I’ve got some regrets over the decision to sell because a part of me wants to honor all of Mikhail’s last wishes, but the thing that’s mattered most to Natalia all along is that she’s not involved with the Bratvá.
“Mikhail wanted me to take over. If he’d lived, he would’ve tried to convince us to get married and me to be trained as the future leader. He tried a lot of times to bring me into his businesses, but I didn’t want to work for the men under him. They all wanted me to be an enforcer. Fighting at Bloodsport against men like me is fine, but beating up people that are half my size because they’re late paying a bill? No.”
Natalia stands and paces back and forth. “How am I to know the whole truth? You say this to me now and that we must rush… how can I trust you?”
“You don’t need to trust me. You just need to trust my signature on the papers the lawyer is bringing. And you’ll review the pictures of the documents. I took them with my phone, so you could see them for yourself.”
There’s a rap on the door, and she jumps. Natalia’s gaze meets mine for a second and then she whirls toward the door and stares at it like there’s a nest of vipers behind it.
“Hey,” I say, giving her arm a squeeze. “There’s nothing to be scared of. You can take as long as you want to read everything.”
I step around her and open the door.
“Lawyer’s here,” Sasha says.
“You know about this?” she demands, moving in front of me to speak to my brother. “He says he will sign the money to me?”
“I heard,” Sasha says with a nod.
“You approve of this?”
“No.”
Her brows rise. “If you are Alexei, you would not marry me?”
“If I were him, I would marry you. But I wouldn’t sign away my rights to the money. I’d keep the money and get to work doing what the old man paid me to do.”
“Oh, yes?”
“Yes,” Sasha says, his expression better suited to a funeral than a wedding.
“To run the bad businesses?”
“That and the rest.”
“The rest? What else?” She looks over her shoulder, the skin pinched between her brows. “What does he mean, Alexei? You say all we must do to get this money is marry each other.”
“It’s what I explained. You get half the money no matter what. You get more if you marry me, and that takes away Egorov’s financial incentive to kill you.”
“Why does Sasha say you have more jobs to do?”
“Mikhail Kalashnik didn’t want you to have a paper marriage,” Sasha says in Russian. “Once Alexei married you, Mikhail expected him to keep the businesses strong, to head the family, and to have kids with you to carry on the bloodline. He’s entrusting Alexei with his entire legacy.”
CHAPTER21
Natalia
Alexei puts the photographs of the documents onto the lawyer’s computer, and I sit with the lawyer to go over them. Because I can’t read them myself, the lawyer reads and verifies what they say. It doesn’t take long for me to feel sure that Alexei’s given me an accurate picture of the will and its conditions.
The lawyer has the prenuptial agreement ready, but encourages me to have a second lawyer review it if I have any concerns. He shows me places online to find my own lawyer, and I thank him for his help.
Now that Alexei’s confessed everything, he is acting like his calm, practical self again. There is no more talk of witches and spirits. Instead, I am the one to whom the world feels surreal. My whole life is completely different than I knew. In a metal box in New York there are magical papers that make me richer than a princess and fill in the empty spaces in my family. I will be able to learn the names of all my relatives through the generations. How can it be real?
Alexei chats with the lawyer as he sits down to sign the prenuptial papers in front of the special notary witness who will put a seal on the papers. He is very relaxed. It’s unnerving how easily he can give all his money away to me.
As he starts to sign, I snatch the paper and hold it behind me. “Alexei, no… not today. This is big decision. You must think some more.”
Alexei sits back and looks at me. “I don’t need more time. Everyone’s here. I’ll sign now.”
