“You know the history between our families. Lies, betrayal, violence. You need to focus on the present.”
“I am,” Nikolai said, irritated at his father.
Zavier took a slow pull of his cigarette and let the smoke drift between them as he exhaled.
“I hear the Olekseis were very unhappy this morning,” he said. His face was as stern as ever, but Nikolai saw the ghost of a smile on his lips.
“That’s right,” Nikolai said. “Nadia’s engagement to Maxim is over.”
“And when will you propose to her instead?”
“It’s been one day, Father,” Nikolai said.
“You know our time constraints as well as I do,” Zavier said. “Where are you at with her?”
Nikolai felt sick at the idea of telling his father exactly how much he’d managed to attach himself to Nadia. There was no way he was going to report on what had happened between them that afternoon, as if it were a trophy or an achievement.
“We’re getting to know one another,” Nikolai said stiffly.
Zavier narrowed his eyes. He had an acute sense for deception, honed over many years of working with the vipers of the criminal, business, and political worlds. Which often times were one and the same. He knew Nikolai was being evasive.
“What is it?” he demanded.
“Nothing,” Nikolai said, shrugging and trying not to look away.
The silence stretched out between them.
Nikolai knew this was a potent interrogation technique...the subject would feel compelled to fill the silence and start babbling.
It used to work on Nikolai when he was thirteen. But not anymore. He just tucked his hands in his pockets and grinned cheerfully at his father
Zavier took one last pull on his cigarette and exhaled slowly.
“Alright,” he said at last. “Well, stay on top of her.”
That almost broke Nikolai’s composure.
He absolutely intended to stay on top of Nadia.
And in every other position he could imagine...
* * *
20
Nadia
Nadia came into the house, flushed with pleasure and amazement at the day she’d spent with Nikolai.
It was insane, falling for someone so quickly after she’d split up with Maxim. She knew it would look awful to her family, and to the gossipy network of mafia families from Moscow to Paris.
And jumping into a new relationship was probably a terrible idea. Didn’t people say that rebound relationships were doomed to failure?
That wasn’t even considering the fact that Nikolai was a Markov. The Turgenevs didn’t have the same long-standing feud with the Markovs as the Lebedevs, but in every branch of her family, her choice would be seen as disloyal at best, and probably dangerous.
She hadn’t even asked Nikolai how his family would feel about it. He might joke about how their grandfathers had once tried to kill each other, but for the older generations, for his father even, those events weren’t ancient history. They were real, painful, and perhaps still burning with hatred in their minds...
But she was getting way ahead of herself. She and Nikolai only been out on a couple of dates, even counting the dinner that had supposed to be with Maxim.
