Chapter 7

🜼 🜼 🜼

Unlike Saratov, where the city remained restless long past midnight, downtown Vancouver quieted as soon as the clock struck ten. Most shops shuttered their doors, and the streets emptied, leaving only the occasional vagrant or drunken reveler. With everyone else tucked safely into their homes, the night felt strangely still.

While Cherriot showered, Yuri stepped outside the hotel for a cigarette. June had nearly softened into summer, but until July took hold, the temperature still plunged after sunset, and a persistent, cutting chill lingered in the air.

SWOOSH

Smoke scattered into the cold, dry wind that brushed his cheeks.

Yuri liked the bite in the air. He had loathed the little border town where he had grown up, yet he had always felt a strange affinity for its climate, for a place where snow blanketed the ground more than half the year. Alexei and the others had often complained that they were sick to death of the cold, their grievances joining into a familiar refrain, but Yuri had remained fond of winter.

The scrape of an icy wind against his skin made him feel undeniably alive. The cold also let him bury himself beneath heavy clothes, concealing the scarred, battered body he had no desire to show anyone. Standing there and staring across the shuttered shopping street, he let his first cigarette burn down to the filter. He was considering a second when a familiar car stopped across from the hotel.

CLICK

Alexei must have finished searching Cherriot’s condo. Unable to shed the careless habits he had picked up in Saratov, he parked crookedly, shoved the door open as though kicking it aside, and climbed out. The sight drew a faint smile from Yuri before he dropped his cigarette butt into the trash bin outside the hotel.

“You knew I was coming even though I didn’t call?”

Alexei spotted him at once and waved. Ignoring the crosswalk, he strode straight across the road with a travel suitcase swinging from one hand. Yuri checked the approaching traffic for him and called out curtly, “Alyosha. Car.”

Even with headlights bearing down on him, Alexei took his time. He stepped onto the sidewalk, and Yuri moved forward to meet him, taking the suitcase from his hand.

“Your devotee’s luggage. He asked for so much that I gave up halfway. I’m not touching some Alpha bastard’s underwear, so tell him to buy his own. His wallet and phone are in there too.”

“Devotee, my ass.”

“He couldn’t take his eyes off you for a second. At that point, ‘devotee’ fits.”

Yuri let out a dry laugh. Alexei should have seen Cherriot pick up an Omega in the few minutes Yuri had left him alone. “Anything happen on the way?”

“Not yet. I’m going to start looking into it now.” With the errand finished, Alexei turned to cross the street, then paused. “Heather said she’d stop by. I told her you were here, and she wanted to check on Cherriot while she was at it. She found something about the group hunting him, so listen in my place.”

Yuri gave a short nod. “When will she be here?”

“Let me see.” Alexei pulled out his phone. “Looks like she’ll arrive within a few minutes.”

“Then I’ll wait here.”

“Can I give her your number? Just in case you miss each other.”

After they had helped Heather in the past, Alexei had exchanged contact information with her, but Yuri had only ever reached her indirectly through him. For a man who avoided widening his circle of acquaintances, a phone number was not something to give or receive casually. His first instinct was to refuse, but in the end, he gave his silent consent. Heather was connected to this case, so it was probably necessary. Besides, she did not seem like the sort to bother him without reason.

“I’m going. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

Rather than point out that the date had already changed, Yuri countered, “Eat first. You only had chocolate and alcohol earlier.”

“Maybe it’s because you haven’t nagged me in a while, but I don’t hate hearing it. Don’t worry, though. Valeri will have something ready when I get home.”

Ah. Right.

Alexei had a lover waiting at home, someone who took care of him far better than Yuri ever could. The thought left Yuri feeling as though he had worried for nothing. Alexei, playful to the end, answered him with a look before walking away.

Only after confirming that Alexei had driven off did Yuri return to the hotel. Standing on a street corner with a suitcase made him conspicuous, so waiting inside seemed safer. Unlike earlier, the lobby had gone quiet. The hotel bar had closed at midnight, and aside from the staff at the front desk, no one remained.

Yuri sat on a sofa and closed his eyes. He had been awake and working since five that morning, nearly a full day, and fatigue pressed heavily against him, leaving his eyes dry and gritty.

Where am I supposed to sleep?

Since he could not leave Cherriot’s side, should he have booked two rooms from the start? No. The rates here were far too high to treat another room as a casual operating expense.

He had misjudged the situation because this kind of assignment was new to him. He had guarded organizational leaders many times before, but then the bodyguards had simply stationed themselves outside a door or in the lobby, keeping watch in shifts without sleeping. He had never needed to remain this close to a client, so he had failed to consider his own arrangements.

As he sat with his eyes closed, drowsiness began to creep over him. He massaged the back of his neck, wondering whether to buy a coffee before going upstairs, when a voice called from behind him.

“Mr. Yuri?”

He remembered the voice. He had not heard it often, but it was familiar enough that he knew his visitor had arrived. Rising from the sofa, he turned to see a woman approaching.

She looked much as she had the last time he saw her: an unassuming beauty with brown hair pinned up and round glasses. Heather Parsons was a reporter for CTV.

“You’re here.” Yuri kept his voice as gentle as he could. He tried to speak more softly to women and Omegas than he did to Alphas, but tenderness did not come naturally to him, and he had never seen much reason to cultivate it.

“Yes! You’ve been waiting a long time, haven’t you? I’m sorry. You must be tired.”

“No. More importantly, is it all right for you to be out this late?”

