Romance: Wanted by the Alpha Lion (A BBW Paranormal Suspense Romance) (Heroes of Shifter Creek Book 2) (39 page)

“We are going to have to change the sheets in here,” he called from the other room. “They look grungy. I can get some from the base when I go back.”

“Are there two beds?”

“We can switch off on the couch and the bed. How about that?”

“I guess that’s fine. When are you going to go back to the base?”

“Before it gets dark. They always go home to eat dinner with their families, so I’ll go then.”

“Do you want me to go?”

“No. It’s probably best just one of us goes.”

“I’ll manage it.”

They stood silently for a moment, looking around the room. The urgency had gone in finding a place to be, and now they had nothing to say.

“You can play the piano now,” Jones commented. “Since you’re so passionate about it, you know?”

“I used to play until I got into high school. Then I quit. Things got hard to keep up with.”

“I see. Well, I’m going to get some work done in the other room.”

The commander left to the bedroom again. Leo stood alone, thinking of the beautiful woman who lived next door.

III.

              Jones left that evening and still wasn’t back the next morning. Leo hoped nothing happened to him – he didn’t know how he’d complete mission without his commander. Plus, he’d slept on the couch without a blanket, which was quite cold and uncomfortable. He didn’t want to sleep on the dirty sheets.

              A light knock came at the door.
Would Jones knock? He took the keys.
Leo opened the door to reveal the lovely Minka and her son standing there.

              “Oh hello,” Leo greeted them. “What can I do for you?”

              “My son would like to learn English,” she answered. “He will teach you Russian.”

              “Okay, sounds good,” Leo said, looking deeply, longingly into her pretty eyes.

“I don’t know what ‘sounds good’ means.”

He smiled, “Don’t worry about it. When would you like to start?”

              “Now.”

              “Okay. I guess that’s okay. Come in.”

              She walked in first, checking out the area. Her son stood outside before she gestured for him to enter. She still examined the room cautiously just in case.

              “Where is other man?”

              “He’ll be back. He just went out.”

              “Where?”

              “I don’t know.”

              She made a disapproving face. “Not good to lose your friend here.”

              “He’ll be back. Now, you want to learn to speak English, huh Vasily?”

              The boy looked to his mother. She explained, and he looked up to Leo and nodded.

              “Does he know any English?” he asked Minka.

              She shook her head, “My sister wanted him to stay Russian. But she is gone, and we are left behind.”

              “Okay. I’ll start with the alphabet then.”

              “You say ‘okay’ a lot. Do not teach Vasily ‘okay.’”

              “Okay,” he grinned.

She rolled her eyes, then sat down on the couch with Vasily. He chuckled to himself, admiring her before writing down the alphabet on a piece of paper left from the previous tenants. He explained what each letter was called and the sound each one made. Minka helped Vasily to understand when necessary. As they went through, Vasily also wrote down the Russian alphabet and tried to explain. Vasily took to English much faster than Leo took to Russian, but Leo tried to act like he got it just as well.

Though he focused on Vasily, Leo kept looking to Minka. Up close, she appeared even more beautiful and smelled of lilacs. He longed to be near her, to touch her. She seemed strong and a real spitfire. Those were the kind of women Leo liked – the ones who could take care of themselves and wouldn’t take any crap from anyone else. Women like his mother.

“How did you learn English?” he asked her as Vasily wrote down upper and lowercase letters.

“I learned in college,” she answered. “There was an exchange student.”

“Oh, I see. Did you go to the college in town here?”

“No, Moscow. Moscow State University.”

“That’s a good school, right?”

“Yes. I wanted to be a doctor, but I wasn’t… how you say… skilled. Blood make me…” she fake vomited.

Leo laughed, “That would sure be a problem. What are you doing here?”

“I like to write. I am…” she thought for a moment, “poet, like Akhmatova.”

“Anna Akhmatova?”

“You know her?”

He nodded with a slight, very slight smile, “Yes, my mother loved her. It was one of the reasons I hoped I’d come to Russia.”

“Why your mother not teach you Russian if she love Akhmatova?”

“She was going to teach me. She uh… she had a doctorate in Russian studies. Um… but she just… didn’t have the time.”

Minka shook her head, “Should have taken time.”

“Yeah.” He didn’t speak for a moment. He then opened his mouth to speak again, when the door clicked open. “Jones?”

Jones stepped in, looking a little ragged. He carried in bags and moved to the room to drop them. Janie followed him, carrying more bags.

“Jesus, these are heavy,” she commented. “What do you have in here? Bodies?”

“Yeah, we don’t have any food, so we need something,” Jones answered. “Hello Minka,
Zdravstvuyte
, Vasily.”

“What did he say?” Leo asked low.

“He said hello,” Janie smiled. “Are you guys having a party in here?”

Minka didn’t smile or laugh, “We have English and Russian lesson. He likes Akhmatova.”

