600AN: It's here! It's finally here! I hope this is as satisfying for you all to read as it has been for me to write. I know it took a long time, but I hope the chapter makes up for it. Please review and let me know what you think. I love Abe so much... I just have to say.
The morning of graduation, I woke to Lissa banging on my door. Despite the fact that I had been getting up for training with Dimitri before sunset for the last year, I had never become a morning person. When I opened the door, Lissa tore through the room like a hurricane, throwing a stack of dresses on the bed and dumping her cosmetics onto my desk.
"Your hair looked so pretty at the party. Please let me do it for you again!" She smiled at me as she ran her fingers through my hair.
"Fine, you win!" Despite the fact that I knew I was going to see Tasha today, Lissa managed to distract me enough to get through the morning.
"So how bad was the dinner party last night?" I asked her as she wrapped some of my hair around the curling iron.
Lissa sighed, "It was definitely uncomfortable. We were all trying to act normal, but it wasn't easy. Adrian actually saved the evening a few times. You know he could charm the habit off a nun and it came in handy."
"Finally something he is useful for," I smirked at her.
"Rose, don't say that. He helped you out a lot when Jesse and Ralph we're following you," she scolded. Lissa did have a point. After we took the phone off of Jesse, there was no need for Adrian and I to pretend date or break up any more, but he did help keep the heat off of me for a few weeks at least.
I rolled my eyes and turned to glare at her, but Lissa smacked me on the side of the head. "Don't move, Rose. I'm almost done."
We met up with my parents, Christian and Tasha in front of the Moroi dorms and I felt a wave of sadness come through the bond. I glanced worriedly at her and she smiled sadly at me. "I wish Mom, Dad, and Andre were here to see this."
I squeezed Lissa's hand as my heart broke for her. The Dragomir's had been my family when my mom left me at school, but now I had both my parents here and Lissa had no one. The tables sure had turned. Pulling her into a hug, I stood on my tiptoes to try and reach Lissa's shoulder. "We will always be your family," I whispered to her. As if sensing something was amiss, Christian came and took Lissa out of my arms and into his.
Unfortunately, that left me without a buffer between Tasha and I as my parents were deep in conversation with each other. For one of the first times in my life, I wished Adrian was there.
"Hi Rose, we missed you at dinner last night." She grinned at me and I wondered what kind of sociopath could smile right at someone's face when they blackmailed them and threatened to ruin their life.
"Yeah, sorry I couldn't come. I had dinner plans with my… Mr. Mazur." I hadn't even told my friends or Dimitri about my dad, I couldn't tell this conniving royal first.
Tasha had a spark in her eyes. "Oh? Is he trying to hire you when you graduate?" I'm sure she was hoping that Abe might solve her problem for her and take me away to Turkey or Russia or wherever was very far from her and Dimitri.
"No, I'm still going to be assigned to Lissa," I said, hoping I wasn't jinxing it since I wasn't official yet, and Tasha's face fell again.
"Oh well… good for you." Thankfully at that moment, Dimitri walked up looking as handsome as ever with his hair tied back at the base of his neck and all dressed up in his formal guardian uniform. The way is black blazer hugged his broad shoulders should be illegal. I had clearly been staring because suddenly Lissa's elbow dug into my side. I flushed in embarrassment and looked around to see if anyone had noticed, but when I made eye contact with Dimitri, he was smiling smugly.
Our graduation ceremony flew by in a blur. I remember cheering as loud as I could when Eddie was assigned to Christian. I couldn't have asked for a better guarding partner for Dimitri. I also remember hearing the roar of applause when I walked up to get my diploma and they announced my scores from the trial. They were the highest anyone had seen in decades. Dimitri was clapping and beaming at me next to the other guardians and I swear I saw Alberta wipe away a tear. They did assign me to Lissa. I guess with scores like those, they couldn't think of a good reason to not give her me. I ran straight off the stage into her arms and we both jumped for joy.
