9
“H ow’s married life treating you?” Alek asked his brother as they sat at their usual table in the mostly empty restaurant, a few days after the wedding.
Roman took a sip of his scalding black coffee, keeping his eyes on the report in front of him. “Fine.”
“You look happy enough.”
“Alessa is nice distraction from all of this.” He gestured to the papers scattered on the table between them, not willing to go into detail about his young wife.
“Alessa, huh?”
Roman ignored the teasing. “Her full name is a mouthful.”
“Sure it is.” The grin coloring Alek’s voice didn’t make Roman look up. “Yana is planning a dinner for your new wife this weekend.”
“I'm aware.”
“You think it's going to go well?”
“As well as any of her dinners usually go.”
“I might bring a date.”
At this, Roman finally met his brother's gaze with an arched eyebrow. “Do you plan to marry the girl?”
Alek sighed, already knowing where the conversation was heading. “No.”
“Is she Russian?”
“No.”
“Then why bring her? You already know how Vitaly is with these things.”
Alek rubbed at the scruff on his neck, looking thoughtful for a moment. “I'm tired of going through Yana's dinners alone. I need something to keep me entertained.”
“Don't say I didn't warn you.”
Roman's attention went back to the documents, and Alek ordered another coffee from a passing waitress. It was pointless to try and argue with his younger brother when he knew Alek was going to do as he pleased anyway. Besides, what Alek chose to do with his love life was none of Roman’s business.
He was old enough to keep his ground when it came to their father’s demands and expectations.
“Aristov still owes us money—fifteen grand, to be more exact.”
“I'm handling it,” Roman said, flicking his eyes to his brother. “Ivan and Vladimir are to collect the entire amount by tomorrow evening.”
“I can go with them.”
“No, you will be at Beluga2 for your usual duties.”
Alek shot him an annoyed look. “I know what you're doing, brat , and it pisses me off. You're going to have to let me collect at some point.”
“You did, last week.”
“From a fucking bakery. I want the real deal.”
Roman leaned back in his chair, gaze turning hard. “You have a problem with the way I issue orders?”
“When Vitaly finds out you've been coddling me for the past year and a half, he's going to lose his shit. You were doing worse things when you were my age.”
Truth be told, he had been coddling his younger brother ever since he got the position of Brigadier.
If you asked Roman, Vitaly had been sloppy when he allowed Alek to remain under his command, but he wasn't going to complain.
He didn't want Alek to go through the same shit he had.
Life in the Bratva was often enough brutal, and if there was anything he could do to shelter Alek from at least a small part of that brutality, he was happy to do it.
“I am your Brigadier, and you do as I fucking say,” he decreed with finality, ignoring his brother’s sulking. “End of discussion.”
???
When Roman got home that evening, it was well past dinner time. After parking the car in the driveway, he stopped to inspect a couple of loose bricks in the pavement on his way to the front door. It reminded him he had yet to speak to Alessandra about house renovations.
The ground floor was dark and quiet when he stepped into the foyer and closed the door behind him.
Spinning his keys around his index finger, he took the stairs, heading straight for the master bedroom.
He found Alessandra sitting on the bed, staring at her laptop’s screen.
Her long hair was swept up into a messy bun, and she was wearing a white tank top with matching yoga pants.
Her tanned skin contrasted nicely with the white of her clothes, and Roman couldn't help but think that she really was a beautiful girl.
Alessandra looked up when she heard him enter the room, offering a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes. “Hi.”
“Hey,” he said, tossing the keys on the nightstand before removing his suit jacket and discarding it on the back of a nearby chair. Silence stretched between them for a long moment, until Roman realized he was going to have to be the one to initiate conversation. “What did you do today?”
She shrugged one shoulder delicately. “Not much. I watched TV, swam a bit and ordered lunch from a Thai restaurant.”
Her words evoked a small pang of guilt because it was the same answer she had given him for the past few nights.
He’d been too busy with work and hadn’t really thought of helping her settle into her new life.
Their marriage was something new for the both of them, but somehow, Roman already knew that he was better equipped to handle the sudden change.
Truth be told, up until that moment, he hadn’t really considered his wife’s feelings at all.
