The words settle between us.
From the dining room, Anya’s voice rises slightly. Not laughter, but something close to it. A guarded response to whatever stupid thing Alexei has said.
I look toward the sound.
Larisa watches me do it.
I should be angry.
I am. But not only at her.
At myself too.
Because Larisa is cruel, bitter, and wrong about Anya. She’s making it a choice between my mother’s memory and hurting a person who had nothing to do with it.
But she’s not wrong about the danger.
I wanted Anya before I married her.
I still want her.
And now I have to decide whether she’s my wife, my weapon, or the first thing in years capable of making me confuse the two.
13
ANYA
When Yaromir returnswith his aunt, something has changed.
Not visibly. Not in any way I could explain to someone else without sounding foolish. His shirt is still perfectly buttoned, his expression still controlled, his scar still cutting down his face like a warning. Larisa walks beside him with her cane in one hand and that cold, elegant posture that makes every room feel like it has suddenly failed inspection.
But Yaromir is different. Colder. More distant than he was before he left.
At lunch, he watched me closely, yes, but there was something almost protective in it. When Larisa questioned me, his silence felt like restraint, not abandonment. Now when his gaze touches mine, it doesn’t stay. It passes over me and moves on.
I don’t like how much I notice.
Alexei is still seated across from me, telling me a story about a man who once tried to bribe Yaromir with a racehorse.
“A terrible horse,” Alexei says, leaning back in his chair. “Ugly animal. Bit three men, kicked a fourth, and tried to jump a wall too high for its own good.”
“What happened to it?” I ask.
“To the horse?”
“Yes.”
“Oh, Yaromir kept it.”
I look at Yaromir before I can stop myself.
He’s pouring water into his glass. “It had spirit.”
Alexei grins. “It had criminal tendencies.”
“That too.”
For a second, I almost smile.