Page 17

“What are you trying to do here, Milov?” Timofey says to me once Matvei steps outside. He sits down across from me and leans forward, elbows on his knees. “Buttering him up like this thing between you isn’t just for business.”

If I didn’t know any better, I’d think Timofey is the older brother here, trying to protect Matvei. I straighten up and pour myself a shot of vodka from the sanitized bottle Valery brought back.

“Don’t say Milov like that. Like it’s dirty.”

He scoffs and pulls the vodka bottle back to his side. At least he uses a glass this time. “I don’t think you’re all as nice as you pretend to be. And I don’t like my brother falling for the enemy.”

Falling for me? I open my mouth and shut it, because I have no idea what to say to that. Whatever is going on between me and Matvei is complicated, messy, and I still don’t know what to believe. It feels like we’re playing a card game. Each time I’m ready to lay down my hand, he holds his closer.

“He’s not falling for me,” I finally say, not meeting his eye. “But I’m sure he appreciates your concern. And meddling.”

The door swings open, hitting the wall with a bang, and Matvei storms in, still holding the phone. Whoever is on the other line has him pissed. I can see it in the set of his jaw. Someone is in for it. Did Timofey do something? Botch the clean-up job?

But it’s not Timofey he’s looking at with those obsidian eyes flashing, it’s me. He marches over and shoves the phone at me. I look from him to the phone and back again.

“What?”

“You lied to me. Told me he wasn’t in town. Told me you couldn’t broker any deal until he got back, remember? Meanwhile, my entire operation is falling apart, taking hit after hit because of your lie.”

Oh fuck. He’s right. The lie was so early on, before all of this happened between us, but I chose to keep up the act even when I knew how badly the Abashins needed an alliance.

“Talk to him,” Matvei says, nodding at the phone in my hand. “He’s more pissed than I am.”

It’s on speaker phone, and I don’t get a chance to say anything before Anton’s voice comes loud and clear and angry through the speaker. “Are you there, Anya?”

If I hang up now, could it make it any worse? “Yes, Anton. I’m here. It’s me.”

He swears loudly for a good thirty seconds. “Are you okay? Did he touch you?”

I look up at Matvei. He’s watching me with that cold, blank mask I’ve come to hate. All the softness from a moment ago is gone.

“He didn’t touch me. I’m okay. I’m safe.”

“You’re not safe, Anya, you’re a hostage. I’m going to cut that bastard’s head off and send it back to his family.”

Matvei snatches the phone out of my hand before I can reply to that gruesome image.

“Try it, Milov. You’ll get your sister back once you agree to meet with me.”

He ends the call before I can do anything at all to lower the tension between the two men. There’s no telling what Anton will do now that he knows where I am and who I’m with. He can be ruthless, and if he says he wants Matvei’s head on a platter, I believe him.

Timofey gives me a dark look and then turns to Matvei. “Told you cozying up to the enemy was a bad idea. Start playing house and she stabs you in the back.”

“It wasn’t like that!” I protest, wishing Matvei would stop staring past me, like he can’t stand to look at me right now. Shame bubbles hot and sick inside of me.

I’d done what I had to, but I should’ve told him sooner. Once it seemed like there was something between us, I should’ve been honest. If I can just make him see that it was a snap decision during those first awful moments after he kidnapped me, there’s a chance I can still save this.

“Um, is this a bad time?” Valery pops in carrying a tray laden with food. “We’re almost done cooking, but it looks like a bad time.”

“It’s a bad time,” Matvei says.

“Can we just go somewhere to talk?” I plead with him.

There’s a big part of me that feels kind of pissed off at his reaction.

He kidnapped me, for Christ’s sake. I did what I had to do to survive against someone I thought was my enemy.

It’s not like he’s a hero in this situation, and he doesn’t have the right to be this upset with me.

The top priority isn’t how I feel, however, it’s defusing the ticking time bomb I just set off between the Abashins and the Milovs, so I have to swallow my pride. For now.

He grunts. “Fine. Backyard. Let’s go.”

I exhale and follow him out through the double French doors at the back of the house into a tranquil patio area.

Palms shade the stone, and hanging baskets of flowers are strung between white columns, perfuming the air.

I wonder who takes care of it and have a brief, amusing image of Timofey with a watering can and pruning shears. It’d be good for him.

We’re hidden from the house by the sheer amount of foliage surrounding us, so at least I don’t have to worry about providing entertainment to the whole Abashin family with this.

I sit in one of the wicker chairs beside a bubbling pond, but Matvei stands and paces, unaffected by the peaceful atmosphere.

After a moment of silence, it becomes obvious he’s not going to be the first to talk. I tuck my hands beneath me and brace myself.

“Look, I lied to you. Anton’s been in town the whole time, as you obviously know now.

That’s not how I wanted this to go. But before you get all angry at me for lying, just remember the situation I was in.

You’d just kidnapped me. I had no power.

No agency. No way of knowing if you were going to kill me,” I say in a rush.

He just keeps pacing, back and forth, head down.

“So I did what I had to do to keep myself safe. It’s not like I could just trust my kidnapper. Do you realize how crazy that sounds? You expect me to behave, to trust you, to do as you say, but you hide things from me! You don’t get the high horse here, Matvei, you kidnapped me. Got it?”