“I drove, so I’m fine. I finally moved past the learner’s stage and passed my test, so now I can get around on my own.”

They had not seen each other in nearly two years, yet Heather spoke without a trace of shyness. Yuri had not been particularly curious about her driving status, but he nodded anyway. “That’s good.”

“Thank you for saying so.”

Heather seemed quite different from the woman he remembered. Back then, while investigating a criminal case, she had infiltrated a dangerous place alone. By the time she asked them for help, she had been desperate and bristling with venom. Yuri had found the small Beta woman impressive, brave despite her size. In ordinary life, however, she seemed bright and cheerful.

“Are you the only one down here, Mr. Yuri?”

“Yes. The client wanted to shower.”

“Mm. Then should we wait a little longer?”

“No. We should be able to go up.”

He had been outside for nearly thirty minutes, so Cherriot should have finished long ago. Yuri led the way toward the elevator. Hearing Heather’s quick steps behind him, he gradually slowed until their pace matched.

“I startled you by introducing Cherriot out of nowhere, didn’t I? I’m sorry. Of all the people I’ve met, you two are the only ones I’ve ever seen throw yourselves into danger without asking for anything in return. That’s why I thought you were the kind of people Cherriot was looking for. Besides, he has more money than he knows what to do with, so I thought he’d pay you generously and that it might help.”

Yuri listened in silence as he pressed the elevator button, then asked the question that had troubled him ever since he accepted the request. “People can help others without compensation even if they aren’t good. If you believe someone is good based on that alone, I think that’s naive.”

“But I have a good eye for people. Maybe it’s because I’ve met so many different kinds. Some people are polite and speak beautifully, yet somehow make your skin crawl. Others speak and act roughly, but they’re kind and honest. You can’t judge everything by appearances, but I trust my instincts. I’m a journalist!”

The more Heather explained, the more uncomfortable Yuri became. “Do you know what kind of person I used to be?”

“That’s private, so I couldn’t know. But do I have to?”

“Yes.” His answer was firm. “There’s a reason you investigate someone’s background when you’re entrusting them with a life. You need to know whether they have a criminal record and what kind of past they’ve lived. You can’t tell by looking whether someone might betray a client for more money or abandon them to save their own skin.”

“But isn’t that something no one can know until the moment actually comes?”

For a moment, Heather’s reply left him speechless. The elevator arrived just then, yet Yuri remained still even after the doors opened. Heather stepped inside first and beckoned him in.

“I know you might call it optimism, but there are many things you can’t learn from a past reduced to words on a page. When you interview people, you uncover so many hidden stories. Even someone who has acted the same way for years can make a completely different choice because of a single emotional trigger. So I trust what I’ve seen.”

Her answer was clear, but it did nothing to settle the unease inside him. Instead, his curiosity curdled into suspicion and resistance. “You think you can judge me after seeing me briefly two years ago?”

“I only saw you for a short time, Mr. Yuri, but I’ve met Mr. Alexei several times since. Besides, it’s fairly well known in online communities like Reddit that he handles difficult cases for absurdly low fees. I know he doesn’t do fixer work just for the money. And you’re his friend. A very old friend, at that.”

Feeling that any further conversation would only complicate his emotions, Yuri closed his mouth. He pressed the button for the twelfth floor, but when it failed to light, he slipped a hand into his coat pocket and found the key card.

Remembering what he had learned earlier, he tapped the card against the reader and pressed the button again. This time, it lit. For no reason, the image of Cherriot standing behind him and reaching an arm past him flashed through his mind, a strange afterimage that refused to fade.

“Did I offend you?”

“No.” He wanted to say that, unlike Alexei, he was not that kind of person. Then he decided that cornering a near stranger and offering an absurd confession would be insane. “It’s only that I still think skilled people would be more useful to Mr. Goodnight’s safety than ‘good’ ones.”

“I understand. But Cherriot…” Heather trailed off and fell into thought. Yuri left her to it. Before the elevator reached the twelfth floor, she seemed to reach a decision. “He particularly hates rotten people. From what I’ve heard, his family situation was fairly complicated. Among professional bodyguards, some are former mercenaries, aren’t they? People with criminal backgrounds.”

The longer she spoke, the colder Yuri’s chest became. His fingertips chilled, and his throat tightened. His heart stumbled out of rhythm against his ears, and for a moment, nausea swept through him despite the solid floor beneath his feet.

“Oh, we’re here. Shall we get off?”

The elevator doors opened. The hotel’s silence seeped through the gap like a ghost and closed cold hands around Yuri’s throat. Beneath his feet, old phantoms stirred in the shadows, whispering that this was not a place where he belonged.

He should refuse the request, even now.

Surely they could find someone else for Cherriot. What Yuri had mistaken for a mere matter of personality had, in fact, been a clear standard. Cherriot did not simply want a “good” person. He wanted someone who was not a criminal.

Yuri was the exact opposite.

“Heather, wait…”

As Heather stepped out of the elevator, Yuri caught her wrist without thinking. He had never touched a woman without permission, but his head was spinning so violently that his hand moved before he could stop it. His grip looked enormous and brutally hard against her slender wrist, and the sudden pull made her stumble.

“Oh, yes?”

“There’s something I need to tell you before we go into the room.”

Heather looked up at him, startled. Her gaze dropped briefly to the wrist he still held, and her earlobes reddened for reasons Yuri could not understand. She parted her lips, nodded, and had just begun to step back into the elevator when a sound echoed down the corridor.

CLICK

A room door opened.