26. Gianna
CHAPTER 26
Fyodor Domalachego is a lot bigger than his picture gave him credit for. The man makes Niko look small, which is hard to do. Black hair with a few flecks of gray, broad shoulders, and dangerously powerful arms. He must have been a serious weight lifter in his younger days, the hard muscle resting beneath a softer layer.
“Hello, Gianna,” he says in a smooth Russian accent. His voice is charming, and he’s quite handsome aside from the scar that stretches from above his eyebrow, around his nose and to the top of his lip. I’m fucking terrified, shaking from head to toe as he towers over the car. The back end is still inside the tunnel, but we’re just far enough out for me to open my door. “Please come with me.”
He offers me his hand, and I take it with a forced smile because if he’s playing kind and civil, I’ll play it back. I’ve already been slapped enough today, and this man has a lot more weight behind him than my father or Carlo. Niko said he knew about our marriage already, but still, my heart skips several beats as I lay my ring hand in his, and his gaze slips over the diamonds and rubies.
He helps me out of the back seat and closes the door behind me, leaving Carlo and the vehicle blocking the exit. If that’s not a message, I don’t know what is. I’m sorry for Carlo’s death, but not grief-stricken like I thought I might be. Maybe it was all the betrayal, maybe it's the fact I’m numb to the things that shake normal people now, but either way, I don’t worry about the man who spent his life protecting me and died beside me. He never did it for love, but for money. He resented me for wasting his life, but he did that, not me.
I’m shaking, but I try to keep it out of my extremities as we walk. I’m so small beside him, and the memory of my father telling me I was supposed to bear three to eight of his children flashes through my mind. Of course, his bullet-riddled skull follows. I’m getting used to that second image, and while it turns my stomach, I push it away. How the hell did my father intend for me to give birth to a single one of this man’s children?
I say nothing, hoping that if he doesn’t hear my voice shake, he won’t realize just how afraid I am. This man killed his last two wives, according to Niko, and he was supposed to marry me. He would have likely killed me if I was his wife, and now I’m just a woman who found a way to tell him no. I’ve never met a mob man of any background who enjoyed a woman telling him no. Even Niko.
I don’t know where Domalachego’s parked, but I don’t see his car nearby as he pulls me back down the road we drove in on.
“Didn’t want to give your husband too much warning,” he answers the question my eyes ask. I’m immediately impressed by his observational skills, but I don’t answer. Another fifty yards pass. How did he catch up with us if he was on foot? Did he run the rest of the way? He must be really offended to do something like that. This won’t end well for me.
“So you’re Gianna.” He muses as the road pitches up, just an obstacle to make our path harder as the road eventually continues straight down the plateau. “You’re even prettier in person. No wonder Mr. Bouchard was so determined to keep you to himself.”
“Thank you, Mr. Domalachego,” I answer him as politely as possible.
“Call me Fyodor.” He shoots me a smile, and while it makes him even better looking, it doesn’t touch his eyes. This entire persona is fake, and I realize with a sudden snap of intuition that’s exactly what I need to do to get out of this. Bullshit. Diplomacy. That’s one thing my father taught me in spades while convincing me he was an olive oil baron rather than an arms dealer.
“Thank you, Fyodor.” I give him a smile. “You’re much more handsome than your picture too, and I hope my choice of husband hasn’t proved an insult to you.”
“I mean this as kindly as possible, Gianna, but your choice means nothing to me. So that also means I am unoffended by it. I never made a deal with you.”
“No you never have,” I muse, letting the suggestion hang in the air between us. Maybe he’s just been dealing with hotheads and idiots, and there’s another way through this. A way that doesn’t result in months of ongoing war and more dead bodies.
“I don’t do deals with women.”
“That’s not a surprise.”
I don’t say anything more because there’s nothing you can do to convince someone who believes you are less than them that you are worthy, that you are an equal. Something I learned the day my husband put a bullet in my father’s head. He died, and I was still not enough for the man. I’m not going to be put off by a little misogyny and the threat of death. I’ll have to deal with that either way.
We walk a little farther before he says, “I don’t make deals with women, but perhaps in the interest of passing the time while we walk, I might hear what you have to say.”
“You see, the issue with my husband’s late father was his inflexible thinking. My own father suffered from the same problem.”
My casual use of the past tense doesn’t escape his notice, and he looks at me with heavy suspicion, but that’s not the important part of what I’m saying right now.
“My husband and I were childhood sweethearts with a very profitable potential for a partnership, but old men can be stuck in their ways. Old grudges die harder than the men who carry them.”
