Page 9 of Forgotten Vows

“I saw how good you two were together. You made sense like how my father and Gabby do.”

I smiled. “She hates it when you call her Gabby.”

“Don’t change the subject.”

“Fuck it.” I leaned forward, setting my elbows on my knees and sinking my face into my hands.

Back when Raisa and I met on our travels, we were young. Stupid. Emil tagged along sometimes too, just to have fun. We weren’t entrenched in our positions in the family yet, simply carefree to enjoy the world before accepting our responsibilities and power.

It was all so long ago. Where was the harm in explaining a little more now?

It wouldn’t change anything. What was done was done.

“Raisa wasn’t just a stranger I’d met while we were abroad.”

“I figured that much.” He furrowed his brow, as if insulted that I wouldn’t have thought he’d assume she was someone significant.

“She was more than just a girlfriend over that summer.”

He nodded, rolling his hand as if to prompt me to get to the good stuff. Impatient, even.

“She was—is—Konstantin Petrov’s daughter.”

Now he cut out the antics.

He sobered. Staring me dead in the eye, he seemed to wait for the punchline. None would be coming. Because I wasn’t joking. I was as serious as ever to tell him that detail that changed our lives.

“She’s…?” He had yet to lose that stupefied expression.

“Raisa Petrov. Konstantin’s daughter?—”

“Are you serious?” he asked. “Konstantin? Fuck. Seriously?”

Raisa and I had dated so many years ago, and still, the importance of what family she came from mattered.

“As in Konstantin Petrov.ThatKonstantin? The old-fashioned, stuck-in-his-ways, Old-Guard fucker?” He cringed as he spoke. Luka had never been fond of the man, and as our boss, the leader of the Dubinin Family, his views trickled down to us. Every Dubinin would recognize Konstantin Petrov’s name, and each one would recall how old-school and strict he was.

When Raisa told me exactly who she was, I had a similar sobering reaction as what Emil was having now. Her father wasn’t impressed with his niece being so “loose”, daring to date a man not of his choosing. Rumors were that he’d had another niece killed for traveling with a man from the wrong family, as in one he didn’t approve of being traditionalist like him. And Raisa was his only daughter…

“You walked away from Konstantin Petrov’s daughter,” Emil concluded slowly.

I nodded.

“And you got away unscathed just in time before he could figure out you were with her at all.”

I didn’t blame him for guessing that. Raisa and I dated for one summer. Almost four months. It didn’t shock me that Emil would assume I’d left as soon as I knew I was helping myself to a woman who hadn’t been “chosen” for me.

But he was wrong.

I hadn’t gotten away unscathed. The ache of having to leave her would ruin my soul and be the source of my misery until the end of all my days.

4

RAISA

The next day after the Rafaels moved in next door, I was back at work, sweating out every drop of water I possessed. This heat wave was too brutal to bear. It didn’t matter how often I schooled myself not to look at the clock because the minute hand moved so slowly, I was still drawn to checking the time.

It dragged. With the heavy burden of the heat and humidity, it trudged along.