But the guy is annoying. He’s definitely not here to learn guitar. He acts like he already knows everything I’m trying to teach him, even though he doesn’t, and keeps trying to make small-talk instead of learn.
At the end of his half-hour, I put my guitar down. “Okay, time’s up.” I don’t offer to schedule another lesson because I didn’t enjoy teaching him. If he asks, fine. But I’m not going to try to get him into a regular package or anything.
He makes no move to get up off my couch. Instead, he pulls a little baggie out of his jacket pocket and starts rolling a joint.
For fuck’s sake.
I don’t happen to have any students after him because it’s already 6:30—my dinner time—but I easily could have. Maybe I’ll pretend I do.
“You want a hit?” he offers after flicking his tongue along the edge of the rolling paper.
“No, I’m good. And listen, I’ve got plans for dinner, so…”
“Yeah.” But the asshole doesn’t take the hint. He just flicks his lighter and lights up in my living room.
I’m not the type to pitch a bitch. Sounds like we know some of the same people, and I don’t want to completely be rude. I get up and start cleaning the kitchen to give him a better hint.
I look over to see him watching me with hooded eyes.
Ugh. Definitely a creeper.
And then behind him, in the doorway of the bedroom, Oleg appears. He’s put on his jeans, and he still looks pale, but his focus is on the back of Jeff’s head, and his expression is deadly.
“Oh hey, honey,” I chirp brightly to call Jeff’s attention to Oleg’s presence.
The guy whips around in surprise, coughing on the hit he just took.
Oleg folds his arms across his massive chest. He’s huge, and he looks like he could rip Jeff’s head off his shoulders with one hand. I notice, only because I’m looking for it, that he’s also strategically propped himself up against the doorframe for balance.
He’s playing along for me, just like he always does at my show when I decide to climb him like a jungle gym or make him carry me around on his shoulders. Or catch me when I dive from the stage.
I wrinkle my nose at Jeff apologetically. “My boyfriend doesn’t really like when guys hang around past their lessons.”
I’ve never seen a guy move so fast. Jeff shoves his pot back in his jacket pocket and slams his ratty guitar case closed. He’s out the door with only one side of it buckled and his jacket dragging on the floor as he carries it under his arm.
As soon as the door shuts, I laugh and skip over to Oleg, reaching on tiptoe to give him a peck on the cheek. “Thank you,” I purr. “You’re a good bodyguard.”
Brows still down, he frowns at the door.
“He would’ve left if I’d told him to,” I reassure him, guessing at his thoughts. “But now he’ll never overstay.” I reward Oleg with a big smile.
Oleg casts another dark glance at the door.
“I know, you would’ve beat him up for me if I needed you to, right?”
Oleg draws his index finger across his throat. A shiver runs down my spine because I believe the threat. As gentle and safe as Oleg seems to me, as much as I think of him as my giant teddy bear, I have every reason to believe he’s a criminal—a dangerous criminal. Those tattoos tell a story of violence. And he runs in a group of Russian guys who all have tattoos like his. They’re Russian mafiya, probably. I don’t even want to know what kind of crimes they’re into. I mean, I found Oleg shot in the back of my van.
“Okay, that won’t be necessary,” I tell Oleg, sober now.
He still looks ready to kill someone.
“Seriously. It’s good to know that, ah, you’re willing to kill for me, but I wouldn’t want that. Ever.” I’m trying to be as clear about this as I can.
Oleg seems to catch my tone because a flash of uncertainty replaces the deadly expression, and he runs a tattooed hand over his stubbled face.
“Is that what you do?” I don’t know where I worked up the nerve to ask. I really don’t think I want to hear the answer. I bring my fingertips to touch the place across his breastbone where I saw the dagger tattoo. “That’s what the ink means, right?”
He gives me a single nod.
Fuck. A violent shiver runs through me. I definitely didn’t want to know that.
“Is that why you got attacked? Someone’s after you now?”
He tips his head to the side, considering my question, then shakes it.
Okay, so he didn’t get attacked as a retaliation over murder. Good to know. Again, I’m stupid for asking.
The less I know about Oleg and his crimes, the better.