Page 24 of Claimed By the Boss
She’s good at waiting.
I make it to the kitchen before she appears in the doorway.
“Who were they?” she asks.
I open the cabinet. Take out a glass. “Council members.”
“I know they were council members. Roman had the floor cleared for thirty minutes.” She leans against the doorframe. Her arms are crossed, not defensively, the way she holds herself when she has decided to have a conversation she knows I will not want to have. “What was the meeting about?”
“Organization business.”
“Zane.”
I fill the glass. Drink. She’s looking at me from the doorway with the patience of someone who has nowhere else to be and no intention of going there.
“It doesn’t concern you,” I say.
Something moves across her face. “I’m sorry?”
“It was a council matter. It’s handled.”
“A council matter.” She pushes off the doorframe. Takes two steps into the kitchen. “Three men come to a closed meeting on a Sunday evening, and you tell me it doesn’t concern me.”
“It’s handled, Celine.”
“My name was in that meeting.”
I look at her. She holds it.
“You don’t know that,” I say.
“I know Gregor has hated me since the dinner. I know he’s been building toward something. I know that whatever was in that folder Fedorov was carrying was not about the northern routes.” Her voice is level. It’s the cold version, the one that costs her more than shouting would. “I’m not an idiot. Do not manage me like one.”
“I’m not managing you.”
“Then tell me what happened.”
“No.”
She stares at me. The kitchen is very quiet.
“No?” she repeats.
“The matter is resolved. You don’t need the details.”
“I don’t need—” She laughs once, short, a sound with nothing warm in it. “I have been attending your dinners and your galas and performing at your table for the council, and you are standing in your kitchen telling me I don’t need information about a meeting where my name was almost certainly discussed by men who have decided they don’t want me here.”
“They don’t get to decide that.”
“Neither do you.” She takes another step toward me. “Neither do you, Zane. You decided I would be your wife. You decided I would move in here. You decided I would attend the dinners. You have made every single decision in this arrangement and called it protection, and I have gone along with it because the contract says I have to.” Her voice drops. Not softer. Lower. “But you do not get to make decisions about what I know about my own life.”
The kitchen between us is not large. She has crossed most of it without either of us noticing.
“Gregor brought a name,” I say.
She goes still.
“A woman from a Bratva-connected family. He made a case for replacing you.” I set the glass down. “I ended the meeting. The case went nowhere. That’s all that happened.”