He’d been pleased with her sweet demeanor and beautiful looks, so much so that he’d overlooked the emotional side of their arranged union.
As a man raised and formed by the Bratva, he’d detached himself from any false illusions of true happiness from the moment he found out that he had to marry the enemy’s daughter.
But as he looked at Alessandra’s face and the shadow of sadness he could detect in her eyes, he realized that maybe he needed to pay more attention to his obligations as a husband.
As he contemplated this, he remembered something. Reaching into his pocket, Roman grabbed his wallet and pulled out a brand-new Amex. “This is for you. I picked it up today.”
“I already have a card,” Alessandra said softly, her gaze moving from the plastic in his hand to his eyes.
“And from now on, you will use this one. You are not your father's responsibility anymore.”
With a small nod, she accepted the card.
There was something in her expression Roman didn't like—a reluctance toward him and whatever he had to offer.
It both pissed him off and intrigued him.
He worked on the buttons of his dress shirt as he continued to watch her.
“Found a cook. She will start next week.”
They had briefly touched on the subject the day before. Since Alessandra didn't know how to cook, Roman had decided it was for the best they hire someone. It had taken a few phone calls on his part and twenty minutes of his busy day to find the right person—discreet and affiliated to the Bratva.
“That's great,” she said, though her enthusiasm sounded flat.
“What's wrong?” he asked, his patience starting to run thin. He could tell something was bothering her, but he'd had a long day and was in no mood to try and figure out what that was.
Alessandra sawed her bottom lip, suddenly looking a little nervous. “I, uh… I wanted to ask you for something.”
“Let's hear it.”
She hesitated for a long moment, and he reined in the urge to demand that she speak already.
“My papà didn't want me to go to college, but he let me take an online business course. I’m about to finish phase one, and if I want to enroll into phase two, I’ll have to pay the fee in the next week or so.
It’s a little over three thousand dollars, and…
” She glanced at the Amex. “I was going to ask Papà, but can I use this one to pay for it?”
Roman kept her gaze, surprised by the vulnerability he heard in her voice. “You want to go to college?”
“I know it's not an option—”
“That's not what I asked,” he cut her off, walking to her side of the bed.
Alessandra looked up at him with soft brown eyes, and he thought he saw a flash of hope behind those warm-toned irises. “Yeah, I’d really like that.”
Before he could stop himself, he cupped her cheek with his palm, running his thumb over the lip she’d been assaulting a moment earlier. “Then you can go to college. Why settle for an online course?”
The shock coloring her face was almost comical. “You don't think it's useless for... well, for me ?”
“You want to be a trophy wife?”
“No,” she said more quietly.
“Unlike your father, or even mine, I don't think a woman's purpose is to look pretty on her husband's arm. If you want to do something with your life, learn business or whatever it is you want to learn, then go for it.”
“You're serious,” she breathed incredulously.
“Why would I joke with this?”
In a flash, she jumped to her knees on the bed, her arms going around his waist. “Thank you.” Her voice was barely a whisper as she buried her face in his chest.
Taken aback by the force of her gratitude for such a small gesture, Roman ran a palm over the length of her back.
Did it take so little to make her happy?
The thought almost made him smile. Maybe he wasn’t such a lacking husband, after all.
If giving her things she wanted got this kind of reaction out of her, he was tempted to do it over and over again, just to see that look of amazement on her face.
Alessandra pulled back after a few seconds, giving him a shy smile. “Sorry, I didn't mean to pounce on you like that.”
“I don't mind,” he assured her, his skin already missing the contact. Arranged marriage or not, his wife had the kind of body that could drive a man crazy. He had taken her every night in the days following their wedding, and he couldn't deny that he was enjoying the perks of married life.
Raising his hand, Roman traced her bottom lip again as the swell of his cock and the need to fuck hijacked his thoughts.
To his surprise, Alessandra seemed to know exactly what he wanted.
For the first time since they had met, she initiated physical contact as she closed the distance between them and pressed her mouth to his softly.
It was all the incentive he needed. Grabbing the back of her neck, he pulled her closer and deepened the kiss.
She sighed into his mouth, her slender frame melting into him.