Chapter Two #2
“You are a Popovich.” His voice slices through mine like a blade, in his usual sharp and cold tone. “And you will do what is required. This alliance will strengthen our family. The world is changing, Katerina. The government is preparing to eradicate families like ours—”
“Mobsters,” I bite out.
His eyes darken, the temperature in the room dropping ten degrees.
“Influential families,” he corrects, though we both know the truth.
“And the ones who survive will be the ones who evolve. A marriage to a man like Maxim positions us for that future, and he’s always seen the potential of a marriage to you—aligning our families.
I suspect he’s had a crush on you for a while as well. You will do this.”
For a moment, I can't speak. Can't breathe.
All I can think about is my mother—the smile she once gave when she watched me dance, the way she whispered that I could be anything I wanted.
She lied.
“It’s years down the road, but I can see the future isn’t looking bright for our family. If we move now into a new business venture, we’ll be safe, and our family’s money and connections will be safe.”
“And marrying Maxim?”
Most girls in my position would love to be set up with Maxim. An attractive, wealthy husband with connections and power… but they can have him.
“His family is well-connected as well. His great-grandfather saw this coming even years before I did. He moved his son into politics, and now his grandson. They understand our kind, and with a marriage between the two families, we can move into a new era. A world much easier for you than I had it.”
I let out a small, humorless snort at the idea that any of this has to do with making my life easier or safer. This is about my father and my grandfather’s legacy not dying. I’m just a pawn.
"What if I refuse?" I ask quietly.
His expression doesn't change. "You won't."
"And if I do?"
He steps closer, and I hate that I flinch.
My father is a man of power and uses fear as a tactic in his “business” process, but he’s never laid a finger on me.
I’m his princess. Or at least, I used to be.
Though I know that Luka didn’t have the same upbringing as I did.
Raised to be the next head of the family, my father wanted to make him “tough”.
And he is. I’ve seen him skate at the Olympics with a broken arm before.
I’ve never seen him flinch before a blow from another player on the ice.
He was built to take pain. Unlike me, who’s been coddled most of my life.
I wanted to dance like my mother, so my father agreed to let me move to New York, train with the best of the best, as my mother did.
He put me through Juilliard and gave me a monthly allowance to live comfortably.
And then, three years ago, my father told me that my life was never my own and that I would return to Moscow and give up dancing when he decided.
So I stopped taking his money and used the very little I had to get an apartment with a few Juilliard alumni trying to break out in the field.
Dancing made me enough to live and eat… not well––not in the luxury I grew up in, but enough to be free of my father’s grip.
Or so I unwisely thought.
"Then you'll learn what happens to Popovich’s daughters who forget where they come from. You’ll be cut off and excommunicated like your brother. The family has afforded a comfortable life for you, Katerina. Now it’s time to pay it back, or you’ll have no inheritance left to salvage."
The threat hangs in the air, heavy and cold.
He adjusts his cufflinks, straightens his tie.
"I've booked your flight. You leave in two weeks to start the wedding arrangements. Maxim’s campaign manager wants a spring wedding before the next election cycle. It will help to boost his rankings if he’s married, and I’ve offered a sizable amount to his campaign if he marries you.
Don't make this more difficult than it needs to be. "
And then he's gone, the door clicking shut behind him with a finality that makes my knees buckle.
I sink into the chair, pressing my hands to my face, willing myself not to cry.
I won't give him that.
By the time I get back to my apartment, it's nearly midnight.
The place is small—a fourth-floor walkup in Brooklyn that I share with one other dancer and an actress. It's cluttered and cramped and nothing like the estate I grew up in, but it's mine and, for the last three years, it hasn’t come with expectations.
Or at least, it was mine.
I drop my bag by the door and collapse onto the couch, staring at the ceiling.
My phone buzzes.
Luka: How was the show?
I close my eyes.
Luka. My older brother. The one who got out. The one who still offers to pay for my apartment, for my grocery bills… for everything. I tell him I’ve got it, every time. I would never allow him to do that.
He was supposed to take over the family business—the name, the money, the power, all the things our father inherited from his father. But Luka wanted nothing to do with it. He played hockey in the Olympics, got drafted by the NHL, and never looked back.
Our father disowned him.
