“This is incredible.” Scarlet stepped away from him, shocked. Trying to remember to keep her mouth from hanging open. She could see why he called it his cathedral. It was beautiful. There was even a kind of hushed silence around it, as if the wildlife respected the place. Once she thought that, then she heard the birds with their flitting wings and calls to one another—the chatter of the squirrels and the slide of lizards under the leaves.
“Isn’t it?” He looked pleased. “I hike a lot. I hoped you’d like it. I haven’t found evidence of other hikers around any of the times I’ve come.” He stepped past her inside the circle of the trees, taking her hand to tug so she followed after him.
“Do you worry about anyone finding your motorcycle?”
“It’s not that far from here and I’ve got it locked up.”
He sounded very confident. He handed her the duffel bag while he spread the ground blanket. “If you get cold, you let me know. I’ve got another blanket as well as this jacket.”
There was no wind in the trees. The top of the canopy swayed above them, and the trees creaked and groaned continuously, but where they were, the thick trunks were solid and unmoving. She found she liked the sounds. The notes were almost like music, a low symphony playing just for them. She sat on the blanket and pulled off the jacket, expecting to be cold. It was warmer in the forest than she thought it would be. The sun was out and had that same interesting strobing effect as it had on the road, the rays shining through the long branches of needles.
“It’s almost hot, but not quite.”
He nodded. “A perfect day.” He handed her a bottle of water. “You’ve got to be thirsty by now. I should have gotten you something to drink at the grove.”
Scarlet shook her head. “I wanted to be alone with you. I don’t know what it was, but I just had this crazy feeling as if we have this one day together. This one perfect day and I didn’t want to miss one second of it.”
Absinthe frowned, his crystal-blue eyes drifting slowly over her face. “What do you mean, one day together? You planning on ditching me after this? I thought maybe we were building something here. I was hoping we were. I’m just laying it out there, lady. That’s where I am. I’m thinking we might take a stab at a future together. Why the hell not?”
She took a breath. There were a million reasons why the hell not. “We don’t really know one another, Absinthe.”
“That’s why we’re here, isn’t it?”
She wanted them to be there for wild sex. They were completely secluded. They could have any kind of sex they wanted, and no one was around to know what they did. She could walk away unscathed. Even as she thought it, she knew that wasn’t the truth. She would never walk away unmarked from him. Already, he had gotten to her. Somehow, in the library, without even laying a hand on her, he’d managed to make his way inside of her.
She took the plates he handed to her. “Tell me about yourself then. Where are you from? Why did you say Aleksei died?”
Those eyes of his jumped to her face. She swore he saw too much. She had her own secrets and she had no right to ask him to reveal his and yet she wanted to know everything there was to know about him. He hadn’t removed his gloves. His jacket had come off, just like hers, but not his gloves. Neither had hers, yet she longed to touch his skin and she wanted to feel his hands on her skin.
“I was born in Russia. I’m sure that isn’t a big surprise.”
He sent her a small smile. This one didn’t reach his eyes and there was no humor in it at all. She waited, suddenly wishing she hadn’t asked him.
“I had an older brother, Demyan. We lived well, I’m told, although to be honest, I don’t remember. My parents were murdered. I do remember that. It’s odd the things a toddler can recall. I see our former house perfectly. I can see my parents. I can remember the things they said, and I can remember the way they were murdered. Every word that was said to them before the gun was fired. I wasn’t more than eighteen months, and my mother was holding me in her arms, but I can recall it verbatim. I wish I couldn’t.”
She closed her eyes. Sorrow hung in the air. She heard it in his voice. More, he said that he “had” an older brother. She didn’t want to ask if those same people had killed his brother.
“I’m so sorry, Absinthe.”
“My parents opposed a political candidate that a man by the name of Sorbacov supported. Sorbacov was very influential at the time. He had the backing of a secret and very violent small division of the military and he used it in order to get his candidate positioned for the presidency. He did that by murdering those who were opposed to and could damage his candidate. He took their children and placed them in one of his four schools to be trained as assets for the country.”