“A truce, a true agreement made in a civilized manner, is just what our families need to prevent any more of these ‘misunderstandings.’” Jenica uses my father’s word, her voice amicable and level. My eyes go over to her only because I can feel her icy gaze on me.
I have known this woman, thisgirl, my entire life. And I know when those eyes are telling me something. This something is not what I want to hear.
In my peripherals, l catch another snake-like smirk from Tristan who is now rotating the knife between his fingers, his eyes fixated on me, waiting for my expression to break.
It won’t.
I know where this is going. I know what a truce looks like between Bratva families. It’s nothing short of a seventeenth century agreement between feuding royal houses. When two families can’t get along—or in our case, can’t stop trying to kill each other in the streets—an alliance is struck, at the expense of one unlucky couple. In other words…
… An arranged marriage.
“It’s been a while since the Rozanovs have resorted to going this route,” I growl, leaning back with my whiskey in my hand. “I find it to be medieval.”
“It’s tradition,” Dmitry states flatly.
“And it works,” my father agrees.
Wrong. It’s a Band-Aid. A facade.
It’s also going to end as soon as I becomepakhan,because it’s fucking bullshit.
For now, though, with these two sitting at the table, there isn’t much I can do.
“So who are we marching to the guillotine this time?” I ask wearily.
I get nothing in response.
Dmitry’s face has not changed. He is a large man with greasy hair and a suit that barely contains his flab. Katya is smiling as she always does. Fake, lip-stained, lifeless. My mother’s hand moves only so she can take a sip of her rum. Tristan’s hand spins the blade between his fingers faster. And Jenica’s eyes, blue like ice, haven’t left me.
A chill runs up my spine before melting and running hot as it all becomes clear.
They want me to be the sacrificial lamb.
“You have to be fucking kidding me.”
“I’m not a kidding man, Ransome,” Dmitry says somberly.
“Is my cousin not good enough for you?” Tristan stops playing with the knife and glares at me.
I show no expression. He’s trying to rile me up. He’ll have to try much fucking harder if he wants to succeed. “Arranged marriage is not for me. I’m going to be thepakhanand?—”
“That’s right.” He runs his slimy tongue across his teeth. “Because your brother is dead.”
My jaw clenches. I can feel my mother flinch. That alone is enough to make me want to flip the table, take thismudakby the throat, and make use of that dull knife.
But I don’t.
My father clears his throat. “Son, you know as well as I do that this is how things work. Jenica is a lovely, smart, well-educated young woman and she will make a finepakhan’swife. A trucebetween the families is a perfect solution.” His words drill into my eardrums like nails in a coffin.
Mycoffin, specifically.
I glance at my mother, who is still sipping her rum, still wounded from Tristan’s comment. A comment I’d love to make him pay for, but that would only further prove the point that we need this marriage before there’s no blood left to spill.
“I, for one, bless the marriage.” Katya plasters on a phony smile and reaches for her drink. “I say we toast to it.”
“Absolutely,” my father agrees, picking up his glass as well.
The others follow suit. I am the only one who doesn’t lift my drink.
