Chapter Thirty

brYAN

ST. PETERSBURG, RUSSIA

“ M y grandfather's a psychopath, my mother is a fiend, and they will both eat you alive if you get scared, so don’t get scared,” Katya stresses, and I just look down at her, squinting.

“That’s your advice?” I ask in disbelief, and she looks at me, like, oops?

“I’m going to kill you one of these days,” I tell her, and she smirks.

“You can try.”

She’s right. She’d rip my head off before I even came close. I sigh, reaching over to pick up her suitcase from the baggage claim—pink luggage tag, her name scribbled on it in Cyrillic and English—and planting it down for her. “You think they’ll like me?”

She glances at me. “Yes, of course.” That’s it. No hesitation. It makes me feel oddly gratified.

“Man, I can’t wait to hear all the stories of you terrorizing everyone as a little kid,” I tease, and she cracks a grin.

“Trust me, I was an extremely irritating child.”

“I have no trouble believing you on that.”

“Hey!” she protests, attempting to smack me, but I grab her arm before she can and tackle her, wrapping my arms around her waist and pulling her close to me, trying to catch our breaths as she tries in vain to fix her wild hair, not really able to move her arms from where they’re trapped against my chest.

“Let go,” she yells, laughing, nearly tripping over her suitcase. All the people around us are giving us weird looks, but then Katya looks up at me, eyes meeting mine, and that’s when I notice that they’re not fully grey like I thought they were this whole time. Not just like rain clouds right before a storm, like they look from far away. Here, up close, you can just see a glimpse of the blue sky behind them.

“You should really say please,” I say breathlessly, and she smiles.

“Come on. They’re waiting for us.”

D r. Dmitriy Andreyev is, hands down, the most terrifying man I’ve ever met, and that’s counting my dad and Wally, my sadist of an ex-coach.

I mean, it doesn’t come as a huge surprise, considering he was a nuclear scientist and maybe, possibly, a secret agent; plus I’ve heard plenty of stories from Katya. Still, nothing could have prepared me for coming face-to-face with the man. It’s pretty clear where my partner gets her icy glare from. Seriously. Even if looks can’t kill, I was on the verge of cardiac arrest before he finally gave a nod of approval after sizing me up in silence for a solid fifty seconds.

But hey, at least I got the nod.

We’ve been sitting in the living room talking about life and work, giving Katya’s grandfather the rundown, waiting for the other infamous family member to arrive.

Then comes the jangling of keys at the door, and Dr. Andreyev pushes himself up from his armchair. “That’ll be Lyudmila,” he says, and Katya immediately rushes to the front of the house, me trailing after them like a puppy.

“We were wondering if you’d ever show up, my dear,” I hear Dr. Andreyev say jokingly, followed by a string of Russian and the sound of jackets being taken off, which is when I peek my head into the hallway and see a woman hanging her coat.

“Privyet, dorogaya,” the lady says to my partner, unwinding her red scarf and putting it on the rack, smiling ear to ear. I’m assuming this is Katya’s mom, judging by the way my partner runs to tackle her with a hug, and also the fact that she looks like an aged-up carbon copy of her.

They chatter in Russian for a second, but then Katya motions towards me, and her mother’s face lights up with recognition. “It’s nice to finally meet my daughter’s partner. She didn’t do you justice. Katya, really, you should’ve mentioned he was so good-looking.”

Katya elbows her, face flushing, but her mom just laughs.

“Lyudmila Andreyeva,” she says, sticking a hand out, and I take it.

“Bryan Young. It’s great to meet you too.” I’m trying to get over the fact that they could easily be sisters. The resemblance is uncanny even with their hair and eyes being different colors—Lyudmila’s blonde, and her eyes are green, not grey; but seriously, it’s like seeing double.

I don’t know why I’m so nervous. It must be all over my face, because Katya’s grandfather lets out a chortling laugh. “I’m very sorry, boy. Put those two in a room together, any sensible man would be scared.”

Katya rolls her eyes. “Wow, thank you. Anyway, we’re going out.”

“Where?” Lyudmila and Dmitriy ask, just as I ask, “We are?”

“ I want to show him the city,” Katya says, and Lyudmila lights up.

“Otlichno! Wonderful. Enjoy yourselves.” Before either of us can respond, she starts pushing us out the door, handing us coats and scarves and hats. “Don’t be late, I’m making pelmeni!”

K atya drags me all over the place, showing me everything—where the best restaurants are, the hospital she was born in, the schools she went to, the park she played in, the tiny little pond she learned to skate on.

