Chapter 8
Ekaterina
I don’t know how we make it through dinner without a single incident. All I know is that, toward the end, the conversation turns ordinary, and I manage to eat without anything getting stuck in my throat.
Only my heart decides to climb into my throat when dinner ends and Artem stops me at the base of the stairs, taking advantage of a moment when his brothers are nowhere nearby.
“Enjoy the evening. I have some business to handle and will be gone for a few hours, but tonight, you know which bed you’re supposed to sleep in.”
All the color drains from my face.
“Leaving all jokes aside, I am not sleeping in your room,” I tell him as clearly as I can, without letting any emotion touch my voice.
“It’s enough for you to speak with Dimitri and have him take the necessary measures, and we can consider this matter closed. With the promise that you won’t install anything else.”
“No.”
I stop breathing.
His answer is short and sharp, while he slips
his hands into his trouser pockets and takes another step toward me.
“You’re being absurd,” I exclaim, my eyes wide, certainly panicked.
He tilts his head to one side like a predator, staring straight into my defiant eyes.
“That attitude does not help you prove your respect.”
“And do you think you’re respecting me by telling me to sleep in the same room as you?”
“My position in this situation gives me every right to demand whatever I want when someone fails to respect my title. You thought you could fool me with cheap blackmail, but you forgot that a Pakhan’s punishment in a situation like this is death. Would you prefer I choose that?”
I feel small, even though I keep my chin lifted and my shoulders straight.
How does he manage to intimidate me so much when, deep down, I feel he wouldn’t actually hurt me?
“No,” I answer quietly, while keeping my pride and a calm that is becoming harder and harder to hold at the surface.
“Good. Then it’s settled. If you get sleepy, you don’t need to wait for me.”
He turns to leave, but I stop him.
“I need an exact time frame. I have no way of knowing you won’t take advantage of this situation. It is quite unpleasant for me, a woman who is supposed to marry another man in a month. What would he say if he found out you were forcing me to sleep in your bed?”
For the first time, I see a muscle in his jaw tick, but more important, his gaze turns colder, harder. In this second, I can swear he has the power to freeze the air around him until my heart becomes a snowball he is preparing to crush in his fist.
“That sounds like a threat,” he says, dangerously calm.
“It’s just reality.”
There is a huge satisfaction in my heart, because I know how to recognize a victory. And this time, I am truly convinced I have made it out from this confrontation with some advantage.
“Three days,” he says shortly. “And your room will be completely cleared. You have my word.”
For an ordinary man, that would not mean much. But for a Pakhan, a given word is sacred.
I nod.
It is a small victory compared to the fact that I have to stay in his room, but it is only the first day, and I have already been one step away from losing my life several times.
I also realize that things could have been worse, but also that Artem is a sensitive psychopath who can make my life even more complicated during my stay in his house.
How exactly he will do that, I don’t know yet.
What I do know is that the ghost of those eyes follow me even when I sit at the piano and begin to play again.
I don’t need the sheet music in front of me, because I know the piece very well, but I know I need to practice more for the concert I have in three weeks.
Well, that truly gives me both anxiety and a pleasant kind of emotion at the same time. But fear is what takes hold of me now, because I have not performed a recital in front of an audience in almost two years. Even though I have been asked to play countless times during this period, I refused.
I simply did not want to.
Or I could not.
Every time I thought about being in front of those people – those strangers – the air seemed to grow heavier with every breath, and disappointment consumed me completely. A series of unpleasant memories resurfaced, and I found myself wanting to abandon the performance altogether.
All these traumas began with the recital I gave on the day I found out my mother had died.
But I visibly broke during my last public performance, two years ago, when I found out my father would not be coming.
At first, I thought something had happened to him, but his right-hand man called me and told me a problem had come up in the organization, one more important than the concert I was about to perform at Royal Albert Hall, right here in London.
It had been my dream to be there, reaching the height of my career, beside the man who had guided me toward something I never believed would become such a beautiful part of my life.
The piano.
But Bratva had always been more important, and that day, he had been forced to remain in Moscow.
The truly traumatic blow came the next day, when I learned that my father had actually been attacked before boarding the plane and had been seriously wounded. Fortunately, he had survived and had given orders that I not be told until after the concert, which he knew meant so much to me.
