21. Anya
ANYA
For a few seconds, I can’t move.
Yaromir fixes my dress like he’s repairing damage he caused on purpose. His fingers are steady at my neckline, pulling the red silk back over my breasts, smoothing the fabric into place. My body is not steady at all.
My legs feel weak. My face is hot. My pussy is still throbbing from his fingers, from his mouth near my ear, from the way he made me watch myself in the mirror while he held my throat and took me apart without even undressing me fully.
And now he says home like it’s a promise.
Like what happened here was only the first course.
My stomach tightens. I look away before he can see too much on my face, but of course he already has. Yaromir sees everything. That’s one of the worst things about him.
Or one of the best.
I’m not sure anymore.
He washes his hands at the small sink, then dries them with a folded towel. His knuckles are swollen from hitting Dmitri. The cuts are open again, red across the skin. The sight pulls me back from the heat a little.
“You shouldn’t have hit him,” I say.
Yaromir stops. Only for a second.
Then he looks at me through the mirror. “No?”
“No.”
His face closes. The change is immediate enough that I know I’ve touched something ugly. “I see.”
Before I can say anything else, he asks, “Did I misread you?”
The question catches me off guard. “What?”
His eyes stay on mine. “Earlier. In this room. When I touched you.”
Heat rushes back into my face. “No.”
“Then why are you defending him?”
“I’m not defending him.”
“Are you sure?”
The thought enters my head before I can stop it.
Is he jealous?
The idea should be ridiculous. This is Yaromir Volkov. He doesn’t seem like the kind of man who gives anyone enough power over him for jealousy.
And yet his face has gone still in a way that feels almost personal.
“Do you still care for him?” he asks.
For a moment, I see Dmitri in the hallway. His hand on my wrist. His beautiful face twisted with irritation because I had stopped obeying. His voice telling me Yaromir would use me.
Then I look at my husband. His injured hands. His hard eyes. The blood he spilled because Dmitri locked a door behind me.
“No,” I say. “I just don’t want any trouble with your dad.”
“My father?” he asks.
I realize too late that I’ve stepped somewhere I do not understand.
“Yes,” I say carefully. “Your father. He already confronted you tonight. Dmitri is his son too. I don’t want this to turn into something worse because of me.”
His jaw tightens. “I couldn’t care less,” he says. “And that man is not my father. He stopped being my father a long time ago.”
The room goes quiet.
I don’t speak. For once, I’m smart enough not to.
Yaromir turns away from me and walks to the sink. He braces both hands on the marble, lowering his head for a second. The movement is small, but it unsettles me more than his anger.
I’ve seen him controlled. Violent. Cold. Hungry.
I have not seen him tired. Not like this.
“When I was a boy,” he says, not looking at me, “I thought the Volkov name meant something. I thought if I waited long enough, behaved correctly enough, became useful enough, he would stop treating my mother like a shame he paid for.”
His voice is flat. That makes it worse.
“My mother believed him longer than I did. She always thought there would be a place for us eventually. A proper one. Not hidden apartments, not locked away like we were filth.”
I stand still. The ache between my thighs fades beneath something heavier.
“He visited when it suited him,” Yaromir continues. “Brought gifts. Made promises. Left before morning. She kept forgiving him because she remembered who he was before he became Kirill Volkov.” He says the name like it tastes bitter.
I think of Dmitri. His apologies. His gifts. His way of making me grateful for scraps.
The comparison makes my stomach twist.
“What happened to her?” I ask quietly.
Yaromir is silent for a moment.
Then he says, “She got sick.”
My throat tightens.
“Not suddenly. Enough time for him to come. Enough time for him to move her to better doctors. Enough time for him to do one decent thing.” He looks at me through the mirror. “He did not.”
I can’t breathe for a second. “Why?”
“Because bringing her into the light would have embarrassed the legitimate family.”
He turns from the sink. His eyes are dry, but there’s something in them that makes me want to look away and stay looking at the same time.
“I didn’t know,” I whisper.
“No. Why would you?”
There’s no accusation in it. Somehow that makes it hurt more.
“I thought…” I stop, because I don’t know what I thought. That Yaromir had been born into power and simply wanted more of it. That his anger was ambition. That his hatred of his father was some mafia son’s war over territory and inheritance.
It’s that too. But not only that.
He looks down at his bloody hand. “I learned young that the word father is easy for men who don’t have to earn it.”
I don’t know what to say. There is nothing clever enough. Nothing soft enough. Nothing that wouldn’t sound useless in this little room with music outside and blood still on his skin.
So I say nothing. I step closer instead.
He watches me, guarded again, as if he regrets saying this much.
I take his injured hand carefully. His fingers twitch once, but he lets me. The cuts across his knuckles are ugly, swollen at the edges. I wrap my hand around his as much as I can and squeeze.
For a few seconds, he doesn’t move.
Then his thumb shifts over mine, barely there. It feels like an answer.
