6. Yaromir
YAROMIR
“Boy, do I have some news for you.”
I look up from my desk. Alexei is standing in the doorway of my study, one shoulder pressed against the frame, looking far too pleased with himself for a man who was not invited in.
“What?”
He grins. “Your brother’s bride has run away from her wedding.”
For a moment, I say nothing.
The pen stills in my hand.
Outside the tall windows, the city is gray under afternoon rain, but inside the room everything suddenly comes into vision. The fire. The glass of whiskey near my elbow. The contract open in front of me that I have not read for the last twenty minutes.
Because beside it, half-hidden under a folder, is a sketch.
A woman’s face. Blonde hair. Wide eyes. Soft mouth.
Anya Sokolova.
I close the folder over it before Alexei gets any closer. He notices anyway. Of course he does. His eyes flick down, then back up to my face, amusement already forming.
I give him a look that tells him not to ask.
For once, he has enough sense to obey.
“What happened?” I ask.
Alexei drops into the chair opposite me. “No one knows the full story yet. The guests were seated, music was playing, flowers everywhere, very tasteful, very dramatic. Then the bride vanished.”
“Vanished.”
“Gone. Dress, veil, everything. Dmitri is apparently losing his mind.”
That gives me a moment of satisfaction so savage I almost smile.
I picture Dmitri standing there in his wedding suit, embarrassed in front of half the families, forced to explain why the pretty little bride he thought he already owned decided not to walk down the aisle.
Good.
Let him feel what it is to be made small in public.
Let him choke on it.
Alexei watches me carefully. “You look devastated.”
“I’m managing.”
“Yes, heroically.”
I lean back in my chair, forcing my face into something neutral. “Why did she run?”
“That’s the part nobody knows. Or nobody is saying.” He pauses. “But there are rumors.”
“What rumors?”
“The official story is that she felt unwell.”
I almost laugh. “That’s terrible.”
“That’s Galina’s version. Your father’s people are saying she had a panic attack.”
“And the real rumor?”
Alexei shrugs. “That Dmitri did something.”
Of course he did.
I look toward the rain-dark windows. “Cheating, probably.”
Alexei raises a brow. “You sound certain.”
“Dmitri is a womanizer. He has been one since he learned women found the Volkov name attractive.”
Dmitri has been seen in my clubs too many times for me to pretend otherwise. Private rooms. Too much liquor. Girls who laugh at everything he says because he tips well and leaves his card behind like a prince blessing peasants.
I don’t throw him out because he always runs the tab high enough to make his presence tolerable. That, and because watching him embarrass himself has become a mild form of entertainment.
Still, there’s a difference between being reckless in a club and being stupid on your wedding day.
Then again, this is Dmitri.
Alexei studies me. “You think she caught him?”
“I think women don’t run from weddings in front of powerful families unless something makes staying worse.”
For a few seconds, neither of us speaks.
My mind returns to her face in the corridor. Her pride. Her defensiveness. The way she looked at me like she wanted to understand the danger instead of running from it.
Maybe I misjudged her.
Maybe she’s not only a pretty little thing trained to smile and obey.
Maybe there’s something more pointed under all that polish.
Alexei tilts his head. “You’re enjoying this.”
“I’m enjoying Dmitri being humiliated.”
“Only Dmitri?”
I give him a flat look.
He lifts his hands. “Fine.” But he’s still smiling.
I tap the pen once against the desk. “Where is she now?”
“That’s the interesting part. No one knows.”
“No one?” I ask.
“Not her father. Not the Volkov security. Not the bridesmaids. She vanished from the estate grounds before anyone realized the ceremony was delayed.”
I glance at the folder covering the sketch.
Something in my chest tightens, though I refuse to name it concern.
Anya Sokolova is twenty-two, wearing a wedding dress, and running from a family that does not forgive embarrassment easily. If she’s smart, she will go somewhere quiet, somewhere no one in her father’s circle knows.
If she’s frightened, she will make a mistake. And frightened people in our world are easy to find. Easy to use. Easy to hurt.
“Find her,” I say.
Alexei’s amusement fades a little. “For what reason?”
“Because my father will be looking too.”
“And?”
“And if he finds her first, she becomes a problem to be corrected.”
Alexei sits back. He understands that.
Everyone who knows my father understands that.
A runaway bride is not a broken engagement. It’s an insult. It makes Dmitri look weak, Galina look foolish, and the old man look like he can’t control his own house.
He won’t care why she ran. Only that she did.
Alexei watches me carefully. “You’re sure this is about strategy?”
“No.”
That answer surprises both of us.
I look back down at the desk. The folder has shifted enough for the edge of the sketch to show. Just a line of hair. The curve of a cheek.
I cover it again. “I don’t know what it is yet,” I say. “Find her anyway.”
Alexei stands.
At the door, he pauses. “You know, if Dmitri cheated and she ran, that means she has more spine than any of us gave her credit for.”
I say nothing.
After he leaves, the room settles back into silence. I move the folder aside and look at the sketch again.
I drew her too soft at first. Too pretty. Too much like the girl I saw at lunch, surrounded by champagne and compliments.
Now I take the pen and change the mouth.
Less polished. More stubborn.
That suits her better.