Chapter 19 #2
There’s something ugly in them. Not simple resentment. Something more personal than that. Bitter, almost. It puts a strange feeling in the room, and I don’t like it.
He says, “You always have to control everything.”
“Yes,” I say. “Especially when you’re making it necessary.”
His jaw tightens.
For one second I think he’s going to say something else. Something worse. Instead he just gives me a look I can’t quite place, half hate, half injury, and turns for the door.
As he passes me, I feel a flicker of unease I can’t explain.
Not fear. Just instinct.
Something in him has shifted.
He leaves without another word.
I watch the door close behind him, then look back at Maksim.
He says, “That looked healthy.”
“It wasn’t.”
“No,” he says. “It very much wasn’t.”
I sit down again.
Maksim waits a second, then says, “All right. Continue.”
I rub a hand over my face. “He cornered her last night outside her room,” I say. “Drunk. Put his hands on her.”
Maksim’s expression changes at once. “She told you?”
“No. I saw it. I pulled him off her.”
He nods once, very slowly. “And after that?” he asks.
“After that she and I…” I stop.
Maksim lifts a brow. “You and she what?”
“We complicated matters further.”
“That’s one way to say it.”
I ignore him again.
He studies me for a moment. “And the child?”
I know what he’s asking.
“I don’t know,” I say. “She still hasn’t told me.”
“But you think it might be yours.”
“Yes.”
Maksim nods slowly. “And you told Alina that if Sienna leaves, the wedding doesn’t happen.”
“Yes.”
“Because she’s useful?”
“No.”
He waits.
I say it because at this point there’s no point not saying it. “Because I can’t seem to bear the thought of her being out of my sight in this house.”
The room goes quiet after that.
Maksim doesn’t smile. He doesn’t mock me. He just sits there for a second, taking it in.
Then he says, “That’s worse.”
“Yes.”
“For you.”
“Yes.”
“For her too, probably.”
I let out a breath. “Yes.”
He rubs at his jaw and looks toward the door Ethan walked out through. “Your son wants to hurt you,” he says.
“He’s wanted that before.”
“This feels different.”
I look at him.
He nods toward the hallway. “That look he gave you. It wasn’t just a spoiled son being angry with his father. It was personal.”
I had the same thought. “I know.”
Maksim reaches for his coffee again, then thinks better of it. “What are you going to do?”
“Get through the wedding.”
“That sounds optimistic.”
“It isn’t optimism. It’s timing.”
He nods once. He understands.
Then, after a pause, he says, “And Sienna?”
I look at him and know he’s no longer asking about logistics.
So I tell him the rest too.
“I can’t stop thinking about her,” I say. “When she’s not in front of me, I’m wondering where she is. When she is in front of me, I want her badly enough to forget every other consideration in the room. And somehow that’s not even the part that worries me most anymore.”
Maksim says nothing.
“She matters to me,” I say. “More than she should. More than makes sense. More than is safe.”
He nods once. “Yes,” he says. “I gathered that.”
I look down at the untouched coffee on the table and say, “It isn’t just sex.”
“No,” he says. “It clearly isn’t.”
The room is quiet again after that.
Maksim’s phone rings before either of us says anything else. He glances at the screen and his face changes at once.
He lifts a hand, already answering. “Let me take it.”
I watch him listen for a few seconds, his expression growing more serious with each one. Then he turns slightly away, asks two clipped questions, says he’ll be there shortly, and ends the call. “Rain check?”
“What’s up?” I ask.
“Nothing.” He looks distracted before he leaves the room.
I stand there for a second after the door closes, then head back out. Sitting still is useless.
From a distance, it still looks like a wedding morning. Chairs straight. Flowers set. Staff moving across the lawn with trays and boxes and garment bags. Music equipment near the chapel steps. If I didn’t know better, I could almost believe yesterday was just a bad interruption.
I know better.
I’m halfway across the terrace when I see Yuri. He’s coming toward me from the side path near the hedges, and I know immediately something is wrong. He’s not a man who rushes unless he has to.
I meet him before he reaches the steps. “What is it?”
He stops in front of me, lowers his voice, and says, “We found something.”
“What?”
He glances once toward the lawn, making sure no one is close enough to hear. His eyes come back to mine. “There’s someone on the guest list who shouldn’t be here.”
“Who?”
He hesitates again.
I’ve known him too long not to understand what that means. If Yuri is dragging this out, it’s because the answer is bad enough that he is measuring how to say it.
“Who?” I ask again.
He lowers his voice. “Mikhail Voronin.”
For a second I think I heard him wrong.
Then I realize I didn’t.
My mouth goes dry. “No.”
Yuri says nothing.
That silence tells me more than an argument would have.
I look back at him. “How did he get near this house?”
“That’s the part you’re not going to like.”
I stare at him. He actually looks uncomfortable now. Slightly. Enough for me to notice.
A worse sign than panic would have been.
“Say it.”
Yuri takes a breath.
“Your daughter-in-law invited him.”