Page 112 of Sins of Arrogance

“And Odessa thought they would kid­nap you for lever­age?” Doesn’t sound like the way to keep a busi­ness re­la­tion­ship strong.

They might get the price they want for the cur­rent weapons, but my da will never buy from them again.

“They want a mar­riage al­liance.” This time the shock is so strong at speak­ing the truth, she slaps her hand over her mouth.

“It’s not our das who are balk­ing then?” I ask, tak­ing a stab in the dark.

And the bratva doesn’t want more money. They want Dier­dre.

Even woozy and un­in­hib­ited, fury suf­fused her fea­tures. “I’m not a bar­gain­ing chip.”

“We all are.” Even me.

True, if I hadn’t wanted what Fer­gal Shaugh­nessy was of­fer­ing, I would have found a way out of mar­ry­ing Kara seven years ago. I’m glad I didn’t, and not be­cause one day, sooner than later, I will be the boss and my son af­ter me.

There is no woman on the planet more per­fect for me than my own per­sonal ob­ses­sion.

“Well, I’m not go­ing to marry a bratva boss nearly twice my age just to pro­vide him with the male heir he didn’t man­age with his first wife.” Dier­dre man­ages to grab her wine glass and drink.

Or tries to. It’s empty.

She puts it down with a frown, like she’s won­der­ing where the wine went.

I don’t want her too ine­bri­ated to an­swer my ques­tions and give an­other sign to my sol­dier in­di­cat­ing I want the non­al­co­holic ver­sion of the wine brought to the ta­ble.

Lift­ing the bot­tle, I shake my head. “Empty. Here’s the waiter with an­other.”

Dier­dre gives my sol­dier a bril­liant smile. “Just in time.”

He pours her a glass of the non­al­co­holic wine and then leaves the bot­tle on the ta­ble be­fore step­ping away with the nearly half full bot­tle in my hand.

Dier­dre is so out of it, she didn’t even no­tice my lie.

She takes a long sip of her newly poured bev­er­age. “Ilya Darakov isn’t even a pakhan. He’s a weapons dealer.”

The name hits like an icepick to my brain. “Our das want you to marry Ilya Darakov?”

“It was his idea and he’s of­fer­ing in­cen­tives that both our das are find­ing hard to re­sist.”

“And when you re­fused to agree to the mar­riage, he tried to kid­nap you?” I ask.

“Not him per­son­ally. He sent his flunkies for me.” Which seems to of­fend her as much as the fact her da wants her to marry the Rus­sian.

“Whose idea was it for you to come to New York?” I ask.

“Mine.” She gives me a se­duc­tive wink. “All mine. But da went along with it. He did not ap­prove of Ilya try­ing to take mat­ters into his own hands.”

“They still want you to marry Darakov though?”

Dier­dre scowls. “Aye. The das think they can use the failed kid­nap­ping as lever­age for even more con­ces­sions.”

“Smart.”

“You think so? I don’t like be­ing bartered like a trea­sure full of di­a­monds.”

Trust Dier­dre to liken her­self to pre­cious stones rather than some­thing more pro­saic. She still sees her­self as the queen on the chess­board.

“What about you? What are you try­ing to get out of com­ing to New York?”