I pass him a sideways look.
“That they can,” he agrees, seeming to listen more carefully the more I speak.
“My husband told me you mentioned the lack of histories between his and your family, but ours is not the same, is it? You’ve had a deal with my father for a long time now. I can understand better than you might think how gravely my father was capable of disrespecting a deal. He didn’t understand loyalty.”
“And you do?” he challenges.
“Better than my father, I think,” I tell him, and I’m sure I do. I’m sure I understand that there are people and things in life worth more than money and power.
“Mrs. Bouchard.”
He stops in his tracks and I stop to meet his glare. There’s a deeper interest in his regard now, I’ve cracked through that fake polite layer I was using to keep me safe. I’m entering very dangerous ground.
“I was hoping to keep things pleasant between us until I could get a hold of your father and husband and speak with the ones I truly have an issue with. I wouldn’t bring him up now as it will be very hard for things to remain so between us.”
I square my shoulders and force myself to stand an inch taller to show him I’m not going to back down no matter how unpleasant things get because I know I either die before Niko finds me or there’s a good chance we both die when he does. All-out war has been raging for weeks, and both sides are hungry for blood, but both sides have been overly led by men. They haven’t been given another peaceful option.
“I quite agree, Fyodor. It will be unpleasant to bring my father up regardless of the circumstances as he is dead, and my husband is the one who killed him.”
He turns away from me, controlling some kind of reaction. There’s no physical sign of what it might be, so I simply wait for him to face me again.
“When, when did your husband kill your father?”
“An hour before we were supposed to meet. He took me, and he started the fire. His father told him to kill me.”
“And what of Alexandre Bouchard? I know he’s dead too. Was that all part of the plan? You both kill your parents, and then you have full power of the territory. Doesn’t sound much like you understand loyalty to me.”
“Fyodor, I’m not a fool. The fine workings of our plan and how things came to pass aren’t up for discussion. This is the reality of the situation, and I’ve offered you the respect of the truth.”
“Your husband doesn’t understand this, but you, a woman, do?”
“I, a woman, am in a position to offer you something much more valuable than my father’s old territory and an ongoing war you don’t have the financial means to survive.”
“What would you know of my financial means?”
“Nothing, but have you looked up the name Fletcher?” I raise my brow at him, sure he hasn’t. Sure that he would have judged things differently if he had.
“No, why would I?”
“If you do, you’ll understand my husband's family is worth far more than his criminal enterprise. His brother is worth more than a billion dollars, and he’s insane enough to enjoy watching every one of you die. My husband has already amassed a paid army. This isn’t a threat or an attempt at disrespect, Fyodor. It is an honest accounting of what you stand against and what you’re actually fighting.
“My father made that deal with you, and he never intended to renege. He told me at that dinner but never a day before it. I was to meet you for the first time when you walked in, just having learned a deal was struck at all. My husband is a hothead, and sometimes he acts in his own disinterest, especially where I am concerned.”
His expression softens, and he says, “I can admit love makes a fool of a man.”
“Do you know from experience?” I’m terrified he’s about to tell me how he killed his wives.
“My first wife, my son's mother, was my soulmate. She was killed when the boys were young.” The old pain and rage are still so clear on his features I’m nearly shocked enough to ask about the rumors, but I know better. It’s not my business.
“I’m so sorry.”
“You would have made me a lovely wife, Gianna.”
“And having met you, I don’t believe I would have minded being your wife either, but I think we can do quite well if you take what I’m offering.”
“You have something to offer?”
“Fyodor, my word is law for my husband, and most of my father’s men have already sworn allegiance to me. I have an incredible amount to offer.”
“You would make your husband look weak in my eyes?”
“That would be your mistake.” I shrug. “If anything, I hold him back from his more reckless decisions. He’s often the type who’s willing to burn himself along with his enemy.” I look him dead in his eyes this time. There is no threat, only a promise.
“Well, Mrs. Bouchard, I’m very surprised to admit we have a lot to talk about.”
“We do. Why don’t you and I go up to the chapel to discuss the matter on neutral ground.”
“How is your husband's territory neutral ground?”
“The chapel is God’s territory, not my husband’s.” I smile at him, hoping I haven’t miscalculated where he is concerned.
“You’re a practicing Catholic?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“You would have made me an excellent wife.”
But too bad for him, I’m already taken by a man who may wind up hating me when he finds out the truth of what I’ve been keeping from him.