Chapter 1 Loss
Chapter one
Loss
Evelina had never so resented wearing black. No less than half of her wardrobe consisted of the hue, but on this day, she wanted to burn it all. She wanted so many things, and it felt like all of them were slipping through her fingers. Just like her mother.
Annetta’s health had degraded faster than expected, and her final month became her final week. Six days after she revealed the existence of a long-lost sister to Evelina and begged a veritable deathbed favor, she was gone.
Evelina thought she had prepared. She’d even thought growing up in the bratva, watching people die around her for most of her life, would make losing her mother easier.
Perhaps it would have, if she’d lost her mother to a bullet or a beating.
But to everyone’s great surprise, it had not been her father’s once-heavy fists or the wrath of his enemies that took Annetta’s life.
Annetta Nikolaev, second wife of Pakhan Mikhail Nikolaev, was lost to the greatest equalizer of them all. Disease.
The funeral was large, but cold. It was a procession without feeling.
It was nothing like what Evelina imagined her mother would have chosen for herself if she’d had the luxury, and nothing like what Evelina wanted for her own.
Not that she would ever be asked. It was the traditional service offered by the church her father attended every first Sunday of the month, and every major holiday, and it had been his choice.
He was the spouse, after all. Never mind that they’d lived apart for nearly a decade.
At the cemetery, her father’s gnarled hand clamped onto her shoulder in a tight grip.
They stood side-by-side as they watched her mother’s casket be lowered beneath the dirt, and for all the turbulent emotion she felt roiling within her, Evelina felt not a drop radiating from him.
He stood stoic, not as tall as he had once been, holding onto his surviving daughter as was surely expected of him and his faded blue-gray gaze fixed forward.
Nothing showed on his face. The harsh reality of that only added fuel to her own agitation.
In the near-silence of the moment, Evelina heard not a single sniffle.
Not even from the fellow wives and daughters who’d come for the occasion.
So, she stiffened her spine, willed herself to keep her glare forward despite that the heat of it was meant for the heartless bastards at her back, and stubbornly held her own tears at bay.
She had cried, and she would cry more she was sure, but not publicly.
She refused to cry as the casket disappeared.
She refused to cry when her father urged her to toss the first handful of freshly turned soil down into the depths where her mother rested.
She refused to let her pain show as she walked away from the burial site.
She didn’t even allow herself to acknowledge Otto when he fell into step behind her, though she was instinctively certain that his nearly tangible closeness—closer than he usually walked—was for her sake.
And a part of her appreciated it. But she ignored that feeling, that unspoken offer of support, and kept her head raised high.
There was still the reception to get through, and there would be alcohol, which meant the atmosphere was only going to get worse.
She expected the drive to the main house to be silent, as the ride from the church had been.
Her father was already settled beside the far window, cane leaning between his knees, and her cousin, Pyotr, was seated beside him with his attention focused on his phone.
The fact that she had to ride with both of them for formality’s sake only made her angrier.
None of them wanted to be sharing the pompous vehicle, but it made the family appear strong when they did.
That was never more important than during times of turmoil—emotional or otherwise.
There was certainly no point balking about it with only the ride back to get through, either, so she angled onto the opposite bench and quietly adjusted her skirt. It’s just ten minutes in traffic. She hoped.
Her gaze flicked out the window as the door was shut, tracking Otto’s movement as he stepped away. She was so used to him hovering that having him in an entirely separate vehicle made her feel exposed and vulnerable.
The car rolled into motion and she curled her fingers into the fabric of her skirt.
She didn’t see her father’s focus shift until he spoke, his voice quieter than it had been even a few years earlier, but still unmistakable. “I want you to move into the main house, Evelina.”
She snapped her head around and sucked in a sharp breath. In her peripheral vision, she thought she noticed Pyotr’s thumbs go still. “There’s nothing wrong with—”
“This isn’t up for debate,” her father insisted. “I won’t have my daughter, my only child, living alone.” He dragged in a breath and curled a hand around his gleaming steel cane. “Least of all in that dilapidated shack that poisoned your mother.”
