"Lia!" Sophie crossed the gallery in quick strides, her dancer's grace undimmed by the wiggling infant. "It looks incredible. Imean—I knew it would, I've seen all these, but seeing them here, in an actual gallery—"
"Ba ba da," Katerina agreed solemnly, then tried to stuff her fist in her mouth.
Sophie laughed. The sound was warm, uncomplicated, the particular joy of someone whose daughter was safe and growing and learning words in two languages. She'd been so broken after Anton's basement. We all had. But six months had smoothed some of those sharp edges, and now she stood in my gallery with her baby and her smile and looked like someone who'd figured out how to live again.
Nikolai followed three steps behind.
His hand found Sophie's back the moment he was close enough—that particular gesture of his, the constant physical contact that said mine without words. He didn't speak right away. Just moved through the space slowly, stopping in front of each painting, giving them the particular attention of someone who actually cared about what he was seeing.
I watched him pause at the nursery painting.
His jaw tightened. Just slightly, just enough that I noticed. The light in that painting fell across Sophie's hair, across Maya's hands, across his daughter reaching toward something off-canvas. I'd captured a moment he couldn't have witnessed himself—the three of us in that room while he was off being a pakhan—and something about seeing it seemed to affect him.
"This one." His voice was quiet. "You've made something real here, Auralia."
The praise landed somewhere deep. Nikolai didn't compliment lightly. Everything he said was calculated, deliberate, chosen. If he said the work was real, he meant it.
"Thank you," I managed.
Then Konstantin swept me off my feet.
Literally. His massive arms wrapped around my waist and I was airborne, my careful heels dangling six inches above the gallery floor while he laughed that booming laugh that probably violated several noise ordinances.
"Our little artist!" He set me down before my heart could fully panic. "Look at you. Paintings on walls. Fancy dress. You clean up good!"
Maya rolled her eyes. But she was smiling—that rare, soft smile she saved for family moments, for the small circle of people she'd allowed past her defenses. She looked good.
"The Deshnevs send congratulations," Konstantin mentioned, casual as commenting on weather.
I blinked. "The—really?"
"Dmitri's wife saw your website. Wants to buy the one of Ghost." He nodded toward the Coney Island painting. "Said it reminded her of a dog they had when the girls were young. I told her you'd probably sell it to her. That's fine, yes?"
Dmitri Deshnev's wife. Wanting to buy my painting.
The Deshnev arrangement had settled into something almost comfortable over the past six months. Almost. The quarterly payments went out on time. The reports crossed Dmitri's desk without incident. Major operations required approval, which meant endless phone calls and careful negotiations, but Dmitri respected competence. The Besharovs had proven themselves—had shown that surrendering autonomy didn't mean surrendering capability.
Not freedom, exactly.
More like a long leash. The collar I could feel against my own throat, just extended to an entire organization.
"If she wants it, she can have it," I heard myself say. "But she pays full gallery price. No family discount."
Konstantin's grin was enormous. "That's what Maks said you'd say."
And then Maks was there.
I felt him before I saw him—the particular warmth of his presence, the way the air seemed to shift when he entered a room. He moved through the small crowd of family with ease, nodding at Nikolai, clapping Konstantin's shoulder, dropping a kiss on Sophie's cheek as he passed.
Then his arms were around me.
He pulled me close, not crushing, just holding. His lips pressed against my temple in that gesture that had become ours—the greeting, the reassurance, the constant small reminder that I was his.
"Nervous, little bird?"
His voice was low. Private, even in this room full of people we loved.
"Terrified," I admitted.
