Page 130 of Mafia King’s Dangerous Vow

The man looks toward the Maybach. He cannot see through the tinted glass, but I know what he is wondering about. I wondered the same thing for the last ten blocks, feeling Aleksander beside me without looking at him too often because looking made the whole thing harder.

Mikhail opens my door and offers me his hand with absurd formality. I take it because the sidewalk is uneven, because I am wearing heels, and because the man at the entrance needs to see exactly what he is meant to: I do not arrive alone.

“Mrs. Sokolov,” the guard says as he opens the door for us, with the expression of a man who has been instructed to remain polite to predators.

I almost laugh.

Not because it’s funny. Because every name in my life has become a weapon lately. Kalinin. Sokolov. Morozov. Ivan. Mark.

Mama.

I walk past him, my spine straightening.

Inside, my father’s assistant looks up from her desk and blanches before she catches herself. She registers Mikhail first, then me.

“Ms. Kalinin,” she says, then corrects herself with a timid, frightened smile. “Mrs. Sokolov. Your father is expecting you.”

Mikhail glances toward the closed office door, then at the chair nearest the assistant’s desk. “I’ll wait here.”

The woman’s smile becomes more strained. “Make yourself comfortable.”

Mikhail unbuttons his coat and sits as if he owns the building, one ankle settling over the opposite knee. “You redecorated.”

The woman looks around the reception area, confused. “No.”

“Hm.” He studies the room. “Shame.”

He gives me a shrug when I turn to him, unable to suppress a smile, as if to say he is providing a public service.

It helps.

The office door opens. My father stands in the doorway wearing a dark suit and a mild expression that fools no one who has ever needed anything from him.

He notices Mikhail, who smiles again and gives him a casual wave.

“Tamara.” If the gesture bothered him, he doesn’t show it. “Come in.”

I step into the office, and the door closes behind me.

“You look tired,” he says as he points to the chair across from his desk.

“I am tired.”

His eyes sharpen a fraction. “Marriage does not agree with you?”

“I don’t think marriage is designed to agree with women.”

That earns me a small smile. Almost paternal. Almost fond. It lands on my skin like something unclean.

“You always did have a dramatic streak.”

“No,” I say. “You just preferred me quiet.”

The smile stays. The temperature changes.

He sits behind his desk and folds his hands loosely in front of him. “And Sokolov? Does he prefer you quiet?”

My mouth tightens. “Aleksander prefers everything quiet. Rooms. Men. Problems.”