Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 92957 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92957 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Noted.
“Your husband is like an older brother to me,” Matvei says with a smile. “We grew up together, and I look up to him. I’m pleased to meet you.”
I smile at him. “He’s everyone’s older brother, isn’t he?” I hold onto his arm, his bicep taut beneath my hand.
Leaning in, he brushes his lips to my cheek.
“Not everyone’s,” his other cousin says with a smirk that makes me feel a little uneasy. “Gleb.” Gleb is more slender than his brother, with sharp features and a charming smile I can’t trust. It doesn’t quite reach his eyes, and I’m immediately on edge. “So you’re the woman who finally got Rafail to settle down. Must be quite the story.”
I glance at Rafail. Settle down?
Why has it never occurred to me that there were other women before me? Settle down? How many women were there before me?
“Oh, I guess you could say that.” I laugh.
Gleb winks at me. Rafail’s muscles tighten under my hand, but his face remains placid. “We’ll have to hear all about it sometime. I bet with my cousin here, it isn’t all candlelit dinners and diamonds.”
“Oh,” I say lightly with a lame attempt at a laugh. “He’s pretty damn good with those candlelit dinners and diamonds if I say so myself.”
Rafail stifles a low growl. “Good girl,” he says softly. “Let’s keep the questions to a minimum, Gleb. I’d much rather hear about your adventures in America. You spent some time in New York, didn’t you?”
America. My heart aches for reasons I can’t quite understand.
Rafail pulls out the chair next to Zoya, who leans in and whispers in my ear, “Now, don’t worry about him at all. Gleb’s a jerk. Matvei’s alright, though, you’ll see.”
But his cousin isn’t finished. “It’s not every day we get to meet the new Mrs. Kopolov.”
Rafail grimaces at Semyon. “Did you let Gleb get into the wine again? We talked about that.”
Gleb’s eyes flash at Rafail so quickly that I think I may have imagined it. “Just be careful around him. Life with Rafail can be…” He leans forward. “Intense.”
I smile. “Oh, I’ve noticed. I happen to like intense. Life isn’t all fun and games, you know?” I give him a wink back and take the glass of water Rafail offers me.
Rafail’s warm, firm hand on my thigh sends a shiver down my spine, somehow both approval and a warning to behave. I half flirt with the idea of pushing, just to see what he’ll do, but the memory of this morning’s still fresh in my mind.
So, while they talk about business and football and the American version of vodka, which they all seem to despise, I talk with Zoya about which dress she should wear to her upcoming semi-formal.
“Have you asked your brother about that yet?” I whisper to her.
“Oh no,” she says with a little smile that’s part grimace. “I was, uh, sort of hoping you would.”
I nod. “Of course I will.” When he’s drunk on sex and half-asleep, I think.
I don’t have to remind myself that I’m in the presence of criminals. That my husband runs a powerful empire, but that none of these people here, not one, not even sweet little Zoya, is innocent.
The way Rafail constantly scans the room, continually vigilant. The glint of metal on Semyon’s hip when he stands to welcome another cousin and aunt. The waitstaff’s furtive glances and rush to immediately make sure the food is served promptly and our glasses are constantly filled.
Uncle Eduard smiles at me as he helps himself to yet another glass of wine. “You’ve married right into a ready family, Anissa,” he says while Rafail is busy talking to Gleb and Matvei. “He’s been a father to these hoodlums for years now. Should make it easy to start a family of your own, you think?”
I blink, startled at the directness of his comment. “Well, when the time is right,” I say with a shrug, though my heart races at the thought. “And even though he’s their older brother, it seems—”
Matvei cuts in with a grin. “Seems he’s already had plenty of practice raising a family, huh?”
Rafail gives a half-hearted smile, but when I look at him, he winks at me. My tummy flips.
“Rafail is too humble to tell you, but he was on his way to college when… when the accident happened,” his grandfather says. “I bought him a suitcase, and he was ready.” His voice grows softer. “Ready to fly away, weren’t you, son?”
I look at Rafail in surprise. For some reason, it never occurred to me that he’d ever wanted anything more than what he has, right here, with his family.
“My flight was supposed to leave that night,” Rafail says, a note of wistfulness in his voice. “When I got the call.”
My heart hurts for the man he had to become so quickly, so unexpectedly. “And you had to cancel everything?”