My mom, in the most emotion I've ever seen her express, told me she was proud of me with a smile so wide she looked like a different person. Abe even put his arm around her, sharing in her joy, as if to say "we made a pretty great kid". It was a very surreal moment. My eyes searched for Dimitri, but I couldn't find him in the crowd. As families began to clear out from the auditorium, and I still didn't see him, I assumed he got sucked into something guardian related.
Dejected, I stopped at my dorm alone to peel off my gown and touch up my makeup before heading to Tasha's. Staring at myself in the mirror, I had to admit, Lissa had done a great job. My hair fell in sleek waves past my shoulders and the eye liner she drew on me made my eyes stand out strikingly against my skin. I looked pretty hot, if I did say so myself. Feeling bold, I swapped my flats for a pair of heels that I never wore and put on some red lipstick. My dress was black and sleek, like the dress I wore the night of the lust charm and I couldn't wait to see Dimitri's face when I showed up in it. This dress, however, was satin with thin straps and a loose neckline that hung low on the chest with a slit up the side. It felt amazing on my skin and I couldn't wait for Dimitri to slide it off of me tonight.
Taking a deep breath, I looked skyward. "Lord please give me the strength to get through this night without punching Tasha's lights out." Without further ado, I made my way over to the lounge Tasha had reserved for dinner.
I was one of the last to arrive and I saw my parents, Lissa, Christian, Adrian, Eddie and his parents milling about. Tasha was in the corner talking with Christian and Lissa, but my eyes were only looking for Dimitri. I spotted him in the corner nursing a drink and when his eyes met mine they went wide. Smirking at him, I did a small spin to show off the entirety of the dress. He swallowed thickly and to anyone else, it would appear his guardian mask was still in place, but I could tell how much the dress affected him. The moment was broken when Adrian appeared at my side and handed me a cup with a wink.
The bite of the smell of vodka hit my nose and suddenly I understood the wink.
"Cheers, Adrian," I laughed as I raised the glass to him.
"Cheers to you and how incredible you look tonight, Little Dhampir."
Dinner was an enjoyable affair despite the fact that Tasha was seated a few chairs down from me. I did my best to ignore her and the small pit of dread in my stomach. The weirdest part of dinner for me was watching my parents laugh and smile at each other. If my mom was anyone else, I would say she was flirting, but I didn't think my mom even knew what that word meant. I hadn't had a chance to talk to Dimitri all night, which I think was on purpose on Tasha's part. We ended up seated as far from each other at the table as two people could be. As we all milled around enjoying the last moments before we would all need to return to our rooms, a hand suddenly gripped my arm and yanked me into the hallway.
I stumbled in my heels and fell into something hard and warm. Looking up, my gaze met Dimitri's hungry eyes.
"Comrade, what…" he cut me off by pressing his lips to mine.
"Roza, do you know what that dress and those red lips have been doing to me tonight?" He lifted me and put me on the hall table, stepping in between my legs. Running his hands up my thighs, he slid my dress up indecently high. Part of me was highly aware that someone could walk through into the hall at any point, but as Dimitri moved his lips to my neck, it was very easy to ignore that part. I gripped my hands into his hair and pulled his lips back to mine. When I moved my hands to his tie to begin to loosen it, he slipped his hands from under my dress and placed them on top of mine, stilling them.
"We can't, Roza," he whispered.
"You started it," I pouted at him, but I knew he was right.
"To be continued," he said as he placed a kiss on my forehead, but the sweet moment was interrupted when someone stepped into the hall.
"Do you mind taking your hands off my daughter, Belikov?" Abe's accented voice rang down the hallway and Dimitri's face went pale.
Groaning, I let my head fall back against the wall and pushed Dimitri back from me so I could hop down.
"Thanks for that, Old Man. I hadn't had a chance to tell him yet," I rolled my eyes at Abe's sense of timing as I flattened my dress back out. Dimitri still had yet to regain control of his motor functions as he processed what happened.
