For a long moment, he stared at the door with its tin 5F. Behind that door, his past and his present and his future were all a-tangle. His brother. The Bolshevik who had killed Alyona. The woman he loved with all his soul and never would have met had circumstances not brought him here.

The unanticipated.

A year ago, even with all his watching, all his decoding, and every pattern he saw, he never could have predicted where he’d be standing now. For every detail he thought he knew, God had proven him ignorant of many more.

But He had been Lord through it all. He’d known. He’d seen. And He’d delivered Zivon to this moment, to this door. He raised his hand and knocked.

28

Zivon stepped inside with his hands held away from his body, wanting to do nothing to inspire Nadya to pull the trigger on the gun that she’d pointed at him.

His gaze, however, wasn’t still. He found Evgeni with it in the first second—sitting at a small table and looking as though he might collapse onto it at any moment—and Lily in the next, spooning up a bowl of broth.

She nearly dropped it when he came through the door. “Zivon! What are you—”

“Milaya.” On second thought, he’d risk the bullet to hold her again. How could he ever have thought he could leave the country without doing so one more time? He rushed in her direction, and she met him halfway, his arms closing around her. “What were you thinking? Why would you come here?”

“The album.” She held him tight, then pulled away enough to catch his face between her palms. “You’d have let them leave with it, never thinking of yourself. I had to think of you for you.”

“Step apart, now!” The command was in French.

“Nadezhda. Relax. Let them have a moment.” Evgeni sounded terrible, if one were to listen only to the quality of his voice. But if one listened to the tone, he also sounded amused.

Zivon turned his face enough to kiss Lily’s hand. “The album does not matter. My reputation does not matter. All that matters is that you are safe.”

“And that I’m with you. You’re not leaving without me, Zivon. Where you go, I go.”

How could that be possible? When it meant leaving all she’d ever known, the parents who loved her and needed her, her work here? Yet, as he looked deep into her eyes, he saw she did mean it. Somehow, this woman loved him that much. A blessing he’d done nothing to earn and could never deserve.

Evgeni coughed, a hard, racking sound that drew Zivon around to face him. Nadya had crouched beside him and was rubbing her free hand over his back.

Clearly, she’d been lying this morning when she said he was fine. “You are ill,” Zivon said.