10. Chapter Ten
Chapter Ten
Nikolai
Ican sense that Lev is angry.
He’s standing behind me as I sit in my private back booth of my restaurant, staring down the man cowering before me. The man in question is named Jessie Barnes who owes me money. An American who thought he could escape to Russia without any consequences.
“Please,” Jessie sobs. “I don’t have the money. Please.”
“Then you shouldn’t have taken the loan I gave you.”
“You reached out to me. You wanted to buy my property.”
“I did.” Extra property means extra cash flow.
It also means more opportunities to launder money or even have an extra hide out in case things turn bad.
This is part of my job that Lana has never seen and I don’t want her to see.
Me intimidating the men around me. She already knows I’m a bad man.
It’s probably why it was so easy for her to lie to her fellow ballerinas about how I hurt her.
“And then you needed money from me. I gave you a loan and now it’s time you pay me back.
That’s why you’re here. I gave you multiple chances to pay me, Jessie, and you didn’t.
So this is your last warning. You’ll stay here until you can scrounge up the money you owe me. ”
Jessie cries harder. A portly man. Middle-aged. Pathetic. “But I don’t have the money.”
“Then something very bad will happen to you, Jessie. Do you want something bad to happen to you?”
“No,” he sobs.
“So then find a way to give me the money you owe me. I have all day.” I lean back in my seat and watch Jessie. Just watch. It’s something I’m very good at.
After a long, few minutes of crying, Jessie finally cracks. “All right. I have a home I can give you. It’s worth the money I owe.”
I tap the table. “Great. Problem solved.”
“But then I’ll be homeless.”
I shrug. “At least you’ll be alive.” I motion to my guard, Dimitri, to take Jessie away. The second he’s gone, I glance at Lev. “Why have I felt you vibrating next to me in anger for the past hour?”
“It’s nothing.”
“Lev, you’ve been my friend for years. If something is bothering you, tell me.”
He blows out a gust of air. “The will.”
I blink. “The will? My will?”
“Yes. Your will.”
“What about my will?”
“You’re leaving everything to her, sir.”
“Lana? Of course I’m leaving everything I own to her. She is my wife.”
“It’s just…” Lev glances down at his shoes before looking me in the eye. “You once promised me that you would leave your house to me if you ever died. You would make sure I was set for life.”
“You’re already set for life. And that was before I met Lana. So, I’m sorry I went back on my promise, Lev. But that was an off-hand comment I made years ago. You can’t hold me to it. You’ll be financially fine after I die. And you already own a mansion yourself. I don’t see the problem.”
“It’s not… a problem,” he says slowly. “It’s more the principle of the thing. You went back on your word. I don’t like that. Sir,” he adds.
“You don’t have to call me sir. We’re friends. And I didn’t realize you were holding me to that. I never put it down in writing.”
“I just think it was a mistake to marry her.”
My spine tenses. “Why would it have been a mistake to marry my wife?”
“You’ve been more distracted lately. You let that man go with a slap on the wrist. The old you would have tortured him until he told us where he’s keeping his money.”
“I didn’t see the point in torturing him.”
“After she saw us torture someone that day, you haven’t wanted to do it since. I don’t like that you’ve changed. You’re becoming soft, sir. I’m afraid to say it.”
I raise an eyebrow. “I’m becoming soft? Just because I’m choosing to not actively torture someone every week like I once did? Lev, I respect you. We’ve worked together for years. But you sound jealous.”
He scoffs. “Jealous?”
“You don’t like change and things have changed. But that doesn’t make it bad. It just makes things different. Understand that. I’m still Nikolai Smirnoff. No one will mess with me.”
His jaw tenses and he slowly nods. Good. That’s the end of that.
I motion at Dimitri to let the next person come in to see me.
I notice that Lev is still radiating anger but I choose not to worry about it.
On to business as usual.
Lana
Boris drives me to rehearsal today instead of Nikolai. The moment of openness between me and my husband is gone. He already left for work this morning before I was even awake. The message was clear: he’s upset with me about what I told the other girls.
I’m upset with myself too. I should have just said it was an accident but I knew deep down that none of them would believe me. I wanted to make myself look sympathetic in front of them. Those vultures. Make them feel bad for judging me.
But it only ended up hurting my relationship with my husband.
The urge to go home hits me. To see my sisters again, mainly Elena. But most likely, my father will tell me to go back home to my husband. I’m not welcome in that house any longer.
A deep, aching loneliness hits me, causing me to shed a few tears. Boris looks at me in the rearview mirror but otherwise doesn’t comment on it. I’m glad. Boris knows to give me my space.