I wasn’t expecting St. Petersburg to be this pretty. It looks like a town in a snow globe, and I’m talking as someone who’s lived in a Hallmark-worthy ski town his whole life. The snow and the lights feel like something I saw on a screen, like a holiday movie you haven’t seen since you were a kid and still stayed up to try and catch Santa every Christmas Eve.

Katya sighs, as we come to a stop on one of the bridges over the Fontanka River. “God, isn’t it incredible? I’ve missed this place like you can’t imagine.”

I quirk an eyebrow. “Okay, should I be offended?”

She rolls her eyes, smacking me in the arm. “Not like that . Someone’s touchy.”

“Have I not earned the right to be, at this point?”

“Fine, fair enough. But it really is beautiful, though, isn’t it?”

I glance over at her. Her nose is pink from the cold, and she’s got snowflakes sprinkled in her hair and her lashes. “Yeah. Definitely.”

As soon as we get back to the Andreyevs’, they’re ready waiting with a stovetop full of bubbling pea soup and a dumpling-type dish that might actually have Grandma Yung’s beat (don’t tell her I said that).

It’s the kind of winter comfort food that feels amazing after so many hours in the freezing cold, and after we’ve all stuffed ourselves, I follow them into the living room, where Dr. Andreyev brings out four steaming mugs of something that smells like a fall candle.

“ Sbiti ?” Katya says hopefully from where she’s splayed out on the couch next to my chair, hair loose over the pillow, and her grandfather nods.

“To warm up your insides.” To me, he adds, “It’s hot drink for the winter. You like tea?”

“Uh, yeah, sure. It smells good.” I can smell the cinnamon all the way across the room.

Katya sniffs her cup suspiciously. “You didn’t change the recipe, did you?”

“The generations-old family recipe? No, I think not. Why?”

“Smells spicier.”

“Is that a good thing?” I question.

Lyudmila ruffles Katya’s hair. “This one here has never been very good with change. Brings out her, ah, colorful side.”

“Hey!” Katya protests, and I burst out laughing.

“You don’t have to tell me twice. You should’ve seen us at the beginning of the year.”

That earns me a swat to the back of the head from the end of the couch, and I grab her hand and lace my fingers through it before she can smack me anymore. I turn and grin at her family. “Exhibit A.”

Dr. Andreyev hands me a steaming mug, giving me a conspiratorial look. “She’s always had a rebellious streak. Gets it from her mother.”

“And who the hell do you think I got it from, you old buffoon?” Lyudmila fires back, in the kind of teasing way that gives me the idea that this is a constant thing for them. It kind of makes sense now that Katya can keep up with our back-and-forth without hesitation, if she grew up going round after round with these two.

I take a careful sip of my drink, and it doesn’t do much good because I still burn my tongue, but whatever. “This is good. Alexandra would love this.” I glance up, seeing the squinty looks on Lyudmila and Dmitriy’s faces. “My sister,” I explain hastily. “She’s five years younger than me. She’s obsessed with all those seasonal drinks they have at Starbucks.”

Katya smiles. “Sasha is very…” She pauses. “ Zhivoy? Lively?”

“That’s one way to put it.”

“Sounds familiar,” Dr. Andreyev says with a meaningful glance at his daughter and granddaughter, before he raises his bushy eyebrows at me. “So. Bryan.”

“Uh oh,” Lyudmila jokes.

“Yes?” I squeak.

“What are your intentions with my granddaughter?”

I choke on my tea, and Katya burns fire-truck red. “Dedushka!”

“Oh, leave them alone, Papa,” Lyudmila scolds, but she’s laughing, and once I recover myself and put down the mug of boiling hot liquid, I look back up.

“Well,” I say, struggling to suppress a grin. “I was thinking Olympic gold, and then we go from there.”

Dr. Andreyev appraises me, squinting, then nods approvingly. “I like this one, Katya. Don’t bully him too much, eh? It’s a wonder he hasn’t run screaming already.”

“Oh my god,” Katya says miserably, shaking her head, and I’m laughing so hard I can’t breathe. She glares at me. “Wow. You too?”

“I’ve been on the receiving end of this all year, sunshine. It’s your turn now.”

She grumbles under her breath, then stands up, sticking a hand out for me. “Come on, Lian sent us the practice tapes she wants us to look at.”

“You heard the lady,” Dr. Andreyev says. “Get to it, mal’chik .”