The front door still sat wide open. Danny had disappeared into the elevator some time ago, now---he couldn’t be sure of how long, exactly---but Nikolai still hadn’t moved to shut and relock the front door. Above the swirling emotions that had come from the confrontation and its abrupt end, one thought presented itself:
What just happened?
He had very little to go on. Each bit of knowledge he did have painted an unclear picture: Danny had clearly been drunk, angry (at him), and said something that had made Noelle (someone he’d known so far to have a strong constitution, not easily shaken by things she heard or saw) look shocked. But what, exactly, had he said?
Danny himself hadn’t offered any insights before taking off---had not even maintained the end of the conversation in English, even after Nikolai had brought to his attention that the majority of it had been in Italian---leaving Nikolai and Noelle standing in the living room.
There wasn’t anything else to be, but confused. He didn’t have enough context for more.
In the privacy of his own home, in the company of someone he trusted to be discreet, Nikolai admitted aloud, “I don’t understand.”
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As a general rule, Danny tried not to have too much wine while drinking alone away from home. It was something he’d carried with him for years, born first of the concern of an immigrant navigating a brand new country, wary of the unknown, and later of the knowledge that had come from falling into sex work. Being drunk alone amongst the members of Moscow’s criminal underbelly was dangerous. Now, it was more habit, than anything else.
And a founded concern that he would do something like this.
Were he sober, he could say that this whole thing wasn’t any one person’s fault. He’d gotten drunk, and Luka could have maybe taken a little more care in his radio calls, and Nikolai...
Well, Nikolai could put his dick in whoever he wanted. Except that the more Danny had had to drink as the evening wore on, the less he liked that thought. So Nikolai could sleep with whoever struck his fancy, but when Danny had done it while they were living together, it became a Thing whenever Nikolai found out about it.
And then Danny had moved out. They had said it was always meant to be a temporary living arrangement (as much as Danny had hated that idea) and Nikolai hadn’t stopped him when he’d brought it up, and then...
And then nothing. Nikolai had backed all the way off, without so much as maintaining regular radio contact. Sometimes Danny heard from him, but for the most part, he didn’t.
Generally, that meant things were over, move on.
But this was Nikolai. Nikolai, who he’d had sex with more than a few times. Nikolai, who he’d lived with for years. Nikolai, who’d asked him to move to a new country with him. Nikolai, who’d bought him dogs, and continued to insist on making wire transfers to keep those dogs well cared for, even on Danny’s relatively small earnings.
Nikolai, who was regularly fucking other people.
Mm, yeah, there it was. His anger, red hot and wine-fueled.
Danny played up how drunk he was (or just let more of the reality seep through) to convince the man at the front desk to let him in and buzz him up to Nikolai’s stupid, whole-floor condo.
He didn’t have his key anymore, but that was fine.
If Nikolai was out again, Danny would wait at the door.
His anger existed without real direction. At Nikolai, sure. The argument could be made that it was largely centered around sex. Further than that, dating. But truthfully, there wasn’t a solid concept for it to rally behind.
He was going to walk up to---the elevator doors slid open---that door, knock, and when Nikolai answered... Just start yelling, maybe. There were plenty of places to start.
They weren’t together, and yet he’d nearly killed Church for having the audacity to go through the motions of courting Danny. They weren’t together, and yet he had always expressed massive levels of concern whenever Danny came home later than usual.
The door thundered under his fist.
Nikolai was fucking other people, and he wasn’t even being subtle about it.
The door fell away before Danny could continue his assault on it, revealing Nikolai, dressed like he might have been planning to go out somewhere (not fancy, but not his staying at home attire), brows knit together.
“Danny?”
Fuck. Him. Fuck him. That was a good place to start. “Fuck you.” The words rolled off his tongue easily. He paired them with a shove to Nikolai’s chest that didn’t even rock him back on his heels. Asshole. “Fuck you.”
Nikolai’s frown grew heavier. “Danny are you-”
“Fuck you,” Danny repeated. He could still taste the wine on his tongue. Fuck him for-- for-- “Do I mean nothing to you?” Oh, ouch Yeah, that. “Did all of this,” a gesture around them to the condo, “mean nothing to you?”
“Danny, I d-”
He shoved again at Nikolai’s chest, and again, and again, until Nikolai finally budged, creating enough space for Danny to get in the doorway. The Russian kept his bulk between Danny and the rest of the condo, though, trapping him in the small space of the entrance hallway.
“Why did you spend months getting mad when I slept with other people, but now that I’m gone, you’re off fucking, what? Three? Four? Men in the red light district?” It would almost hurt less if Nikolai had been bringing home men he’d picked up in bars. Or if, like his coworkers, he was picking favorites from the draculoids he oversaw, if those rumors were to be believed.
That would feel over. But this? This didn’t.
