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"Just depends on the type of business, exactly." She replied. "That determines where in the city I need to be."

Oh.

Knot turned to look at him. She chastised herself for getting lax around the man, but there was too much accuracy attached to the question for her to be comfortable with him asking it out of the blue. "Yes." She answered, honestly. She wasn't going to deny it. Admitting she did wasn't the same as laying it all out there for someone. There was no shame in admitting it. "Are you asking as someone who has one as well, to know what it looks like?"

Though it was tempting to almost throw in a snide comment about how he actually wouldn't know what one looks like...because he didn't have one. But she knew that wasn't true. He wouldn't have been so mad and so angry at her as Still if he didn't care to some extent.

She was so used to having to pry answers from him, that she was surprised when he honestly answered her question, and then some. It also didn't take rocket science to know who he was talking about. She knew who he was talking about.

Knot looked away from him. Not just to the fire, but to the other side of the cabin, because she knew in that moment, she wouldn't be able to school her face, so she turned it away completely. Her eyes closed and her brows knitted. It didn't fix everything, what he said. While the words exchanged in their fight had a lot of truth to them she didn't want to acknowledge until now, there were quite a handful of things he had said to her with no other intention than just to be cruel. It didn't absolve all that hurt, but to know that he hadn't pushed her aside, that he still thought of her, too---

It changed a lot for her.

After a moment, when she felt she could reign in that sudden burst of emotion. Knot fished out her phone. She'd try to pretend like it was a reason she had turned away from him, and checked the time, anyways. Still no reception, but she didn't care anymore if this storm lasted for 30 more minutes for the next 30 hours.

"Yes and no." She answered, slipping her phone back into her coat pocket and turned to look back at him. "See, I'm in the same boat in a way, but my line of work is a big reason why we're fighting. After some time, I'm seeing the problems with it...so it's not with enthusiasm I'm throwing myself into it. Just enough to get by, until I figure out what to do next." And maybe, sometime soon, she'd be able to just tell the man without the need for placeholders.

"By the way---" Knot reached up to cup his cheek, and then she leaned in to kiss him. She didn't linger, but her lips against his were firm and sure. The woman let her hand drop. "Happy New Year's." She said. "It's just after midnight. You're not exactly the first Russian I wanted to kiss in the new year, but you'll do." She smirked at him.

Who was this man? She felt like she was almost talking to Beringia with how easily the words flowed between them. She almost wanted to laugh at the 180, but this was what she had wondered about. What it could be like if she wasn't apart of the Negaverse. What he'd be like. She was seeing it, and it made her heart ache for it. An ease with which they talked, an acceptance of her---and more. People can change. Yes. They can.

"Oh---" He pulled her back in, and she didn't bother to fight the way her stomach fluttered and the desire heated her. He asked, and for a moment, she searched his face and his bright blue eyes. Like arctic ice, that shifted shades of blue. She thought of Beringia once more, but she didn't let the thought of him hinder her. He had been upfront about having other women in his life and...well. This was fair. This was fair, and it was Sergei. She wanted him.

"Why not." She replied, and the woman shifted so that she straddled his lap, pressing close against him. Knot's hands reached for him once more, cupping his face firmly. She ran her thumbs over his bottom lip as she smiled at him. "It'll make for a good memory. That one time I spent New Year's keeping a Russian police officer warm in an abandoned cabin during a winter storm."

She crushed her lips to his then, perhaps with a little too much want and familiarity, but she let it go.