Page 54 of Mistaken
Yes, that tracks,” she admits. ‘He can be an idiot. He’s a man raised to give others orders. But I have faith that Maksim can learn to be a better man for you.”
The men turned to look at us, and she squeezed my hand, launching back into conversation with them without a hitch.So smooth,I thought in admiration,I could never be like that.
With the vodka, the good food and conversation, and the jet lag, I fell asleep on the way back to the Morozov mansion.
“????????…”
“Mmmm?” I tried to force my eyes open.
“We’re back home,” Maksim’s hand was cupping my cheek, and I realized I was halfway on his lap, my face buried in his neck. “Would you like me to carry you in?”
“Oh,” I awkwardly struggled upright. “No, I’m fine, thank you.”
Still, he wrapped his arm around my waist, supporting me on the trek up the stairs and to the master suite. I was dozing off again, so I didn’t move when he pulled my dress off, and my shoes, leaving me in my underwear and tucking me in. “Sleep well. We’re going ice skating tomorrow.”
Maksim…
She was so beautiful, sleeping in my ancestral bed, the size of it making Ella look smaller, and her glorious, black hair spread over the white sheets. The lingerie I’d selected for her was outlining her body so sweetly, displaying her lovely breasts…
Blyad'!This woman was going to be the death of me. But I would not force her to have sex with me. Still… holding her as she sprawled casually over my chest, nose buried between my pectorals as she slept was… good. I could never allow this when she was awake, but I was not that stupidly rigid to not enjoy it now, feeling the soft exhale of her breath on my skin. Sighing, I carefully adjusted my legs. I would sleep tonight. I was holding my bride and, in my bed, the bed I’d earned by killing my father. I could sleep.
“Dress warmly today,” I warned Ella, “ice skating here is a much colder experience.”
“Everything here is a colder experience,” she laughed, “how far away from the Arctic Circle are we again?”
“We’ll warm your thin American blood yet,” I promise her, wrapping a silky green scarf over her turtleneck and her jacket.
We’re meeting Alexi and Lucya again today, along with their children. This time together with the head of the Turgenev Bratva is crucial. Whatever’s coming, alliances will be crucial.
“Ella!” Lucya descends on my bride, kissing both cheeks, she grins tauntingly at me. “Maksim.”
“Hello, Lucya,” I say dryly, hiding my amusement. Their daughters and youngest son huddle beside her, but Konstantin, their sixteen-year-old, walks up boldly, shaking my hand.
“Hello, Sir,” he says seriously, “it’s good to see you again.”
Alexi ruffles his son’s hair fondly. “Kon’s been accepted to the Ares Academy.”
“Congratulations,” I’m impressed. The private school he’s speaking of is populated almost completely by the children of families in organized crime. It is notoriously difficult to get into.
“Are we skating or talking!” Lucya shouts, and everyone piles onto the ice.
“I guess your bodyguards here in Russia are better skaters, huh?”
Ella’s skating alongside me, but I didn’t take her hand this time. My standing as Pakhan was different here. My reputation is crueler, harsher here in St. Petersburg, it has to be. A romantic, silly thing like holding hands is not something I can do here.
“They are,” I nod to a loose circle of men around us, and two more on the suspension bridge above us, keeping watch.
“We’re skating under a freaking bridge,” she marvels, craning her head back to see the cables and steel cross beams as we pass under it. On the other side, the river widens, and there’s fewer people skating along.
Yana, their fourteen-year-old, skates parallel with us, looking hopefully at Ella, who notices immediately. “Hey, girlie, you want to do some tricks with me?” She nods vigorously, and they’re off, laughing and skating in circles around each other. Yana is nearly as tall as Ella, and I watch my wife exclaim over the girl’s lack of a scarf and pull off the green one I’d given her, wrapping it around her neck.
“Your new bride is good with children,” Alexi skates alongside me, “do you plan on building your own dynasty of strong, terrifying children soon?”
Chuckling, I shook my head. “I don’t know if I am ready for children, particularly if they take after Ella.” She and Yana are both wearing white jackets and holding hands, they almost look like sisters.
Alexi gestures for two of his guards to move closer to them as their circles grow larger and larger. But the guards are still too far away when the first gunshot sends a vicious crack into the ice and the second hits Yana in the side, spinning her around and falling through the crack in the ice into the black water of the Neva River.
Chapter 16 – Through the Ice
