Chapter 7 Vera #2
Dimitri enters exactly at seven, and I can immediately tell tonight is going to be different. There’s something coiled about him, tense in a way I haven’t seen before. His jaw is set, his movements too controlled, like he’s holding back.
He sits and doesn’t say anything. He just stares at me with those cold gray eyes.
Anya serves the first course which is a salad with goat cheese and beets. The smell hits me immediately, sharp and earthy, and my stomach lurches. God, I hate beets. I press my napkin to my mouth, breathing shallowly through my nose.
“Not hungry?” Dimitri’s voice cuts through the silence.
“I’m fine,” I manage.
“You said that yesterday. And the day before. You’re not fine.”
I force myself to pick up my fork, spear a piece of lettuce and bring it to my mouth. Chew. Swallow. Keep breathing.
“Tell me something,” he says casually, but there’s nothing casual about his tone. “This boyfriend of yours. The one you were seeing before our marriage. Does he know where you are?”
My fork clatters against the plate and I swear I stop breathing. “What did you say?”
“The intelligence report mentioned you’d been seeing someone.
Leaving the house in the evenings, returning late.
Clearly it was serious enough that you kept it secret from your family.
” He takes a sip of wine, watching me over the rim of his glass.
“So where is he now? Does he know you’re here? Is he trying to contact you?”
My heart is pounding so hard I can hear it in my ears. “I don’t—that’s none of your business.”
Dimitri smirks. “Everything about you is my business. You’re my wife.”
“In name only,” I shoot back. Oh God, we were so careful. How did someone figure out I was seeing someone? “You made that very clear.”
“So who was he?” Dimitri presses. “Some civilian? Another family’s son? Someone you thought you could run away with?”
The bitterness in his voice surprises me, but I’m beyond caring at this point. I can’t tell him it was Alexei.
“There’s no one,” I say, which is technically true. Not anymore. Not since Alexei died and took my whole heart with him. “Whatever your report says, it’s wrong.”
His smile is cruel. “Liar.”
I set down my fork again, willing my voice to remain calm. “Why do you care? Why does it matter if there was someone? You don’t want me. You’ve made that abundantly clear. So what difference does it make if—”
“It makes a difference because you’re mine now,” he interrupts, his voice dropping to something dark and possessive. “And I don’t share.”
The hypocrisy is stunning and I blink in surprise. “You won’t even sleep in the same house as me most nights. You can barely stand to be in the same room. But I’m supposed to be exclusively yours? That’s rich.”
“I come home every night for these dinners, don’t I?”
I roll my eyes. “To torture me, yes. What an honor.”
His jaw clenches. “Careful, Vera.”
“Or what?” The recklessness from last night is back, fueled by exhaustion and nausea and the crushing weight of everything going on in my fucked up life.
“You’ll make my life more miserable than it already is?
You’ll cut me off even more?” I narrow my eyes.
“Tell me, Dimitri, what else can you possibly take from me?”
He stands, moving around the table again, and I should be afraid but I’m too tired to care anymore. Let him yell. Let him rage. At least it’s something other than this cruelty.
But he doesn’t yell. He stops a few feet away, looking down at me with something in his eyes I can’t read.
“I could take a lot more,” he says quietly. “Don’t tempt me.”
We stare at each other for a long moment. Then another wave of nausea hits me, so strong and sudden that I can’t hide it. I press my hand to my mouth, squeezing my eyes shut, fighting to keep everything down.
“What is wrong with you?” His voice has changed, the anger replaced by something else. Concern? No. Impossible.
“Nothing,” I gasp. “I’m fine. I just need—”
I don’t finish the sentence. I push back from the table and barely make it to the bathroom down the hall before I’m violently sick.
When I emerge ten minutes later, shaking and sweaty and humiliated, he’s standing in the hallway, waiting for me with arms crossed against his broad chest.
“This is getting ridiculous,” he snaps. “You’re seeing a doctor.”
He’s right, I do need to see a doctor but not for the reason he thinks. “No,” I say firmly.
“That wasn’t a request,” Dimitri says sharply.
“I don’t need a doctor,” I insist, wiping my mouth with the back of my hand. “It’s just stress. It’ll pass.”
“Stress doesn’t make you vomit every day.”
“How would you know?” I’m too exhausted to be careful anymore. “You’re not here. You avoid this house like it’s infected. You only show up for dinner to remind me how much you hate me. So don’t pretend you care about my health.”
Something flashes across his face—hurt? Guilt?—but it’s gone before I can identify it.
