Page 43 of Boardroom Ties
My feet stop working. My lungs stop working. Every organ in my body files a joint complaint and storms off the job with no plans of coming back.
Matvei, on the other hand, seems unfazed. Without moving a muscle, he gazes calmly at me over the rim of his whiskey like he’s been standing there waiting for me to turn around all night. Or for my whole life, really.
Raymond’s hand tightens on my back. “Ah!” he says brightly. “There he is.”
“Who?” I manage to splutter, pretending I was not just zoning out badly.
“My protégé. Come. I want you to meet him.”
My protégé.
Myprotégé.
My motherfucking protégé.
… This can’t be happening.
I let Raymond steer me across the ballroom, past a dowager in pearls, a senator’s wife, and a man I’m fairly certain owns half of Queens. The closer we get to Matvei, the blanker his face becomes, and the more ice settles into mine, because one of us has to sell this, and I am not up to the task.
“Matvei!” Raymond booms, clapping him on the shoulder. “There you are. Hiding at the bar like an Irishman.”
“Thank God I’m not Irish, then,” replies Matvei coolly. “Russian through and through.”
“Ah, well, we can’t all be perfect, can we?” Raymond jokes. He immediately bursts out cackling at his own really-not-that-funny joke. “Glad you could make it.”
Matvei’s mouth does a strange twist that does not resemble any human smile I’ve ever seen before. “Wouldn’t miss it for the world.”
“I should hope not. Have you met my wife? Cassandra, this is Matvei Satyrin. My best associate. He’ll make partner before he’s thirty-five if I have anything to say about it.”
Matvei’s eyes pin me to the floor. “Mrs. Snyder.”
“Mr. Satyrin.” My voice sounds like it belongs to someone else. “It’s a pleasure.”
“The pleasure is mine.”
He takes the hand I don’t remember offering. He holds it a beat too long. Raymond doesn’t notice, thank God. He’s turning away to flag down a waiter, already losing interest in this small, polite exchange between his wife and his favorite lawyer, because why would he care? Why would he ever care?
“I hear you’re his best associate,” I say, because I have to say something or I’ll scream.
“He’s a flatterer.” Matvei lets my hand go. “I hear you’re his best wife.”
“No, only his latest.”
And, if I have it my way…
… his last.
Raymond returns with two fresh glasses of champagne and presses one into my hand before I can protest. I hold it and don’t drink. Matvei’s eyes flicker like he’s doing math in his head, but he says nothing.
“Darling,” Raymond says, a word that grates on my nerves, “stay and chat. I need to go shake a few hands. Matvei, keep her entertained, will you? She gets bored at these things. Can’t have her wandering off, you know? Pretty things like her have a tendency to fall into the wrong hands if a man’s not careful.”
Matvei inclines his head in a graceful half-bow that looks almost royal when he does it. “Of course.”
And then Raymond is gone, cutting through the crowd toward a knot of men in the far corner. I’m left standing alone at the bar with the father of the baby in my uterus, who is coincidentally also the man I walked into a bar to hire to kill the man who just introduced us.
Matvei waits until Raymond is out of earshot. Then, very quietly, without looking at me: “Come with me.”
“Where?”
