I didn’t feel lost anymore.
I knew what I wanted, I just knew I wasn’t going to get it.
I wanted to open my dream business with my friend. I wanted the man I’d been in love with since I was a teenager to love me back the way I needed to be loved. I wanted my mother to be there on my wedding day, helping me get ready and giving me advice on how to keep my husband in line. And…I couldn’t have any of it. That reality had dropped into my stomach like a stone the morning after my attack, when I woke up to an empty room. The side of the bed Bones had slept on was already cold. He’d been gone a while. Bones left without saying goodbye, like I hadn’t mattered at all. I was alone. Again.
I promised myself right then that I’d stop pining and wasting my time on a man who was never going to choose me. I’d tried, for such a long time, to convince Bones that this thing between us was worth the risk.He kept insisting that it wasn’t safe for me to love him, when he was really just protecting himself. Bones couldn’t bear losing control, and when you loved someone…reallyloved them, you lost all control over what happened to your heart. Bones wasn’t protecting me. He was protecting himself and sacrificing my heart to do it. Well, I was done. I was done waiting for someone to think I was worth the risk to fall in love with. Now, I just needed to figure out what that meant for me and where I went from here.
“You finished?” Indi said with a smack of her lips, pulling me from my thoughts. I pulled one last sip from my cup.
“Yep, let’s go see how the other half hangs out when they aren’t doing gangster things. Maybe we can hit up Allure later?” We climbed out of Sheila and locked her doors. Indigo and I walked arm in arm into The Goldfinch and were met by Riordan’s personal assistant. It only took me a moment to realize who she reminded me of as I eyed her deep burgundy blouse tucked into a sleek charcoal-gray pencil skirt that ended mid-calf. The heel on her shiny black high-heeled Mary Janes clicked on the marble floor of the foyer. The sound triggered my memory, and I realized that Astrid reminded me of Christina Hendricks when she played the fierce and ambitious Joan in TV’sMad Men.
“Welcome back to The Goldfinch, Indigo, Ms. Campbell,” she said as we approached the private elevator.
Indigo and I both said hello, her with a hug and me with a polite wave. “And please,” I add, “call me Lennon.”
“Thepakhanis currently in a meeting, but Mr. Petrov and Mr. Fedorov are waiting for you upstairs. Follow me, ladies.” Indi and I followed Astrid, and I disarmed when asked at the door to the penthouse. Astrid and the guards knew better now than to demand Indigo also lose her weapons. She might not have a gun on her at the moment, but I knew for a fact she had at least two blades hidden in her boots, a taser on her keychain, and a rock in her pocket that she said “looked cool” when she found it in the driveway back home. I didn’t know what she could really use it for other than a projectile, but knowing my bestie, she’d find a way to turn it into the world’s most randomly lethal object. To be completely fair, the rock was flat and roughly the shape of Snoopy the dog’s head, so…I guess that was kind of cool?
Indigo
Mr. Fedorov turned out to be Ivan. Astrid led Lennon and me into the penthouse, and I could see the blond Russian in question sitting at the dining room table with a complicated laptop set up, his fingers tip-tapping across the keys as he glared at the screen. “Hey, Spike, where’s my knobbly-kneed cousin?” My voice must have summoned Riordan because he came from somewhere deeper in the penthouse. Astrid made a weird snorting sound from behind me. Either she was trying not to laugh or she needed a tissue. “There he is! Hey, cuz! We’re here to hang out because of all the misogyny in biker culture and also because we were bored. What are you guys up to?”
Riordan adjusted the cuffs of his gray button-down shirt, the silver metal of his cuff links winking at me as he crossed the room and gave me a kiss on the cheek in greeting. It was better than the awkward hand kisses we’d traded the first time we’d met, and I felt the cockles of my demented little heart warm at the gesture. My cousin always looked so put together in his fancy shirt and slacks, and I could see Lennon eye him appreciatively out of the corner of my eye. If she wasn’t stupid in love with Bones, I’d be trying my best to play matchmaker right about now.
“Ms. Vaughn,” Riordan spoke to Astrid without bothering to look at her, “you’re dismissed.” I didn’t love the way his voice changed when he spoke to Astrid, but if she didn’t seem to mind, maybe it wasn’t my place to say anything. Astrid gave me a small smile when I waved goodbye, but otherwise, the only sound that accompanied her exit was the click of her high heels on the floor.