“Go to bed,” he says finally. “We’ll discuss this tomorrow.”
My hackles rise at being treated like a child. “There’s nothing to discuss.”
“Vera.” My name on his lips is a warning. “Go. To. Bed.”
I don’t have the energy to fight anymore. I turn and climb the stairs, feeling his eyes on my back the whole way.
Two days later, I’m in the library, sitting in my window seat with a book I’m not reading, when Dimitri appears in the doorway. He’s dressed formally in a dark suit, a crisp white shirt, and a dark tie. Business clothes. His expression is carefully neutral.
“Get dressed," he says. “Something appropriate. We have a meeting.”
I look up from my book. “A meeting?”
“A joint family meeting. Konstantin called it. Territory divisions, trade routes, all the boring details of making sure this peace treaty actually works.” He checks his watch. “We leave in thirty minutes.”
My stomach drops and it’s not from nausea. “You want me to come?”
He looks annoyed. “You’re required to come. You’re the living symbol of this peace, remember? The bridge between our families. Both sides need to see that you’re..” He trails off, searching for the word. “Alive. Unharmed. Proof that the treaty is holding.”
“I’m not going,” I say immediately. The thought of seeing my family—of my father, of Uncle Marcus—makes me want to vomit again.
“Yes, you are.” His tone brooks no argument. “This isn’t negotiable. You’re my wife. You attend family meetings with me. That’s how this works.”
“I can’t.” My voice cracks. “Please. Don’t make me face them. Not yet.”
His expression shifts and softens almost imperceptibly, but then it hardens again. “Thirty minutes,” he says firmly. “Wear the gray dress. It looks…” He pauses. “Appropriate.”
He leaves before I can argue further.
I make it to my room before the panic really sets in. I’m going to see my father. My family. The people I haven’t spoken to since the wedding, since they sold me to the Volkovs to save their own skins. The people who killed Alexei.
The thought of being in the same room with both families, with all that rage and hatred and violence, makes me want to crawl under my bed and never come out.
But I don’t have a choice. I never have a choice.
So I dress in the gray dress Dimitri specified.
It’s conservative, expensive, and exactly the kind of thing a mob wife wears to important meetings.
I do my makeup carefully, trying to hide the dark circles and the pallor.
I style my hair back in a neat bun, and look at myself in the mirror.
I barely recognize the woman staring back.
She looks like someone who’s survived something terrible.
I suppose I have.
Dimitri is waiting at the bottom of the stairs. His eyes sweep over me. “Good. Let’s go.”
The drive is silent. We’re in the back of his SUV, the same one from our wedding day, with the same driver and the same guards. Dimitri stares out his window, radiating tension.
“Where are we meeting?” I finally ask.
“Neutral location. The Ashfords refused to come to Volkov territory.” His voice is flat. “Can’t imagine why.”
The sarcasm stings, but I don’t rise to it. I’m too focused on trying not to throw up, and keep my breathing steady. I need to prepare myself for whatever’s coming.
We pull up to what looks like an abandoned office building on the outskirts of the city. But when we enter, I see it’s not abandoned at all. It’s been converted into a meeting space.
The smell hits me first. Old carpet and industrial cleaner and the underlying scent of cologne and perfume from too many people in one space. My stomach lurches.
Then I see them.
My family is already there, clustered on one side of a large conference table. My father, looking older than I remember. My uncle Marcus with that same smug expression that makes me want to scream. Several other men I recognize—advisors, enforcers, my father’s inner circle.
And they all stop talking when they see me.
My father’s face goes pale. Uncle Marcus’s expression hardens. But neither of them moves toward me or says my name.
I’m suddenly, horribly aware that I’m wearing Dimitri’s ring and I’m standing beside him. To them, I’m not their daughter or niece anymore—I’m a Volkov now.
The enemy.
Dimitri’s hand lands on the small of my back and I have to fight not to flinch.
He guides me to the other side of the table where the Volkovs are gathered.
Konstantin is there, looking distinguished in an expensive suit along with Roman, Dimitri’s head of security.
Several other men whose names I don’t know.
They look at me with barely concealed hostility. I’m an Ashford in their midst. The daughter of the family that killed their Alexei.
I sit where Dimitri indicates which is right beside him, close enough that our shoulders almost touch. He pulls out my chair, the gesture almost gentlemanly if not for the way his hand lingers on the back of it. A territorial claim that everyone in this room understands.
She’s mine now. Stay away.