Page 21 of Claimed in Sin
"You want to marry this girl?" he asks.
"I want to take her from Orlov and use her to flip the Belovas. If that means marrying her, I'll marry her." Why does my throat constrict as I say that? And why am I feeling a strange twist in my chest that warms and spreads outward as I think of marrying Marina?
"That's not what I asked." Roman leans back in his chair. "I asked if you want to marry her."
The room is deathly quiet as I think about it for a second. I've never thought of myself as the type who would get married, but Kaz has a lady now, and so does Roman. They're happy and in love, and I'm tired of being alone. Marina or some other woman—either way, I'm ready to have a partner, and she is an incredible woman. Plus, it would represent a huge win for the family. It's a no-brainer.
"Yes," I say.
He stares at me with eyes that search me like he's testing my word to see if it's true. And when he looks away, flicking hiseyebrows up once, I know he understands I’m still figuring it out. Then comes his warning.
"This changes the game, Stepan. You understand that. You're not running an operation against the Belovas anymore. You're tying yourself to one of them. If this goes wrong—if Sergei retaliates, if Orlov comes after you, if the girl turns on you—you're exposed. You can't take this back."
Then he sighs and runs a hand down over his unshaven jawline.
"The strategy is sound. The Belovas come to us, Orlov loses his bride and his access to Perm, and we consolidate the gun trade without firing a shot... I just don't know."
When he stands up and looks to Timur, I believe I've convinced him.
"For what it's worth," he says, "I hope she's worth it." He walks to the door, gesturing for Timur to follow, and the anxious tension in the pit of my gut loosens slightly.
I don't know if Marina will ever go for this or how stubborn she'll be. And I don't know if her father will react the way I hope, but once you've tasted forbidden fruit, you're an addict, and you will never settle for less.
Besides, if Orlov gets in my way or even thinks of hurting her, he's a dead man. Then there will be no man to marry her off to in an alliance.
And that might just be what it takes to help her break her stubborn loyalty to men who only have her pain in mind.
11
MARINA
The seamstress has her mouth full of pins and her hands on my waist, pulling the satin tighter across my ribs. I've been standing on this pedestal for the past forty minutes while she adjusts the hideous dress Maksim demands I wear for the wedding. I flick a glance at Elira and she snickers at my annoyance. I can't even get to my phone, which is on the table across the room.
"Turn," she says around the pins.
The dress moves with me as I turn and I watch my reflection in the mirror. I look like a woman who's about to marry a man she loves, not a prisoner being forced to make a business arrangement. If I unfocus my eyes and don't look at the glare on my face, I'd almost believe it were true.
Elira sits on the sofa behind me with her legs crossed and a glass of champagne in hand. Her foot bobs as she catches my eye in the mirror and winks. "He's going to die," Elira says. "Honestly, Marina, when he sees you in this dress, he is going to stop breathing."
"You think so?" I'm so numb. Most women go giddy over picking out their wedding gown, while I feel like a zombie. My mind is on Stepan. It has been all day. Maybe he would go insane with desire if he saw me in this dress, but Maksim will only nod politely and expect me to not upstage him.
The seamstress hums in agreement, adjusting the hem as I hear my phone buzzing. Stepan was flirting with me before, trying to convince me to sneak out with him. But after weeks of telling my father I was out dress shopping and never picking one, the excuse is going to start sounding like a lie. I can't go home without having a dress nailed down, complete with receipts to prove it. Which means I can't leave this dress shop until the seamstress is done with her damn pins.
"Problem, Miss?" she mumbles, now only a few pins in her mouth.
I force a fake smile and shake my head, but I give Elira a pleading expression and she seems to get the point. When I glance at my phone and nod a few times, she rolls her eyes at me and walks over there, picking it up to bring it to me.
"Thank you," I mouth, but she's already back to her seat to sip her champagne.
I immediately turn my attention to the multiple messages on my phone, some of them nothing more than emojis—mostly eggplants and tacos or peaches—and grin when I see the most recent one.
Stepan: 3:22 PM: What are you doing right now?
I wait until the seamstress turns to get more pins and then I pull at the collar of the uncomfortable dress before I reply.
Marina: 3:23 PM: I'm at Dom Nevesta getting fitted for a dress I don't want to wear.
I send a smattering of wedding-related emojis and then a frowny face. It feels like Stepan is the only one I can actually be myself with. If I got painfully honest with Elira, she would just encourage me to see it from my father's perspective, because she's like that. She will always try to make me feel comfortable in my circumstance when she knows it's not an easy fix. But Stepan feels different, like he can see the way I feel trapped and wants to help me out of that.