“So what are you guys up to? Ivan lookssuperinto whatever he’s doing on his laptop. Is he playing a game? I heard someone on Lennon’s phone say that Hello Kitty Island Adventure is all the rave right now.” Lennon tried to hide a smirk as Riordan snickered.
“Not exactly,lisichka.”
“The onlykittyI want to see on my screen is—”
“Sobrat,” Riordan growled in warning.
Ivan rolled his eyes at my cousin. “I’m not playing a game,” he explained in a bored tone, “I’m trying to figure out what the Callahans are up to and waiting to hear back from Nicodemus.”
“About what?” I asked, genuinely curious about the mysterious dark web persona who ran the Astraea platform. I pulled the cool rock I found out of my pocket and super subtly wedged it between the cushions of the sectional couch. For lack of a better word, The Goldfinch was the Petrovs’ home in Nevada, and I felt like maybe I could start leaving small pieces of me here and there to make my mark on it. I didn’t have shared memories, family photos, or mementos…or anything other than blood tying me to these people. If I could be sneaky and hide a bits and bobs of mine in their space, it would help us get used to each other. Like when a puppy leaves its momma, and the puppy parent takes a piece of fabric with the mother’s scent on it to make the puppy feel more comfortable in its new home. But in reverse.
Ivan’s eyes remained on his screen while I hid my rock. “We haven’t heard anything regarding The Consortium since our interrogation of Gregor,” Ivan said as he scrolled. “He told us what he’d been up to with the Beast of Boston, so I’ve been trying to reach out to Nicodemus to find out if he’s heard anything. The problem is, Nicodemus contacts you, you don’t contact him.”
“Oh yeah, how is Gregor doing?” Lennon asked with a vicious little smirk.
“He’s no longer wasting oxygen, so I’d say he’s doing better than he did when he was alive,” Ivan drawled in a bored tone.
“Indi, I was wondering if you and Lennon would like to—”
Riordan was interrupted by his cell phone, which had begun to ring. He answered the call with an apologetic face. “Zdravstvuyte. Da…Seychas? Indigo zdes′. Ponyal.” I felt an annoying sense offrustration at not being able to understand what my cousin was saying. It sounded an awful lot like I was going to get to ride a pony. I distinctly heard my name and a word close enough to pony to pique my interest. I really needed to download that green bird app to my phone so I could learn how to speak Russian. Lennon and Bones were sort of teaching me Spanish, but most of the phrases I’d learned were curse words or basic things like “My name is Indigo,” “Where is the hospital?”and“Don’t touch me or I’ll cut off your baby dick.”
“No me toques o te cortaré la verga de bebé,” I said to Riordan after he’d ended his call. Lennon snickered. Riordan quirked a brow in question, and I just held my hands up.
“Isn’t very nice, is it?” Ivan coughed out a laugh at my antics, ducking his head behind his laptop to hide his snicker at my cousin’s expense.
“Threatening my manhood? No, that isn’t very nice, at all,” my cousin drawled, mischief making his green eyes flash. “Yo hablo español.German, French, and Italian too, if you ever need a translator.” Lennon was full-on giggling at my pout, annoyed that I couldn’t get the last word in unless it was going to be in boring oldInglés.
“That was my father. Something has come up and he’d like to speak with both of us. Privately.” He turned to Lennon. “Would you be comfortable staying here with Ivan? I could always call Astrid in, if that would be preferable?” My bestie caught my eye, and we had a silent conversation, like all true, star-blessed best friends can do. Bob, I loved her.
I lifted my shoulder, and she shrugged. “I’ll be fine waiting here with Ivan. Maybe I can convince him to show me that picture of your knees in those scout shorts. Indigo said they looked like a giraffe’s.” I shot Riordan an apologetic look, but the effort was wasted with Ivan’s sinister chuckle. Riordan opened the door and scanned the hallway, ensuring that everything was safe before he moved back and held the door for me.
“Ivan would never,” Riordan said as I passed him and waved at the guards stationed there, his tone filled with absolute certainty. “Because he knows retaliation would be swift and devastating. Two words,sobrat.Senior. Formal.”