"Comrade, this is my long lost dad. Dad, this is my boyfriend." I gestured between the two of them and heard Dimitri whisper "Dad?" followed by some Russian which I could only assume was as many cuss words as he knew.
Ignoring Dimitri and his mental breakdown, Abe smiled at me. "You called me dad."
Embarrassed, I crossed my arms and shrugged. "Don't get used to it."
Dimitri seemed to finally be able to speak. "You?" He looked at Abe incredulously.
"Funny how our families have intertwined again after all these years," Abe smirked at him. "A conversation for another time. I only came back here to tell you I'm not the only one who has noticed your absence and that Tasha is looking for you, Belikov… Maybe tidy yourselves up before you head out though." Abe disappeared back out into the party and Dimitri and I took each other in with a laugh. Both of us had traces of red lipstick on our face.
Cleaning up quickly, we headed back out to the party at slightly different times. I came out second and saw that Tasha had already engaged Dimitri in conversation and he was drinking heavily from a glass of what I assumed was vodka. I wondered if it was because he just found out my dad was Zmey or because he was being forced to talk to Tasha. I barely had a moment to dwell on it when Christian came up to me.
"We got the pictures," he whispered giddily before he explained how he had asked to use Tasha's phone to take pictures with Lissa, but instead, they went through her texts, emails, and photos and deleted everything they could find.
"Wow, I'm impressed, Ozera. That was some straight 007 shit."
He jokingly brushed some imaginary dirt off his shoulders. "Once I confront her about it, this nightmare should be over for you." Throwing an arm around me, he gave me a squeeze. "Almost there, Rose!"
Before long, it was time for us to all head back to the dorms for curfew. I found it silly that we had all graduated, but the school was still making us abide by curfew until we left campus. Regardless, I didn't plan on staying in my room tonight. Somehow I was going to sneak off to Dimitri's. He must have had the same idea, because when he was leaving to head back to his room, he pressed the key to guardian housing into my hand with a wink that set my blood boiling.
When Tasha announced that she would walk Christian and Lissa back to their dorm with the rest of us, Adrian and I made eye contact. I raised an eyebrow at him and he nodded. This was it. When we got far enough away from guest housing to avoid being overheard by the remaining family members lingering around, Christian made his move.
"Eddie," he said loudly enough to catch Tasha's attention. "Are you excited to be partners with Guardian Belikov?"
Eddie looked at him with wide eyes. "What? I thought he was Lissa's guardian."
"Nope," Christian smirked. "He requested to be reassigned to me."
Eddie looked a little starstruck. "I had no idea. Wow… I can't believe he's going to be my guarding partner."
Just as Christian planned, this caught Tasha's attention. "Dimka asked to be reassigned? Why did he do that?" My body tensed in response to her question and my aura must have showed some concerning colors because Adrian quickly put an arm around me.
"I don't know, Aunt Tasha," Christian looked at her stone faced, "I thought you would have some idea."
Tasha froze for a second, but seemed to realize she was caught. Her face transformed into a mask of rage I had never seen on her before.
"It's because of you, you filthy blood whore!" She pointed at me and began to dig through her bag before she pulled out her phone. She tapped on the screen for a few seconds before the blood drained out of her face. "Where are they? Where did my pictures go?"
"We deleted them," Christian told her. "It's over Aunt Tasha, it's time to let this go."
Tasha rounded on me again, clearly not done. "I don't know how you managed to seduce him, but I'm going to make sure Dimitri never looks at you again. I have proof you've been sleeping with Adrian too and he's going to hate you."
I scoffed at her. "You already sent him a picture of Adrian and I kissing, what more can you do?"
"It was all faked, Aunt Tasha, Rose and Adrian never really dated. It was pretend to get you off her back about Dimitri," Christian chimed in.