I look down at our hands because looking at his face is suddenly too much. “I wasn’t defending Dmitri,” I say quietly.
“I know.”
“You didn’t a minute ago.”
“No.”
I glance up.
His eyes hold mine. “Now I do,” he says.
The words settle somewhere deep in my chest. I nod once and let go of his hand before the silence turns into something I’m not ready for.
Outside, the auctioneer’s voice rises through the corridor. “Ladies and gentlemen, we now move to lot twenty-three.”
I freeze.
Yaromir notices immediately. “What?”
I don’t answer at first.
The emerald necklace. The one Irina said Katya wanted. The one Dmitri would supposedly get for her.
Yaromir looks toward the main hall, then back at me. “Anya.”
“It’s nothing.”
His eyes narrow slightly. “You’re a terrible liar.”
“I’m not lying.”
“You stopped breathing.”
I turn toward the door. “We should go back.”
For a second, I think he might press me. Instead, he offers his arm.
I take it.
The moment we step back into the auction hall, the room seems brighter than before. Louder too, though that might only be because my body still hasn’t settled from what happened in the side room.
My lips feel swollen. My thighs feel weak. Every step reminds me of his fingers. I keep my face calm and pray no one looks too closely.
Of course, everyone looks. People turn when we re-enter. Some pretend they’re only glancing at the auction platform. Others don’t bother pretending at all. Their eyes move over Yaromir first, then me, then the space between us.
My cheeks heat.
God. How long were we gone?
Long enough for people to notice. Long enough for Dmitri to return.
He stands near the right side of the hall, beside Katya again.
His tuxedo jacket has been changed, or maybe cleaned.
His hair is fixed. His mouth looks slightly swollen, and there’s a faint darkness near his jaw that makeup can’t fully hide.
Good.
His eyes lock on Yaromir first. Then on me. The look in them is ugly.
He looks at my flushed face. My messy hair pinned back badly after Yaromir’s hands ruined it. My mouth, which I know is still too red.
My stomach twists, but I don’t look away. Not this time.
Beside him, Katya watches me too. She’s pale, but composed. Her silver dress catches the lights when she shifts, one hand curled around a champagne flute she’s not drinking from. When her gaze drops to Yaromir’s hand at my back, her mouth tightens.
I feel a small, mean satisfaction.
Then the auctioneer’s voice cuts through the room. “Lot twenty-three: an antique emerald and diamond necklace, late imperial style, set in platinum and yellow gold, with Colombian emeralds and old mine-cut diamonds.”
Two attendants carry the piece out under careful lighting.
The room reacts at once. Even people pretending not to care turn to look.
The necklace is displayed on black velvet, and for a second, I understand why Katya wants it.
It’s beautiful.
It’s the kind of necklace made for a woman who expects people to lower their eyes.
Deep green stones sit at the center, surrounded by diamonds that catch the light like ice.
It looks old, heavy, and expensive enough to carry a history of women who got what they wanted by surviving men who underestimated them.
My fingers tighten slightly around Yaromir’s arm.
He feels it. Of course he does.
His head dips closer. “You want it.”
“No.”
“Then why are you looking at it like that?”
“I’m allowed to look.”
“Anya.”
I exhale through my nose. “Katya wants it.”
His face doesn’t change, but something in his eye changes. “How do you know?”
“I overheard my friends talking.”
“Your friends.” The way he says it makes it clear he doesn’t think much of them.
I don’t either anymore.
“They said she had her eye on it,” I say. “And that Dmitri would get it for her.”
Yaromir’s gaze moves across the room. To Katya. To Dmitri beside her.
Dmitri is still glaring at us, but when the auctioneer begins listing the details of the necklace, his attention shifts toward the platform. Katya leans toward him and says something. Dmitri’s jaw tightens, then he gives a small nod.
Yaromir sees it. So do I.
My stomach hardens.
Yaromir’s hand settles more firmly at my waist. “What do you want?” he asks.
“I told you. I don’t want it.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I look up at him. The room is full of people, but his attention makes it feel smaller. Private. Dangerous.
I glance at the necklace again. Then at Katya.
She’s still watching the auction platform, but I know she’s aware of me. A woman always knows when the woman she betrayed is standing close enough to witness whether she wins.
“I don’t want her to have it,” I say.
Yaromir’s mouth barely moves. Not a smile. Something colder. “Then she won’t.”
The auctioneer lifts his gavel. “We will begin the bidding at one hundred thousand.”
A paddle rises immediately near the front. Then another.
Dmitri waits a moment, like he wants to appear casual. Then he raises his paddle.
Katya’s face softens with satisfaction. I hate how familiar that expression is.
Yaromir doesn’t move. For one panicked second, I think he’s going to let it happen. Then he lifts his own paddle without looking away from me.
“Two hundred thousand,” the auctioneer calls.
A ripple moves through the room.
Dmitri turns.
His eyes find Yaromir. Then me.
And for the first time all night, I smile at him.