“
Oh.
Sounds like you found a catch, Minka.”

“A catch?”

Vasily just looked between them with wide eyes. He had no idea what they were saying, but seemed to enjoy hearing them speak. Leo smiled at him and moved to take the seat near him on the couch. Jones exited the bedroom and leaned against the wall, watching all of them.

“It’s like… he’s a good man to date.”

“No, no,” Minka shook her head. “I have son. I do not date.”

Leo felt his heart drop. Vasily looked up at him and took his hand, saying something he couldn’t understand. Though he couldn’t understand, Leo knew it was something calming. Jones watched them, saying nothing.

“All right, all right,” Janie laughed. “Come on, I want you to look at some of my work. See you later, DaVinci. Take care of yourself, okay?”

Minka gestured, and Vasily stood to follow her. Jones waved goodbye, then moved to grab the other bags.

“These are heavy. Jesus,” he said under his breath as he carried it into the other room.

“Do you want help, Sir?” Leo asked.

“Not now.” He came out of the room and lay on the couch. His legs hung over the side. “I’m very tired.”

“Where were you?”

He kept his eyes closed and didn’t open his mouth. Stillness washed over his pallid face – he looked ill. “Where do you think I was?”

“I knew you went back to the base, but you didn’t come back.”

“No.” He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I got back to the base, and I packed everything up. I was able to load it and go down to get the final bag when I heard someone. They’d gotten in.”

“What did you do?”

“I did what I had to do to get out.”

“Did they follow you?”

“No.”

Leo wanted to ask if he was sure, but he knew not to question his commander. Especially in the state the man was in.

“They shot me,” he said softly. “I got it out, and it’s fine, but it’s been rough.”

“Oh my god, Jones. Did you lose blood?”

“I was shot. Of course I lost blood.”

“You need to go to the hospital.”

“No, I don’t. I just need to rest.”

“Yes, you do.”

He opened his eyes and looked at Leo, “I was a medic before I got here. I dressed the wound; it’s fine. I need you to let me rest here.”

“Okay.” Despite the situation, Leo smiled, thinking of how Minka noted he always said, “Okay.” He actually did. “Do you want some food? Did you bring any?”

“I brought what was left. It’s one of the heavy bags I just carried in.”

“I’ll make you something. Maybe you just need to eat.”

Leo rushed into the room and opened one of the bags near the door. Cans and cans of food lay in the bag, packed in like sardines.
Jones sure knew what he was doing.
He grabbed some soup and carried it to the kitchen. He hadn’t even been in there yet – he didn’t realize how hungry he was. Still, he pulled out a pan that had been left there and made the soup for his commander first.

As he did so, he thought of Minka. How cute her voice was when speaking English, how sure she was with her thick accent. When she spoke Russian though, it felt like magic. He imagined what it would be like if she whispered Russian dirty talk in his ear, making his whole body tingle with just her breath. He wanted to feel her closer; he wanted to have her in his arms.

He had to learn Russian, and he had to get Vasily proficient in English. If he could do it, perhaps Minka would respect him, and then he could win her over. Proving his worth to her would be hard, but he knew it would be worth it. He liked challenges.

Wasn’t that why he chose to be a SEAL?

IV.

Jones got better over the coming days. He played guitar and wrote things down thoughtfully every so often. He would leave to make calls and often stopped by Janie’s room before returning to his own. Although Leo felt happy that Jones grew progressively better, he didn’t like being out of the loop. Something seemed up with the commander, and Leo wasn’t sure what.

Since Jones kept leaving, Leo had time to teach and learn with Minka and Vasily. Leo enjoyed the time – he’d always wanted to learn Russian, but he’d never had the heart too after his mother….
He didn’t like to think about that.
Despite Vasily’s age, he taught very well and did possess the patience Minka described. He also learned quickly. He could say, “Hello, my name is Vasily. How are you?” within days. He could even have decent conversations (though minimal ones.)

Leo didn’t learn so quickly. Russian appeared more difficult than he imagined it would be.Plus, he couldn’t keep focus with Minka so near him. She made his mind scramble like an egg or a TV without reception, the white noise all of his thoughts. He wanted to impress her, but he found it difficult to do while trying to learn a completely foreign language to him. Plus, Jones didn’t seem too into them doing their lessons in the apartment.

“Hey, I need you to learn this song,” Jones said as he came into the apartment and tossed some sheet music to Leo on the couch.

Leo looked to his guests sitting with him. “We are doing our lessons right now, Vince.”

“Well, I need you to learn that song stat, Rubin. We have a gig.”

“A gig? I don’t know if I can learn all of this so quickly.”
If at all.

“That was not a request.”

“What is ‘gig’?” Vasily asked.

“It’s a show. A job for musicians,” Jones explained. Vasily stared at him blankly.