"That's not true! Rose has tricked you too, Christian. Rose had a miscarriage a few weeks ago. It had to be Adrian's baby or some other Moroi." Tasha pointed at me, her fingers sparking with uncontrolled fire magic.
My jaw dropped. How the hell did she know that? Medical records were confidential! "You bitch." I whispered and I saw everyone's eyes turn to look at me.
"Rose?" Lissa's eyes were wide as she looked at me in confusion. I ignored her.
"I don't know how you found out about that, but don't you ever, say those words to me again." My anger was quickly rising and I made to step towards Tasha, but Adrian held me back. "Dimitri already knows," I spat at her, "Go ahead, tell him. It won't do you any good."
Lissa's hands clapped over her mouth and I realized I needed to have a talk with all my friends after this.
Tasha's face went stony as she pulled one more thing from her bag and held it up. It was one of the pictures from my birthday party that Dimitri and I had taken together. In this one, we were both smiling as we kissed on the sofa. I shivered as I wondered how she got the picture, thinking about how someone might have broken into the cabin while Dimitri and I slept in the other room.
"I'll have to do it," she said more to herself than to the rest of us. "I'll have to show Kirova. Dimitri might get fired, but then he will have no choice, but to accept my offer."
I began to panic, but the photo in her hand suddenly caught fire and turned to ashes before my eyes. Tasha rounded on Christian, knowing he was the only other fire user in the group.
"How dare you pick her over me, Christian. I raised you. I almost died protecting you."
"Actually, that was me." Suddenly, Abe stepped out from the shadows onto the lit path. He began to clap slowly. "Bravo kids, good job so far, but I've seen enough. I think your Aunt is past reasoning with, Ozera. I'm sorry."
"What do you want Mazur?" Tasha spat.
"You like your job, Natasha?" Abe had his hands in his pockets, the picture of nonchalance, except for his eyes which were blazing with fury.
"What are you talking about?"
"Do you like your job? Teaching karate, living in America? Seems like you have a good life set up." Abe continued.
"I do…" Tasha looked warily at him. "What is your point?"
"My point is, that if you ever come near Rose again or think about harming her or Dimitri in any way, you will suddenly find your lease for your studio cancelled and your US Visa revoked before you can even blink."
"You can't do that…" she narrowed her eyes, "Even if you could, why do you care?"
Abe grinned at her and it was a smile that could make anyone blood run cold. "Oh I assure you I can… and if you call my daughter a blood whore one more time, it will be the last thing you ever do, do you understand?"
Tasha's face went even more pale if that was possible and she nodded, looking between me and Abe.
"Excellent, my guardians are waiting to escort you off campus. Christian, go ahead and say good-bye to your Aunt. She's leaving immediately."
Christian recovered from his shock at meeting my dad and clutched at Lissa's hand. "Aunt Tasha, it will take time to forgive you for this, but if you ever try anything like this again, I will never speak to you again. Have a good flight." He turned and pulled Lissa along with him towards the dorms and I suspected he was very close to tears and wanted to be away from the rest of us. My heart broke for him.
"One more thing if you don't mind, Mr. Ivashkov I need to borrow your compulsion." Abe waved Adrian over and he let go of me for the first time since this whole ordeal began. "I need you to compel her to forget about the miscarriage."
Adrian nodded and I'd never seen him take a task so seriously. Once Adrian finished, Abe clapped his hands together once more. "Well I think we're all done here. Anton, Ahmed, please take Natasha from the grounds."
"Wait… one more thing!" I stopped my dad before they took Tasha away and he looked at me with an eyebrow raised. Walking up to Tasha, I looked her in the eyes and said "Fuck you" before punching her so hard, I felt her nose crack under my fist.
Abe sighed. "Do you feel better?" he asked.
"Much," I said, shaking my hand out. "Now you can take her."
AN: SOOOO... what does everything think?! Please leave me a review and let me know! I'm so excited to hear what you all think!