That was also the day I met Oliver Prescott III, the son of an important British lord and Member of Parliament. Like a prince, he greeted me after the recital, which I had shortened by two pieces because of the storm inside me, with an enormous bouquet of red roses.
He had no idea that red reminded me of the death I had seen far too many times.
But my hesitation that day did not stop him from continuing to court me, even though I always felt his affection was also connected to my family’s roots.
Or perhaps the ties between our families formed afterward.
To be honest, I don’t know. What is certain is that, even now, I do not fully understand how the hell I ended up engaged to him.
Was it pressure from my father? Oliver’s sweet attempts to be a proper partner, always attentive and affectionate with me?
My relationship with him is strange. We don’t speak every day, and we rarely go out, because most of the time he is away from the country for matters related to his business, importing materials for construction, as well as deals he has with his father, which he does not tell me about.
He is twenty-nine and one of the most desirable bachelors in Great Britain, both because of his father’s influence and because of his pleasant appearance. He has the face of a good man, with light brown hair, brown eyes, and a few freckles across his nose and cheeks.
His smile caught my attention the first time I saw him, full of warmth and sincerity.
Oliver is a pleasant man, but I don’t love him. And he knows that.
Just as I know the idea of this marriage came from our families, who saw a benefit to their respective businesses in our relationship.
A lord and a Vor?
A completely unsuitable and senseless affiliation, and to this day, I still do not understand what made our parents put pressure on such an important step in my life and Oliver’s.
I am confused, and there are many things I still do not understand.
But I realized that once the plans for this permanent union advanced, my relationship with Oliver became almost mechanical.
As if we had already been married for many years and each of us simply lived our own life while preserving the impeccable image of a serious couple.
And he will not be present at my performance.
I avoided telling him for quite some time that I had decided to give the recital, precisely because I knew he would be away during that period, and I did not want him to cancel his plans.
I only told him last month, but I did not describe the event as something important, because a large part of me does not want him there.
I would have wanted to share that moment with someone who truly matters to me, not with someone who attends only for the sake of looking good in the photos the press would take of us together.
So I let him believe it was just a simple recital, like others he had not been able to attend, and chose to bear, on my own, the weight of a pressure only I truly understand.
Because, in reality, I am alone.
Aside from Oksana, who is like a sister to me, I’ve never managed to truly love a man the way I see in movies. That kind of magic that makes you forget everything that matters and makes you capable of dying for the other person, because without him, life would not be worth living anyway.
I play and play and play, until my fingers grow tired and the sounds become heavy.
Eventually, I decide I’ve delayed the inevitable long enough and force myself to find the courage to go to bed.
Although it is almost midnight, none of the brothers seems to have returned home. Knowing how close they are, I assume they will come back together, since they left that way too.
After a quick shower in my own bathroom, I dress in a thin set of pajamas and take a robe with me to cover my bare legs.
If I known something like this would happen, I would have brought long pajamas, but for now, I only have a classic set from Victoria’s Secret, a T-shirt and shorts.
It could have been worse if all I had with me were the thin negligees I have not even taken out of my luggage yet.
Nothing about this day went the way I thought it would.
And not in a good way, for fuck’s sake.
By the time I step back into his room, my heart is already racing.
In the quiet of the night, I get another chance to look around the surprisingly tidy room.
Royal blue dominates the space, blending perfectly with the classic furniture, giving me the feeling that I am standing in the bedroom of a modern king.
The wood finishes are delicate, but without excessive details that would make the room feel oldfashioned. The shapes are rounded, elegant, with a stable and powerful air.
Just like the man who sleeps here.
I move forward with a sigh, and after leaving my robe on the armchair, I slip beneath the fine sheets, which feel as if they are wrapping around me like the delicate wave of a deep ocean.
Even though I am tired, I toss and turn, waiting for the monster to appear.
What will he do?
Will he laugh at me for being here?
I don’t think so. He does not seem like the kind of man who would be that petty in a situation like this.
Will he try to take advantage of me because I am in his bed?
I hope not.
No matter how attractive I know he is, I could not accept something like that. He is a stranger. A monster. Earlier today, his hands were covered in blood, and then he ate dinner with calm, acting as if nothing had happened.
The scenarios and the pounding of my heart, which barely manages to settle, keep me company until, close to midnight, the door opens.