“Clara?”
Oh shit. My grandmother was home.
“Wait a minute, Miss Olga. Let me get your coat off first,” Judy’s voice gently scolded, and I could so easily imagine the pair standing at the back door, the younger woman gently pulling the coat off the frail body of a woman she’d grown quite fond of and hanging it across the back of one of the chairs at the kitchen table.
I knew I looked desperate as my eyes flicked from Nikolai to the door and back again.
“Who’s car is that outside, Clara? You didn’t tell me we were expecting guests or Judy could have stopped at the bakery on the way home to pick up some of that fancy dessert you and your young man brought me the other night.”
My heart almost stopped beating as the words grew louder, my grandmother coming closer until she and Judy were framed on the threshold.
“You…”
It was a single word and yet spoke volumes. Even from across the room I could see the color drain from my grandmother’s face and see her beginning to shake.
“He’s leaving,” I said, quickly crossing to her and slipping my arm around her waist. Only when I had her safe in my arms did I look to Nikolai.
His lips curled in the same exact smirk they had that night so long ago. I felt a cold unlike anything I’d ever experienced flooding through me. I was in trouble… deep trouble.
“Please… just go,” I begged softly.
“Of course,” he said, bowing toward us. “I’ll call you later, Clara.”
I didn’t bother to even ask how he knew my number or declare I’d not answer the phone. I knew I owed him for not simply doing whatever he wanted to me, regardless of the presence of witnesses. That had never stopped him before. All I could do was nod and gently guide my grandmother away from the door, Judy silently assisting me.
Hell was supposed to be hot, but it wasn’t.
I could attest that it was bone chillingly cold as the man I hated with every ounce of my being paused beside me on his way into the foyer. He bent toward me, the coldness in his eyes rivaling the icy fingers dragging me back into the depths of hell as he whispered, “Get rid of your young man, or I will,” before he straightened and walked through the front door.
My heart constricted as I saw two men appear outside the doorway to follow in his shadow. He hadn’t left his henchmen behind after all.21Clara“Let me make us some tea,” Judy said.
The old Clara would have snapped that tea was just about the last fucking thing I wanted, but the new me understood she was simply using inane conversation to lower the tension in the room and to help her client relax. Baba was now seated, but trembling, the skin white around the corners of her mouth. I looked up and smiled. “That would be great, thanks, Judy.”
Once the nurse had moved into the kitchen, I pulled up an old wooden footstool I’d upholstered in a toile fabric. The design of the linen was in the Delft Blue that Holland had made famous and depicted a scene from the castle made famous by Walt Disney. I’d loved it as a child, pretending it was my carriage that was going to take me to the ball. Of course, my fairy godmother was not going to show up and whisk us away from the shitstorm I could feel brewing. That little chore was totally in my hands. Sinking to sit, I then took both of my babushka’s hands in mine. God, they were so cold and so very frail. I gently stroked my fingers over hers, not yet speaking, waiting as we both fought against the pull of a past neither of us had ever wanted to revisit.
“I’m so sorry, Baba,” I finally said softly.
“So am I,” she returned.
She hadn’t assured me I had nothing to be sorry for. Nor had she raised her voice and damned me for bringing crap down on her head yet again. Instead, she’d been honest and, for that, I was both extremely grateful and infinitely sad.
Instead of returning with a mug or two of tea, Judy returned carrying a tray with the full tea service I’d actually forgotten we even owned. It was my grandmother’s and normally resided in that hard-to-reach cabinet tucked above the refrigerator. She set it down on the coffee table and carefully removed the round teapot that sat on top of the tall samovar and set it under the spout. It was as if we were all watching some fascinating production as the tea streamed into the pot, wafts of steam rising to settle on the silver sides of the samovar before disappearing as if they’d never been there only to reappear a moment later until, finally, Judy reached over to lower the lever, shutting off the stream.