Page 20 of Crimson

“He’ll get what’s coming to him,” Zavier said. “But first, we get the bid. Later, we can take our revenge.”

“And how are we going to get the bid?” Nikolai asked.

“I have an idea about that,” Zavier said, smiling again. “I saw you looking at that girl.”

“What girl?” Nikolai said, though he knew very well who Zavier meant.

“Nadia Turgenev,” Zavier said.

“What about her?”

“She’s the child of our enemies. And the child of two ancient, noble families.”

“So?” Nikolai said.

“If you made a match with her, it would prove how very forgiving the Markovs can be. And it would lend legitimacy to our name.”

“I’m not going to marry a Lebedev!” Nikolai scoffed.

“You’ll do whatever you have to do to close this deal,” Zavier said coldly.

“We only have a few weeks at most!” Nikolai said. “You want me to seduce her in less than a month?”

“I expect you to win her over in much less time than that,” Zavier said.

Nikolai shook his head. His father had gone completely mad.

“Aren’t you forgetting she’s already engaged to someone else?” he said.

Zavier gave his son a look of utter disdain.

“An Oleksei,” he sneered.

The idea was crazy. Nikolai would have much preferred to use their usual tactics of bribery, threats, negotiation, and violence. However, his father seemed intent.

And Nikolai couldn’t deny that he had his own compulsion to go find that beautiful girl and speak to her.

So he sighed and downed his drink in one gulp.

“If that’s the plan,” he said, “I’d better get going.”

* * *

9

Nadia

Nadia wandered around the vast, gleaming, modern mansion, having no idea where Maxim had disappeared to. After her initial relief at being rescued from her grandfather’s house, she was more annoyed with him than ever.

He always did this to her—sneaking away at parties, and returning an hour later, talking a mile a minute, rubbing his nose and acting like she didn’t know what he’d been up to.

Her patience with Maxim was wearing increasingly thin. Even though her mother had only been gone for two weeks, Nadia felt like she’d aged ten years. She wasn’t the same frivolous little girl anymore. She wanted more than parties and vacations and fun.

Perhaps she wanted more than Maxim.

The thought skipped across the surface of her mind, like a rock thrown across the surface of still water, leaving endless ripples in its wake.

Would she actually consider leaving Maxim?