Dark wood walls, high ceilings, heavy chandeliers dripping crystal. There’s a huge table in the middle, where people decide wars and who gets to disappear. Icons line one wall, saints painted in gold leaf, watching everything with calm little faces while the Volkovs ruin lives under their noses.
My dress rustles when I step through the door. The sound is embarrassingly loud.
Three men are in the room.
Roman is by the window, in a dark suit that fits him too well and a white shirt. I see the edge of a tattoo just above the collar. He stands with his hands braced on the sill, shoulders tense, staring out at the city.
He doesn’t turn right away.
When he hears my dress, he does.
The movement stops halfway, like someone hit pause. His eyes run over me from the veil to the neckline to the ridiculous skirt. His hand tightens on the window frame until his knuckles go white.
For one stupid second, he actually looks… stunned.
Heat races up my throat. My first thought is irrationally petty:good. Choke on it.
Then his face shuts down. Everything smooths out into that blank mask I’m starting to hate. He adjusts his cufflink like he’s in an ad for expensive watches and turns back toward the room, but his gaze doesn’t leave me.
He watches me walk all the way in.
The second man is already seated at the head of the table.
I know it’s Vadim before anyone says his name. He has presence, the kind that bends rooms. His hair is silver and perfectly groomed, his suit dark blue and obviously tailored in some Italian place that sends champagne along with your receipt. His hands are smooth, soft. The ring on his finger is a heavy gold with something old and military carved into it.
He looks at his nails.
“Anya Nikolayevna Morozova,” he says, and his Russian is pure Moscow theatre, smooth. “How punctual. I do appreciate a woman who understands schedules.”
His voice is pleasant. It makes my skin crawl.
He waves lazily at the chair opposite him. “Sit, devushka.”
The third man is thin and nervous and already halfway to sweating through his shirt. Wire-rimmed glasses, receding hairline, a cheap tie that doesn’t match his expensive surroundings. He stands as I approach and sets a stack of papers in front of my chair with hands that shake so badly one sheet skids halfway across the table.
“Sergei Vetrovin,” Vadim says, still not looking away from his nails. “Family lawyer. Also notary. Witness. And when needed, scapegoat.”
Sergei flinches like someone flicked his ear.
I gather my skirt and sit, trying not to knock anything over. The leather is cold under me and smells like smoke.
“Congratulations on the dress,” Vadim says, finally glancing up. His eyes are a strange yellow-brown, like honey that’s gone a bit dark. “Galina does know how to make a girl look expensive.”
I want to spit at him. Instead, I fold my hands in my lap, because they’re shaking again and I don’t want him to see.
The contract is thicker than any contract I’ve ever signed. I flip through it because I have to do something that isn’t stare at Roman or stab Vadim with my eyes.
The words blur. I catch phrases.
“Binding and irrevocable.”
“Canonical and civil.”
“Annulment not recognized by the Family.”
“Termination by death only.”
Family with a capitalF.