Our grandmother—Babushka, the true head of our family—allowed it. But what choice did she have? The head of the family's only son walked out on his duties. It made our family look weak, divided, and vulnerable to dismantling, which is what the government wants to do, if you ask my father.
Luka doesn't talk about it. Doesn't talk about them. But I know he still watches over me.
I type back slowly.
Me: It was fine. Papa was here.
The response is immediate.
Luka: Call me.
I hesitate, then press the call button. I knew he’d be concerned the moment I told him.
He answers on the first ring.
"What did he say?"
No hello. No preamble. Just straight to the point. That's Luka.
"He’s ensuring that I can’t get a sponsorship visa renewal from the Company when it expires in six weeks," I say quietly. "I have to go back to Moscow by the end of the month and marry Maxim Volkov."
Silence.
Then: "Like hell you do."
"Luka—"
"He can't force you to go back."
"He already has. He blocked my work visa extension through his influence around town. He's arranged a marriage—"
"To whom?"
"Maxim Volkov."
Luka swears, low and vicious, in Russian.
I close my eyes. "He said it's my duty. That I've had my 'adventure,' and now it's time to come home."
"And what did you say?"
"What could I say? You know I have no choice. He’s going to sour all my connections in New York. He practically owns everyone involved with the theaters in New York. And when my visa expires, I’ll be deported, anyway. Sent back to Moscow, or prison… one of the two.”
Another silence, longer this time. Like he's trying to come up with a solution that gets me out of this, and I wish with all my heart he could. If anyone can stop this, it’s Luka… but at what cost?
When Luka speaks again, his voice is calm. Too calm.
"How willing are you not to go back to Russia?"
I sit up slowly. "What do you mean?"
"I mean… how far are you willing to go to stay here? To keep dancing? To pursue your dreams."
"Luka, what are you—"
"Just answer the question."
I think about my father's cold eyes. About Maxim Volkov and walking down the aisle to marry him. About the life waiting for me in Moscow—gilded and suffocating and nothing like the one I've built here.
I’d rather live three girls deep in a studio apartment than go back to the opulent life in Moscow that doesn’t belong to me.
"I'd do anything," I whisper.
"Good." I can hear him moving, the sound of a door closing. "Then pack your bags."
"What?"
"I'm working on something. I'll have the details for you tomorrow. But Kat…" He pauses. "You need to trust me."
"I do trust you."
"Even if it sounds insane?"
I laugh, and it comes out shaky. "You're my brother. Insane is kind of your specialty."
"This might feel like insanity beyond what you might be comfortable but I think it could work." There's a smile in his voice now.
“Do I have to fake my own death?” I ask.
Finally, Luka lets out a soft chuckle. "No, not that extreme, but it might feel like it. Get some sleep. I'll call you in the morning."
"Luka—"
"Trust me," he says again.
And then he hangs up.
I sit there in the dark, my heart pounding, my mind racing.
I don't know what he's planning.
But for the first time in weeks, I feel something other than dread.
I feel hope.
The next morning, I meet my best friend, Irina, at a coffee shop in the West Village.
She's already there when I arrive, with two lattes and a croissant waiting on the table. She takes one look at my face and groans.
"That bad?"
I sink into the chair across from her. "Worse."
"Your dad?"
"He's forcing me to go back to Moscow. Arranged marriage to a politician with bad taste in flowers."
Irina's eyes go wide. "You're kidding."
"I wish I were."
"Can't you just… refuse?"
I give her a look.
She winces. "Right. Scary Russian mob family. Forgot."
Irina's one of the few people who know the truth about my family—not all of it, but enough. She's been my closest friend since Juilliard, the one person I trust completely.
"So what are you going to do?" she asks.
"I don't know. Luka says he's working on something, but he wouldn't tell me what."
"Your brother's kind of terrifying, you know that, right?"
"He's protective."
"He sent you two bodyguards when you sprained your ankle last year."
"That was excessive," I admit, but he was worried it had something to do with my father, or someone trying to send a message to my father. In truth, it was just a clumsy moment of mine.
"That was unhinged.” She shakes her head, sipping her latte.
“It happened right after he told my father that he was renouncing his place in the family. My father was irate. Luka thought that maybe my father was taking out his punishment on me to teach Luka a lesson. He was being an overprotective brother… I’ll give you that.”
"And how did Luka take this?”