“Wait again.” She waves her hands to stop me. “Are you actually trying to get me to believe that you are part of… a gang?”
I let out an exhausted sigh. “It’s not a gang.”
“Oh, I’ve seen the movies. It’s totally a gang. So what are you, like, the ring leader? The Godfather? You’re like Jack Nicholson inThe Departed?” She laughs at her own joke, but when she sees my eyes turn to slits, the laughter dies quickly.
“Are you mocking me, Miss Parker?”
Her throat bobs. “No, I’m just— No, of course not. I’m just trying to make sense of what you’re telling me because honestly, it sounds nuts.”
“Am I a joking man?”
“Not usually, no. But–”
“Am I a lying man?” I ask.
“Also not as far as I know but—” She stops. Something in her must click because as she studies me, her face pales. “Holy shit.”
“Now, shut up and listen. New York is run by two Bratvas. The Rozanovs?—”
“—and the Chadovichs.” She finishes the sentence and I can actually see the dots starting to connect in her head. Her skin is still pale, her hands trembling. The enormity of what this means—for her, for me, for us—is beginning to sink in.
“So you do pay attention. Yes, the Chadovichs. There’s a lot of bad blood between our two families. A lot of dead bodies. And the current leaders?—”
“Anton and Dmitry.” The two names come out in a breathless whisper. I toss a dish towel at her in case she’s going to be sick.
Still, it’s impressive how quickly she’s catching on; I’ll give her that. I almost smile. The little stalker is not stupid by any means. “Yes. And in order to avoid more death, Anton and Dmitri want a truce. Of sorts. By means of arranged marriage.”
“Arranged marriage? Is that even a thing anymore?” she asks.
“In our world, yes. At least for now.”
“So, what—is there some Bratva princess out there that you were, like, betrothed to at birth?”
“Not in so many words. More like… I am the second in line for the Rozanovs and I have to marry someone of equal status in the Chadovich family.”
Amara’s eyes flutter and flicker around in a series of blinks as she struggles to catch all the moving pieces. Then her face sours. “Not… Jenica?”
“Yes. Jenica.”
Amara gets up and starts pacing the room. She wrings her hands, her face a storm of emotions. I give her a minute to process.
Finally, she looks at me. “And you don’t want to?” she asks, pausing for a moment.
“Of course not. Truces like that are a medieval way of handling years’ worth of conflict. But the Bratvais all about tradition.”
“So you don’t love her?” she asks sharply.
“No.”
“Are you attracted to her?” More sharpness.
“You’re missing the point. I have six months before I become the nextpakhan. If I can avoid a marriage to Jenica for that long, I can veto the arrangement all together and deal with the Chadovichs on my own terms.”
“So you’d be free to marry anyone you want,” she states. Really, though, it’s a question. What she’s actually asking is,Could you marry… me?
“Marriage isn’t on the table. And it’s not the center of gravity here.”
Amara sucks the inside of her cheek with a nod and I can tell by the way her lips are pursed that she is mentally overstepping. She’s hanging onto threads of what she thought was real, of what she perhaps wishes was real. But unfortunately for her little dream world, that’s just not the one we live in.
