Page 27 of Sold to My Ex's Brother
Marlena—that was the name of the housekeeper. I’m pretty sure he had mentioned her to me when I had first arrived. My stomach sinks when I think back to what I saw on the day we fled the place. I have a bad feeling that she didn’t make it out of there alive.
“Did she...?”
He pauses for a moment, and then shakes his head. “No.”
He doesn’t need to say anymore. I can see how much it hurts him, having to admit something like that out loud, and I wonder how close the two of them were. Had she worked for their family for a long time? Taken care of him when he was a little boy? Ithink about pressing for more, but I get the feeling I would only come up against the harsh reality of how deeply he is stung by her loss.
“So how long till it’s ready?” I ask, turning the subject to something a little more pleasant. “I’m starving, and it smells really good...”
“I thought you said you didn’t have much of an appetite,” he remarks, glancing back at me, eyebrow cocked. I shrug.
“Guess the baby likes the smell of what you’re cooking,” I reply, flashing him a grin. And, to my surprise, he returns it. I feel a little flutter in my chest, something close to surprise that he actually doesn’t seem to despise me, after all that I have kept from him. I’m sure there is still a whole hell of a lot for us to figure out, but as it stands, I find myself beginning to unwind, something coming unstuck within me as I figure out where exactly I stand in all of this.
“About ten minutes,” he replies, and I rise to my feet, pulling open a couple of the cabinets.
“I’ll get the table laid. Well, the breakfast bar.”
“I can handle that?—”
“You’re cooking,” I remind him. “Least I can do to help, right?”
He pauses for a second, as though considering arguing with me, but he thinks better of it. I start to fuss around with the plates and cutlery, pulling out enough to serve up the noodles he is making, and the two of us fall into a companionable silence as we work. I know that this man likely holds the key to more power than I have ever encountered in my life, but right now, we couldjust be any other couple, getting ready for dinner after a long day.
He grabs the plates and serves up the noodles, which are deliciously fragrant and perfectly cooked. He hands me a plate, and I inhale deeply, letting out a sigh.
“God, this smells just like the takeout place I used to buy from in high school,” I remark, as I tuck in. “It had the greasiest fries and they used to serve them with this crazy, spicy sauce... I think that’s how I made it through my exams, honestly.”
He smirks slightly, watching me from the other side of the table as I tuck in. There is something piercing about his gaze, something about him that seems to reach deep down inside of me, studying a part of me I’m not sure I want anyone else to discover.
“Did you go to college afterwards?”
“What do you mean...?”
“When you finished high school. Did you go to college?”
I shake my head, twirling some of the noodles around my fork as I frown. “No,” I admit. “I was going to go, but my dad... He wasn’t doing well. Wasn’t taking care of himself. I thought he was just depressed, but that was the start of his gambling addiction getting really bad. Shit, I guess that’s when he first got in touch with your brother, needed someone who wasn’t going to ask too many questions when it came to lending him money...”
Anton winces. “My brother’s not the kind of man you want to have a debt with.”
I snort. “Yeah, trust me, I’ve figured that one out already,” I reply, my voice heavy. “I just...”
I struggle to put it into words, instead taking a bite of my noodles in the hopes of distracting myself.
“I just wish I’d got to have that same experience that everyone else my age got, you know?” I remark. I don’t know what it is that is making me come clean with him like this—it’s not as though I’m exactly open with anyone else in my life about how much I feel as though I have missed out on.
But this man, the one sitting opposite me right now, he’s the closest I’ve got to family, given that he’s the father of my child. And, for the first time in a long time, I feel a little less burdened by the weight of it all, some of the heaviness of my pain finally beginning to ease.
“I know how you feel.”
“You do?”
He nods. “I didn’t get a chance to do all of that either,” he explains. “When my father died, I took over the business. Became the Pakhan, just like he had been. Artem, he’s older, and he thought he had some right to it, but even back then, our father could see that he wasn’t the man for the job. That he would find some way to make a mess of it, no matter how hard we tried to save him from himself.”
He takes a bite of his noodles, sipping from the glass of water beside him. He seems as surprised as I am that he is laying it out so openly. After all that has happened, I guess that we should be upfront with each other; any more secrets are going to get spilled eventually, at least in a cabin as tiny as this, and I don’t know how long it will be before we can return to the city.
If at all.
“You grew up in that mansion?” I ask, with some interest.