“Is this what you do?” he continued. “Fuck a few escorts until you find one you like, and then string him along until he can’t take the distance when you pull back and he leaves?” That was cruel. Nikolai wasn’t like that.
“Do you pick them for the noises they make when they’re under you, or the way their mouths look when you’re fucking them?” More words meant to cut, but Nikolai didn’t even flinch. He just had that stupid frown on his face, kept trying to interrupt with Danny, I don’t-
Why wasn’t he fucking reacting--?
“Or was I just not doing what you wanted,” a question said like fact. “I’ve had your dick down my throat, if you had a complaint, I could’ve taken it.”
Nikolai did look toward the wall the hall shared with the kitchen, then, expression shifting into something Danny couldn’t quite place, beyond the fact that seeing it just added fuel to the fire. It wasn’t a long look, just a quick flash of his attention to the right, but it was long enough to suggest there was something else on his mind.
Now, of all times, he had something else on his mind.
He shoved again at Nikolai’s chest, and again, finally forcing him back into the living room, but on the last shove, Nikolai’s hands closed around his wrists before he could pull back, keeping him close. (His gaze landed briefly over Danny’s shoulder, off in the kitchen, and his expression shifted again.) “Answer me!”
“Danny, I don’t understand,” came Nikolai’s frustrated response.
He didn’t understand. He didn’t under-- Danny sucked in a breath, gearing up for just what he thought of that, when Nikolai interrupted, “I don’t speak Italian.”
What. “What.”
In the sudden silence that fell, the scrape of wood against stone rang out like a gunshot from behind him.
Nikolai’s gaze slid over to the source of the noise first, concern bleeding through his frustration by whatever he saw over there. He didn’t release his hold of Danny, so the Italian had to make do turning to peer over his shoulder to see-
Noelle. Distantly, something in him was immediately, vehemently horrified to see her standing there.
And she looked... Like she was hoping the floor would swallow her whole, or that it had before this moment, papers clutched in her arms, one leg still pressed against the chair she’d just pushed back and stood from.
From the corner of his eye, Danny saw Nikolai look between the two of them, getting a read on them both. Whatever he found prompted, “What did he say?” Then, “What did you say?”
Rather than answer, Noelle instead stepped away from the table, moving in the direction of leaving the kitchen. Presumably, she was going to be leaving. Quickly. “I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to invade, I was just going.”
“I think that’s best,” Danny agreed at the same time Nikolai said, “Wait.”
Wait? He wanted her to stay?
“Really. We can talk about this,” Noelle lifted the papers a little to contextualize, “another time, it's okay. I shouldn't be here right now.”
Danny couldn’t agree more. Nikolai, apparently, had a death wish.
“No, I-” Eyes back on Danny, Nikolai began again, “You’re drunk. Let me take you home, or call a cab, or-”
Oh. So that was how it was. “You’re getting rid of me.” His mouth felt clumsy around English, but it was easier to manage than Russian.
Immediately, the change was obvious. (Maybe Nikolai had been onto something, saying he hadn’t understood.) Nikolai recoiled, Danny’s words far more effective than a slap to the face. “No.”
“Yes.” For someone so good at his work, what required reading people on some level, Nikolai could be so stupid when it came to other people. He didn’t feel like he was tripping over his words when he next said, “You are literally trying to put me in a car and send me away. But she’s asking to leave. If you don’t want me here, at least have the decency to say it to my face-.” He couldn’t properly shove at Nikolai again, but he pushed his weight forward, feeling Nikolai’s hold on his wrists flex in answer.
He wasn’t going to let go until he heard the answer he wanted, was he? About other people, that thought might have garnered a reaction other than the fresh wave of anger that it did now.
Nikolai didn’t get to dictate all the terms of their interactions, and if he thought he did, he had another thing coming.
“Let me go.” He pulled with increasing insistency against Nikolai’s hold, even as he felt his balance shift too far back. He’d fall if Nikolai let go that second, and yet, he still pulled. “You want me gone, fine, just let me-” Both of them were talking over him, too many words in languages his wine-drunk mind couldn’t quite keep up with. “Let go of me-!”
He wasn’t sure what it was that finally did the trick. Whether his volume, his tone, or the sudden outburst in Nikolai’s native tongue that startled Nikolai into letting go. Danny landed solidly on his ass, and for a heartbeat, all three of them were silent. And then Danny was getting to his feet.
“Danny-”
“No.” He suddenly, desperately didn’t want to be there anymore. “Don’t touch me.” He didn’t look up to see if Nikolai had understood that. He needed to leave. All of that, and his outburst hadn’t even had a lasting impact because Nikolai hadn’t understood a word he’d said.
He wasn’t sure if Noelle said something else, or if Nikolai had grown some sense and knew better than to reach out again, but Danny managed to get out the door and into the elevator without more incident.
