"Are you sure I look okay?" I ask Dominique. I start as Dimitri's assistant today.

"Yeah," she says as she yawns. "You look hot and professional at the same time."

"You're sure my skirt's not too short?" I ask, smoothing it down. Dominique nods.

"It's good." She looks at me. "It's good you're getting out of The Red Line."

"I'm still working there on weekends," I tell her.

"At least you have a super sexy boss," she tells me. "Does he have a sturdy desk?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Cuz you don't want it to break if he takes you on it." Dominique's grinning. I shake my head.

"I'm gonna leave now," I tell her.

"Good luck. I'm going back to bed," she says. I smile as I walk out.

I take the bus to Dimitri's office. I stop and get coffee before walking in. I don't get as many odd looks. I get off the elevator and walk into his office. He's sitting down.

"Hey," I say. Dimitri looks up.

"You're early," he says. I shrug.

"I got you coffee," I say and hand him one. "So, what exactly am I supposed to do?"

"Can you help me arrange my desk?" Dimitri asks. I frown.

"It looks pretty neat to me," I say. He grins sheepishly and opens one of the drawers. Papers are crumpled and shoved everywhere.

"Every drawer maybe looks like this," he says. I laugh.

"Where do I start?" I ask.

"Just try to group the papers by whatever seems right." He looks at me. "Sorry."

"Is there anything else?" I ask.

"Not really. I'll let you know," he says. "I have a meeting, I'll be back in an hour or so."

Dimitri leaves and I start looking through the drawers. Damn, everything is shoved everywhere.

I sigh and sit down on the ground. I pull out papers and put them in stacks. "Oh, Jesus," I mutter when I find a half-eaten protein bar.

Dimitri comes back an hour later. I've gotten through two drawers.

"Five," I tell him. He frowns.

"Five what?" he asks.

"Five half-eaten protein bars." I throw a wrapper at him. "That's disgusting."

Dimitri shrugs. "All of my other assistants quit or were fired before they could go through my desk."

"That's not even a good excuse," I say. He laughs. "I tried to organize papers based on cases."

He sits down. "Thank you."

"No problem," I say. I go to open the third drawer but he stops me.

"Not that one," Dimitri says. I frown.

"Why not? It's probably just as bad as-"

"Don't go in there, Kincaid," Dimitri says in a firm voice.

"Fine," I say. "I won't go in there as long as you throw away your half-eaten protein bars."

Dimitri smiles. "Deal," he says.

I stand up and walk around him. I sit down and start looking through another drawer. I frown at a sheet of paper. It's in a foreign language.

"What's this?" I ask.

"Oh, just a letter from my mom," he tells me.

"Is this is in...what? German?" I ask. Dimitri smiles.

"Russian," he says. "My mother is from there originally."

"Can you read this?" I ask. He nods. "Fluently?"

"Yeah," Dimitri says. I point to a sentence.

"What does that say?" I ask. He smiles.

"My mother and I have an...interesting relationship." He looks at me.

"What does that mean?" I ask.

"It means that she um, called me a stupid dick that should stop fucking trash," Dimitri says. My lips twitch into a smile.

"She really said that?" I ask. He nods. I laugh. "That's kind of amazing."

"I guess," he says. "She means well."

"What about your dad?" I ask. He shrugs.

"I never met him," Dimitri says. "My mother left Russia when she was pregnant with me."

"You and Jerome are half-brother's then?" I ask.

He nods. "My mother fell in love with a rich businessman and they got married. Along came Jerome," Dimitri tells me. "Anyways, Jerome and I are both fluent in Russian. Do you speak any other languages?"

"Oh, no. I um, grew up in a small town," I say. "It was very rural. You know...church and football."

"You still talk to your parents?" Dimitri asks.

"We don't get along."

"Damn it, Adelaide!" Mother yelled. "Stop screaming!"

I blinked. I had nightmare's about Braxton every night and always awoke screaming.

"I'm sorry," I said quietly.

She shook her head. "How did I end up with a daughter like you?" I heard her mutter as she walked away.

I hugged my knees. I couldn't stay at my apartment after what he did. Everywhere I looked I was reminded of him.

The only choice I had was to stay at my parent's house. They kicked me out when I was sixteen. I couldn't be the perfect daughter.

They secretly resented me. And I was powerless to do anything. My nightmare's had only been getting worse.

I shuddered at the thought of him. My nightmare was of one of the usual ones: him coming back. He had the same look in eyes.

"Stop it, Ade," I muttered.

"Kincaid?" Dimitri's eyes search mine. He touches my shoulder.

"Sorry, I got...distracted," I say.

"No worries," he says. "How come you and your parents don't get along?"

"I don't want to talk about it," I say. He sighs.

"I swear you say the same five lines," he tells me. I frown.

"No, I don't," I say.

"You say this at least once a day: 'It doesn't matter'," Dimitri says. "It's getting old. I keep telling you to let me in and you keep pushing me away. And then sometimes when you finally start to open up, you give me extremely vague answers."

"I just...some things I can't talk about," I say.

"Why can't you talk about them?" he asks. I sigh.

"Some things are better to be left in the dark," I say. "But, my parents never agreed with who I was."

"When was the last time you talked to them?" he asks.

"Two years ago," I say. I stand up and brush my skirt off. "Is there something else I can do for you?" I ask.

"There are some things in the copy room," Dimitri says. "Take the elevator to the tenth floor, take a right and then it should be the third door."

I nod and follow his instructions. I manage to make it to the copy room. There's a mailbox with Dimitri's name on it. I grab what's in there and then start looking at the faxing machine.

"Adelaide?" a familiar voice says. I spin around.

Oh, God. It's Lincoln.