Matvei stops pacing long enough to pull a cigarette from his pack and light it, but he doesn’t respond.

Fine. If that’s how he wants to be. I’ve never been good at feeling guilty for long, and even though I do feel bad about lying to Matvei, that part of me is rapidly shrinking.

I dig my nails into the wicker arms to keep from lunging at him.

Something about that man always makes me want to smack him.

“I’m not going back.”

That makes him look at me. Behind a cloud of smoke, he’s the cold, handsome man I met that first night at the bar, and despite my anger, I feel a flare of desire. Stupid body.

“I’m not just a bargaining chip for you to use, but even if I were, bringing me back to Anton now would be a stupid way to use me.

He’s pissed. Furious. Wants your head on a pike.

” I push down the unpleasant thought and pray I can pull this off without either of the men getting hurt.

“He’ll just take me back and double down on his alliance with Shevchenkos.

He’ll do everything in his power to crush your family. ”

He taps the ash from the end of the cigarette and looks through me, those black eyes unreadable.

“I’m just wasting my fucking breath here,” I mutter to myself.

A frog trills from one of the stones lining the pond.

I spot him, tiny and green with big eyes, looking up at me, and I feel a sudden longing for Zephir.

He’d lean against my legs right now, and everything wouldn’t seem so awful, so out of control.

He wouldn’t hate me, even if Matvei definitely does.

Matvei takes the final drag on his cigarette and stubs it out.

Without a single word, he turns and walks back inside.

I bite back a frustrated scream. So that’s how it’s going to be, the silent treatment.

I can’t believe that man is twice my age and giving me the same punishment I used to give my brothers when I was a teenager.

If he can’t see that I’m not the only one in the wrong here, his skull is even thicker than I’d thought.

How can he kidnap me and somehow think anything I do in response to that is unreasonable?

And why the hell do I feel even a tiny bit guilty over lying?

Unfortunately, that answer is way too obvious to ignore.

Somewhere along the way, my feelings for Matvei became a lot more complicated than just lust and anger.

Now everything is wrong between us, and I’m not sure I can repair it.

I sit in the garden while the sun starts to set, sinking behind the roof of the house in a brilliant sherbet slash.

If things weren’t such a mess, if Matvei were sitting in the chair beside me, I might be able to enjoy it.

As it is, I just sit and think in an endless loop of disasters: Anton doing what he said he’d do and taking a hit out on Matvei; Matvei trading me back to my brother, like I’m nothing at all to him, and not even getting what he needs out of the deal.

I could wallow for hours, but the problems will still be there when I’m done. I have to make Matvei understand.

Thankfully, most of the family has dispersed, and it’s just Matvei and Oleg in the living room. Oleg smiles when he spots me, and that little gesture almost brings me to tears. That’s how close to losing it I am.

“Hey, Anya. It’s nice out there, isn’t it? Sometimes I bring my laptop out to work, and it makes the day fly by.” He looks between me and Matvei, then stands and stretches. “Think I’ll join that poker game in the basement. Diomid never knows when to fold.”

He leaves, and it’s just me and Matvei. This time, I’m not giving him a chance to run. I sit next to him on the couch, just a finger’s width of space between us.

“Don’t ignore me. It’s childish and it’s not going to help anything. You might be pissed but so am I, and I think I have more of a right to it than you do. Can you deny that?”

Matvei sighs and rubs his hand through his shorn hair. I wonder if he used to wear it longer, if it’s a habit from that time that he never lost. “I believed you. I trusted you. Again and again.”

“And I screwed up. If I can forgive you for the whole, you know, kidnapping me and forcing me into marriage thing, I think you can find it in yourself to forgive me for lying to you about this. I was always going to do the thing I said I would—broker the deal between your family and mine.”

At least he’s talking to me now, even if every word is spat out like a curse. “Why lie? You could’ve been back home sooner.”

“Everything I told you in the bar about my brothers, how overbearing they are? That’s why.

Believe it or not, being kidnapped by you felt like more freedom than I had with them.

Screwed up, right?” I bite the corner of my nail, mulling that over before I go on.

“Suddenly, with you, I was in the thick of things. Actually involved in the life they’d been keeping me from.

I could do something. I could be important. ”

He glances at me from the corner of his eye. “Reckless as ever. Gambling with your life to prove yourself. It’s why your brothers are so overprotective.”

“Maybe,” I reply. “But it’s my life to live. My chances to take. They can’t see that, not yet, but this was my chance to make them. Does that sound completely stupid?”

His shoulders relax, just a bit, but I’m so keyed into him, his body language, always searching for a clue to what’s going on inside that I sigh in relief. “It sounds like you, princess.”

Even that horrible nickname sounds good right now. “Can’t help who I am, I guess. But can you forgive me for lying? I meant what I said earlier, giving in to Anton straight off is going to get you a bad deal. If you’re still willing to work with me, we can do better.”

He leans back against the couch and puts his arms behind his head. God, that makes his arms look huge. I swallow.

“Promise me this,” he says, catching and holding my gaze. “No more lies. No more sneaking. I want to trust you. Don’t make it so hard.”

“Stop trying to get rid of me, and we have a deal.”

“I thought you’d be eager to leave me.”

“I thought so too,” I say, chewing on my lower lip, “but things changed.”

“Things changed,” he agrees.