“You’ve seen very little of it,” I say, pushing her forward past the formal library with its two-story shelves. “There will be time.”
“Is that… is that a tree? Inside?” She cranes her neck as we pass the indoor courtyard, where a hundred-year-old olive tree grows beneath a retractable glass ceiling.
“Anatoly’s idea,” I say. “From the old country.”
Nikolai trails his hand along the stone half-wall. “Alya likes to climb it when no one’s looking.”
“Smart kid,” Bella murmurs. A smile flickers across her lips—small. Real.
We turn down another corridor lined with black-and-white canvases. Abstract. Violent. Stark slashes of chaos in expensive frames.
She studies them like they’re puzzles she’s halfway through solving.
“Let me guess.” She points to one particularly unhinged piece. “This is called ‘Murder Scene Number Five’?”
“Redemption,” Yelena says. “Petrov. 1967.”
Bella jerks her head around, stunned. It’s the most words my mother’s strung together in her presence.
We reach the kitchen. Thefamilyone. Not the industrial fortress where staff prep twelve-course dinners. This room is warm. Stone counters. Hanging copper pots. Lanterns glowing on the patio just beyond the glass.
Bella blinks. “We eat in here?”
“My father had this room built for family dinners,” I say, steering her inside. “Not the formal ones. The real ones.”
She stiffens. So do I.
The word sits between us like a loaded gun.
Family.
It doesn’t have to be spoken out loud to echo.
Behind us, a maid spots me and quickly begins clearing a space at the head of the table. Another one rushes in with fresh utensils and folded napkins. No one needs instructions. They just move.
Then the atmosphere shifts. I don’t even have to look. Ifeelit.
Anatoly walks in.
The staff snap straighter.
I push the wheelchair closer to the table—my usual spot. Then stop.
“What?” she asks, cautious.
I don’t answer. I just reach down and lift her out of the wheelchair.
She tenses immediately. “Konstantin—”
“Let me.”
Her breath catches, but she doesn’t fight me. Her good arm loops around my neck, clumsy and unsure. I feel her heartbeat, quick and high. I feel how light she is. How breakable.
I set her down gently into the seat beside mine.
She adjusts her sling, avoids my eyes, and mutters, “You know I could’ve walked.”
“And I didn’t want you to.”