Evelina reared back. “Otets, the house didn’t kill Mamma. And even if it did, you dumped her there!”
She definitely saw Pyotr lower his phone to his lap at that.
Her father’s wiry brows plunged in a scowl and he snapped his cane outward, striking the backside of her nearest shin with the pole.
His own strength may have waned, but combined with a sturdy metal stick he still hit hard enough to draw a gasp from her and cause her foot to slip out of position.
As he resettled, he said, “I’ve already sold it.
The new owners take possession on Monday.
You’re to be moved back in before then. And be grateful, Evelina.
I persuaded them to accept it with whatever possessions my grieving daughter couldn’t manage to take with her when she leaves, so you need only grab what matters.
” He turned his head toward the window as soon as he was done.
Evelina ground her teeth and held her breath until her tone was under control. “Yes, Otets.”
Most of the time, Otto would say he was fond of his job.
He didn’t drop the ‘L’ word around all that often, but he was certain there was no other assignment that would bring him as much satisfaction.
Not every man got carte blanche permission to shadow a beautiful younger woman through life, throwing wholly viable promises of pain at all the morons who treated her like a toy rather than a person.
The job wasn’t perfect, of course. He wasn’t allowed to touch, either.
Not that that had always been a problem. It sure as hell wasn’t supposed to be. But being a little older and a little below her social station did not prevent him from recognizing the obvious. Evelina Nikolaev was a stunner. Even when she didn’t want to be.
Currently, though Otto was holding up a wall half a room away and at the wrong angle to see her face, he was absolutely positive she didn’t want to be.
In fact, he’d bet anything the only thing she did want was to get the hell out of her father’s oversized home.
It was the house where she’d spent the first sixteen years of her life. It was the house where they’d met.
It was also the building Pakhan Mikhail Nikolaev used as a base, where he held most of his meetings and made the majority of the decisions that would one day plummet him into Hell.
There were always soldiers milling around, less-familiar men ambling down one hall or another.
Worst of all, her pain-in-the-ass cousin, Pyotr, also lived under the same roof.
That all meant house staff, two sets of security details, an endless stream of lower-ranked and edgier men, usually at least one brigadier, and who knew how many outsiders. Pyotr was known to play. It was a security nightmare.
Otto knew he’d need to care about all of that soon, because he doubted the pakhan would let Lina stay in her more modest, unassuming home halfway across the city.
This house was the only other viable option.
Mikhail couldn’t afford to let his only heir live truly independently, on her own anywhere, let alone the hard streets of Chicago.
Otto knew that mattered to Lina. He was even fairly sure he understood.
In the moment, as he watched her sink into herself, alone in a crowded room for the third time that day, he struggled to care about anything other than her pain.
It was hard enough, losing a mother. Being forcibly surrounded by smiles, laughter, and the encompassing rumble of relaxed conversation, as though everyone had gathered for nothing more than some Sunday brunch?
That was a disrespect neither Lina nor her late mother deserved.
“How’s your girl?” a low voice rumbled at his shoulder.
Otto shifted his gaze to sweep it across the room until he could see Kirill in his periphery, just for a moment.
Kirill was the same age as him at thirty-six, two inches shorter than his six-foot-three, and had opted to bulk himself up more in the gym over the years.
He had also learned to read Otto nearly as well as Otto’s own father, as frustrating as that sometimes was.
Otto grunted and reversed the direction of his visual sweep. “Heartbroken, how else?”
“Right, of course.” Kirill turned to lean against the wall beside him. “Rumor has it Pakhan’s having her brought back to the main house. Thought you’d wanna know.”
Otto felt the scowl dip his lips. “I assumed.”
Kirill sighed. “Pyotr’s pretty much been living like a prince around here lately, so … that’s bound to be a situation, you know?”
“Da.”
Kirill grunted. “You don’t have to do that shit with me.”