I briefly consider ducking back inside and giving up, but I don’t want to give Aleksandr the win. I can do this and prove that I’m useful, if it means helping my family.
I can endure it.
I might like attention for the brief second where I get to be right about something, specifically asshole-ish men, but I do not like it when every head in a room turns towards me in unison.
Maybe my fashion choices haven’t helped me, but I don’t think the Valentino summer dress is the issue here. Even if I blended in with everyone wearing their uniformblack jumpsuits and ugly vests, I would still be the only person of my entire gender for what feels like an entire mile.
Everyone is staring at me. Unfamiliar faces, all of them male, all walking around like they own the place.
“Excuse me, do you know where I could find Yuri?”The reactions range from curious to annoyed to total stonewalling.
The eyes of strangers narrow as I approach them. One man driving a forklift yells at me to get out of the way.
For a shipping heiress, I have no idea how the port operates. For obvious reasons. I can’t turn anywhere without seeing a rough-looking man cursing or speaking in a dialect so filthy I can’t understand it.
One of them even winks at me.
Eventually, I find someone who points me towards an industrial looking building, looking dubiously at my outfit choice.
Just as I’m about to give up, a voice booms out from behind me.
“Saw that you were looking for me.”
I thought Aleksandr was huge. This man is a giant. He towers over me, stroking a hand through his thick beard as he looks down at me.
“I’m Natalia.”
He chokes out a laugh. “I know who you are, Natalia. I’m under strict orders to make sure you don’t do any damage to that pretty face of yours.”
I hold out a hand for him to shake, which he does with surprise, tucking a cigarette behind his ear. Nothing about hisgrip on my hand makes my nerves tingle with excitement the way Aleksandr does.
“Well, Yuri, I need a job and I guess you’re the one who’s going to give it to me.”
He rakes his eyes up and down my dress and heeled boots. They’re not stilettos, they’re block heels, and they’re the most practical footwear I have. I stuffed the hi-vis vest in a trash can on my way here. I figured that the bright colors would make me visible enough.
Yuri nods his head towards his office, and I follow him.
There’s none of the strange tension that I feel when I’m sitting in a room with Aleksandr. It’s a relief to have some normality. To talk to a man who doesn’t make my stomach flip with nerves whenever he looks at me.
Yuri is just as confused as I am about what I’m meant to be doing here. “What kind of work did he think you’d be doing?”
“He said you’d be able to show me what it’s like to work in the real world.”
Yuri lets out a bark that’s somewhere between a cough and a laugh. So he thinks I don’t know the real world either. Where does he think I’ve been living?
“That does sound like Leks.”
“How long have you known Aleksandr?”
Yuri chuckles at that, pausing for a minute to roll a cigarette. “I’ve known him since he was a kid who didn’t know what he was fuckin’ doing down here. Got Leks out of quite a few messes until he was old enough to do it himself.”
“So you’re an old friend of Aleksandr’s.” He chuckles again and I narrow my eyes at him. “What’s funny?”
“Just your accent, darlin’. Like a boarding school teacher or something. You make Leks sound like a motherfucking prince.”
I like Yuri, I decide. He might look like he would eat me alive, but he’s softer than he lets on. Unlike Aleksandr. Aleksandr is like a black hole — all-consuming and endless.
“I kinda thought he was the prince. Of this place, at least.”