Minka explained to him in Russian, which made him understand and he nodded. “Can we come?”

“It’s a state dinner, so I don’t know about that.”

“Is there any way you could get him in? He normally doesn’t take interest in things,” Minka said softly. “He only likes to draw and keep to himself these days.”

“You could come too,” Leo said urgently (
too urgently.)
“Like as a friend date thing.”

“Not safe for me. Safe for Vasily though.”

“That probably is a good idea for you not to go,” Jones agreed. “We wouldn’t want anything to happen to you, but Vasily should be okay.”

“When is it?”

“Tomorrow evening.”

“What?” Leo asked, standing. “I can’t learn a song in…”

              “We don’t say ‘can’t’ around here,” Jones responded. “Just ‘do.’”

              “Yeah, okay. This is going to be a disaster, Jones.”

              Minka guided her son out, “We will see you tomorrow. Good luck.”

              The smile she gave with her luck giving goodbye made Leo’s stomach wrench. He knew he already felt too attached to her; he had to get a grip on himself. But he knew he couldn’t. As Jones said, ‘can’t’ is not a word used; just ‘desperate longing and potential disappointment.’

              “Why did you agree to do a show? I told you I haven’t played piano in years.”

              “It’s for the state. It will be good intel. Especially with the kid there.”

              “What is Vasily going to do?”

              “Well, he can fluently speak Russian, which means he can fluently understand Russian, and he’s a kid. They’re not going to expect a thing. We’ll just guide him in the right direction, you know?”

              “That seems awful exploitative, don’t you think?”

              “We are trying to complete our mission here, Rubin. We have to do what we have to do.”

              “I don’t want to use a kid to finish the mission though. He doesn’t know what’s going on.”

              “She’s not your girlfriend, okay? She’s just a girl who wants better for her son. This certainly isn’t doing it for her.”

              “For one, you don’t know anything about our relationship. For two, I think everyone wants better for their kids. That’s just a fact.”

              “You just think you have it all figured out, don’t you? Let me make this situation a little clearer: someone on the inside has revealed us. I was just ambushed at the place we used to live, and the government is out for our heads. I understand that she’s a pretty girl and you get along with her, but we can’t have another Cassius on our hands.”

              “I am nothing like Cassius. I want to be here.”

              “So act like it. Learn the damn song and stop making goo-goo eyes at the locals.”

              Leo frowned. "What is your problem?"

"My problem is that you are still standing here instead of learning the song."

Leo sighed, grabbed the sheet music, and went to the piano. He barely even remembered the notes now. It had been so long. He lost interest in it when he went to live with his grandparents. It seemed worthless if his mom couldn't hear him and praise him for his expertise.

He stared at the music for a moment, wondering how he’d ever learn the song in so little time. He knew it would be difficult, especially with how little he’d played in many, many years. He didn’t know how he would pull it off, and he didn’t want Vasily to see him fail. The boy then may report back to his mother, and that would not do. Leo didn’t want to hurt his chances with Minka – he knew they were slim anyway, so even a small detriment could mean disaster.

Then, Jones sat down next to him, and showed him which notes to play. The commander didn’t say anything to his underling; rather, he pointed to the note and exhibited which key to play. Eventually, Leo played the song on his own without Jones’s help (though it still had a lot of work to go.) Once Leo could do it on his own, the commander stood and walked to the room, grabbing his guitar along the way. Leo couldn’t understand why the man would be so rude to him at one moment, then so kind in the next.

Maybe he’s bipolar?

Leo continued practicing throughout the night, determined to master it. He couldn’t embarrass himself in front of Visaly; he couldn’t embarrass himself in front of the state. As he played, he thought of how he could help the Russian people if he were able to learn the song and infiltrate the government. Specifically, he thought of how he could make Minka’s life better. She seemed strong, yes, but he saw sadness in her eyes; he knew something wasn’t quite right.

He imagined falling in love with her, marrying her, taking her away from the artists’ apartment building. Visaly could go to a nice school; he could put his smarts to use. The boy could grow up to be an engineer or a scientist or an architect. He could find the cure for cancer. And Minka would look to her husband, her eyes full of love and happiness, to thank him without saying a word. They’d lay together in the same bed, and he’d hold her – her bare skin against his, his body warming hers.

He, of course, also thought of what it’d be like to make love to her, to feel her thighs quake against him as he thrust inside her. He wanted her to need him, to plead with him to make love to her. She’d want him like a drug – always longing for him, always ready for the next high with him. He knew if she’d let him fall in love with her (let herself fall in love with him), he’d never be able to be apart from her. He would become one of those codependent men wanting to spend every living moment with his woman. And in that, he’d want to spend every free moment loving her, feeling her from the inside.

She’d already entranced his every thought. Maybe it was
she
who’d become a drug to him. Maybe he’d become addicted to her without even noticing.