I convinced him to let me fix it up instead.”

He uses a thumb to rub some dirt off of a dial on the handlebars.

“He hates this thing,” he muses.

“I didn’t know you fixed bikes,” I say.

“Even a prince needs a few practical skills,” he says. “And I can’t cook or clean for shit.”

He puts the helmet on, and I follow suit, then look down at the sidecar.

It’s not very big, and it might be the only thing in this garage that looks more beat up than the bike itself. I’m pretty sure that if we hit something, it’ll crumple like aluminum foil.

“I’ve never ridden in a sidecar,” I say, my voice sounding dubious even to me.

“I won’t make you start now,” Kostya says. “As long as you promise you can hold on tight.”

I think of the night before, trying not to stare at him as he handed me his shirt, and I’m glad I’ve got this helmet on in the dark because I feel my face flush just at the thought.

“Of course,” I say.

Kostya uncouples the sidecar, wheels the bike forward, and then gets on. He’s wearing jeans, motorcycle boots, and a black leather jacket that fits exactly the way a black leather jacket ought to fit a man.

Watching him straddle a motorcycle, even with the helmet hiding his face, all I can think is: it’s completely unfair how hot he is.

“Come on, zloyushka,” he says. “You’re not having second thoughts, are you?”

“Not for a second,” I say, sounding slightly braver than I feel.

I’m not nervous about going out with him, but I’m a little nervous about riding something that looks like it belongs in a museum.

Also, I can’t figure out how to get on the back. The second seat is just high enough that I don’t know if I can get a leg over it, so I stand there for a moment while Kostya holds the bike still, and I shuffle from foot to foot.

“Step there and hold onto my shoulder,” he finally says, pointing at a bar sticking out of the back.

“It won’t fall off?” I ask, poking at it gingerly.

“It’s a foot rest,” he says. “This is what it’s for.”

I put my weight on it and grab his thick shoulder, swinging my leg over the seat.

Kostya turns his head, and for just a second, his hand drifts to my knee and holds it, warm and comforting. I take a deep breath and then reach my arms around his waist, very determinedly not thinking about him shirtless.

He says something, but I can’t hear him.

“What?” I say.

He turns his head and reaches back, sliding one finger along the underside of my helmet. There’s a faint click, and then I hear Kostya’s voice right in my ears.

“Tighter,” he says.

I tighten my arms, and the bike roars to life, the noise echoing inside the big garage. We take off toward a big garage door, slowly opening.

I fight the urge to duck as we go under it, and Kostya points a remote back over his shoulder.

Royals, I think. They use garage door openers just like we do!

Then the bike’s engine cuts out.

“Shit,” I say into my helmet’s intercom. “Did it break already?”

“I told you, this thing is indestructible,” Kostya’s voice says back. “The engine is too loud.”

We coast through the palace grounds, past hedges and trees and old stone buildings until we’re at the service entrance. Unlike the front gate, this is a simple iron affair, and it opens as we approach, then closes behind us.

Once we’re outside the palace grounds, the bike roars to life again, and I tighten my arms around Kostya as we pick up speed. Soon, we’re flashing past the dark windows of shops and restaurants, the warm summer breeze blowing my hair back.

Then we’re past the Old Town, riding inland from the sea, and I can see the shadow quarter — or the gray district, whatever, I like my way better — looming in front of us.

There’s no way to describe it except to say it’s Soviet as hell, pure communist-bloc brutalist architecture. The buildings are huge, uniformly gray cubes. Some are perched on concrete legs, some have rows of windows looking out at the night glassy-eyed, but there’s no mistaking any of it.

I’m not surprised that tour guides won’t take tourists here. Besides apparently being dangerous, it’s ugly.

Kostya drives us down a street that dips below, and suddenly we’re next to a channel full of water. There’s no guardrail or anything between us and the canal, and I turn my head so I don’t have to look at it. The buildings here all have loading docks right on this street, at the level of the canal. Each had a streetlight at one time, but most of them are smashed or burned out now.

He lets off the gas and the motorcycle starts slowing. I haven’t seen another person since we entered the gray district, and it’s making me feel uneasy. Finally Kostya brakes, then puts his feet down and walks the bike into a dark, narrow alley between two huge industrial buildings.

When he cuts the engine, there’s near-total silence. Not even the concrete-lined canal behind us makes noise.

“This is where the bars are?” I ask into my intercom.

“Illegal bars have a way of being quiet,” he says.

Slowly, I release Kostya, find the foot rest, get off the bike, and get my helmet off, shaking out my hair and running my fingers through it, wishing I had a hairbrush. Kostya gets his off and runs his hand through his hair once.

“Why’d we park in an alley?” I ask, my voice low, glancing into the pitch blackness beyond us.

“How would it look to have a hundred cars parked outside an abandoned building?” he asks.

Good point.

“Like there was something going on inside,” I say, glancing again at the dark.

“This way,” he says, and puts one hand on my lower back, leading me out of the alley. Between the motorcycle ride, Kostya’s hand on me, and the bad part of town that’s way too quiet, my whole body is on high alert, tense like a tightrope.

Something crunches under my foot, and I look down. It’s a syringe, needle sticking out, and I thank my lucky stars that I wore closed-toe shoes. Not that I haven’t been plenty of places with syringes on the ground.

Kostya’s hand lingers on my back as we walk along the canal on the dark, ugly cement path between the loading docks and the black water. I keep my back straight and walk my best don’t-fuck-with-me walk, but I know full well that if something happens, it’s not going to be me kicking anyone’s ass.

We walk past a few buildings, and then Kostya walks up to one. He reaches up, knocks on a high window, then crosses to a door on the opposite end of the wall and waits.

I look up at him.

“Secret code?” I ask.

“Of course,” he says. “Every good illegal bar needs one.”

After a few more moments, the heavy metal door swings open a few inches and a very suspicious man with a thick beard and long, dark hair peers out and glares at Kostya.