I compose my face before I arrive at the dance studio. The last thing I need is for the other ballerinas to have seen me crying. The cold air hits me in the face when I get out of the car. I wrap my puffy jacket around me more.
Maria is walking across the parking lot at the same time I am. We both stop for a second before Maria shakes her head and walks on forward. I shouldn’t have been so harsh with her yesterday.
“Maria,” I say, catching up with her. She ignores me. I grab her arm, stopping her. “Maria, wait. Before we go in there…”
“What?” she snaps. “Do you want to make me feel bad for wanting to protect you against your abusive husband again?”
I flinch. “No. Need I remind you that you showed up to my wedding to humiliate me? You call me a bitch but you’re not a nice person either.”
She huffs and tries walking away but I cling to her arm, preventing her.
“I’m sorry,” I blurt out. “I shouldn’t have said that. I…”
“What?”
“I really am sorry. All right? I don’t have many friends in the company. Sometimes it gets hard and I have to do what I have to do to protect myself.”
Maria’s eyes soften. “You don’t have any friends in the company.”
“What?”
“You said you don’t have many friends and I said you don’t have any friends. The word many implies you have some friends.”
“Are you correcting my grammar right now?”
She flushes. I’m not sure if it’s embarrassment or the cold weather. “You’re right. That wasn’t right of me.” She sighs. “Lana, how did we end up hating each other?”
“Competition.”
“True.” She looks around before leaning in closer to me. “Between you and me, I hate Ana. She’s so annoying.”
“So why do you follow her around?”
“Because everyone likes her and you’re a social pariah. I can’t be seen talking to you. You understand.”
“I hate Ana too.”
“Well, then we can both hate Ana together. But when we’re inside that studio, I still have to pretend to hate you. Honestly, I do actually hate you. You stole Odette from me. And Odile. I was looking forward to playing the lead role.”
I flinch. “You’re right. I did steal it from you. But I wanted it with everything I had inside of me.”
She shivers and nods to the door. “Should we go inside? I’m cold.”
It’s then that I realize just how quiet outside it is. Not even the sound of a bird chirping. Boris has already driven away. I know he spends time at a chess park when I’m at practice.
Something makes me look around the parking lot. Call it gut instinct.
A black van drives right up to where me and Maria are. Before I can even react, a man gets out of the front and approaches us. A very handsome man, I can admit.
Maria notices just how handsome the man is too. From the way she flutters her eyelashes to the way she juts her hip out, she likes this man. “Hi. Who are you?”
The man pulls a gun from his jacket and points it at me. “Get in the car.”
I gasp, my body going tense.
Maria lets out a scream and starts to run away but the man grabs her and hoists her towards the van. He throws her in the back of it before he grabs me. I’m made of ice. I can’t move.
My body lands hard on the floor of the van. He gets into the driver seat and quickly takes us away from the studio. The back of the van is one large, open space. No seats.
“What’s happening?” Maria cries. “Why are you doing this to us? Who are you?” She pouts. “And to think I thought you were handsome.”
The man doesn’t say a word to us as he drives.
“Lana,” Maria says, snapping me to attention. “We have to get out of here.” She tries opening the back door but it’s locked. “Try your side.” When I don’t move, she snaps, “Lana!”
I blink and finally get my body to work. I try the other back door but it also isn’t budging. We’re stuck. Me and Maria are being kidnapped.
Who is this man? I have never seen him before. He’s not one of Nikolai’s and nor is he my father’s.
“Who are you?” I ask.
He doesn’t answer.
“I am the wife of Nikolai Smirnoff. Do you know that? You shouldn’t be doing this to me. My husband will be upset with you.” I go still as a thought hits me. What if… what if this is Nikolai’s doing? Is he so upset with me that he’s going to have me murdered?
I know Nikolai hires other people to do his dirty work. He did it with Claudia. There’s no reason he couldn’t do it to me.
No, I say to myself. Despite everything, Nikolai doesn’t want to hurt me. I have to believe that.
The man finally speaks. “It’s because you’re Nikolai’s wife that this is happening.”
“Did my husband hire you?”
He goes back to not speaking. Asshole.
Maria wraps her arms around herself, whimpering. “Are we going to die, Lana? Are we?”
“Is this Bratva business?” I ask the man. “Is it?”
Still no answer.
“The Bratva?” Maria whispers. “You mean the… the mafia? Are we being kidnapped by the mafia?” She sobs. “We really are going to die, aren’t we?”