It should be illegal for anyone to be this good-looking, especially when they’re already rich and spoiled. It’s too much. Fate should have given him awful teeth or a low IQ or something to even the score. But as far as I can tell, he’s pretty much perfect. Other than the shit personality, of course.
Karina has sidled up next to him. She’s trying to engage him in conversation about the car her father’s buying her for her sixteenth birthday. Roman isn’t paying the slightest bit of attention to her. He’s too busy glowering at me from across the table in between sips of hot cocoa.
“WHAT?” I say, finally, when I’m fed up with it.
“I was just wondering why you’re even at Blackwood at all,” Roman says coldly.
“My mom wanted me to switch schools this year.”
“I’m sure she did,” he says. “But why did they let you in?”
There’s so much derision in his voice that I almost feel like he’s made a four-paragraph speech on my unworthiness, instead of just six scornful words.
“My mother’s a legacy,” I tell him, trying to match his frosty tone. “Not that it’s any of your business.”
“Who’s your mother?”
“Franka Bobrov. Does that answer all your questions, Inspector Poirot?”
“Most of them,” Roman says, shrugging. “Except one.”
I should really change the subject.
Or just ignore him.
Or pretend I have to go pee.
Instead I glare at him, folding my arms across my chest. “Yeah?” I say. “What’s that?”
“Just wondering how a Bobrov ended up married to a loser like your father.”
I jump to my feet, so angry that I almost turn the whole table over.
Anna stands too, crying, “That’s out of line, Roman!”
Roman is faster than any of us. He’s come all the way around the table, nose to nose with me—or I guess nose to chest, since he’s so much taller than me. He glares down into my face, trying to use his bulk to force me to back up. That’s not happening.
“I’ve eaten at your family’s restaurant,” he says to me quietly. “Your father cleared away my dirty dishes.”
That’s horseshit. Papa doesn’t bus tables.
However, he probably did come over to Roman’s table to welcome him. And maybe he even sucked up to Roman a little, because the Turgenevs are Bratva royalty. My father’s business depends on their goodwill.
We’re subservient to the Turgenevs. Compared to their level of wealth and power, we really are peasants.
So the truth in his insult stings me.
But I’ve got a little truth for him, too.
“You think you’re better than me because of your father?” I say to Roman. “Whatever he is has nothing to do with what you are. You’re nobody on your own. You’ve accomplished nothing. You’re just a spoiled child . . . and you suck at skiing.”
That last bit probably wasn’t necessary. Roman’s face had already bleached furiously white long before I got around to impugning his skiing skills.
He looks so angry that I think he might slap me.
I certainly want to hit him back.
Instead, Roman takes his cup of cocoa and dumps it down the front of my coat. The hot, sticky chocolate stains Anna’s flawless white down jacket, utterly ruining it.
“Oops,” Roman says, smirking at me. “Hope you don’t have to take out a second mortgage to pay Anna back for that.”
He walks away from me, Karina following after him.
I stare down at the front of the soaked coat. I can feel the cocoa seeping through to my sweater and even my bra.
Then the worst thing of all happens.
I burst into tears.
I fucking HATE crying in front of other people. It’s so humiliating.
The fact that I let Roman Turgenev make me cry . . . that’s the most embarrassing thing of all. I can’t believe I’m that weak.
“Hey,” Anna says, putting her arm around my shoulder, “I’ve got lots of coats, you don’t have to pay me back.”
I will get her a new coat though, even if it takes me six month’s allowance.
That’s not the part that bothers me. It’s the tears. The humiliation.
It’s the tears. The humiliation.
I’ll never, never, never forgive Roman for that.
Five Years Later
2
Roman Turgenev
Paris
Would you like to know your future? If your answer is yes, think again.
Vera Nazarian
“If we put the baccarat table over here, we could add two more three-card tables here,” Violet says, rearranging the tiny furniture on our diorama.
“We don’t want it to be too crowded,” Anton says. “Better to have more private rooms even if it means less tables in total. The revenue for the private room could be five times a single open table.”
“It won’t be too crowded!” Violet says. “Remember, this isn’t to scale. You’ll have loads of space between these tables over here.”
“Oh, this isn’t to scale?” Anton says. He picks up the Storm Trooper representing our cashier. “I thought this was a perfect reproduction.”
Violet snatches the figure out of his hand, giving him a stern look.
“I’m improvising,” she says. “We can get a better model made once we agree on the general layout.”
“Can I be Han Solo in the new model?” I ask her.
“I already made you an Ewok, little brother,” Violet says, reaching over to mess up my hair. “Because you’re so cute.”
She’s only eighteen months older than me, but she loves to lord it over me. I think because she was the baby in her family for so long, she’s enjoying being the big sister for once.
I only found out I had a sister two years ago. It wasn’t the most pleasant surprise at first. Actually, I hated everything about it. When you’re raised as an only child and the sole heir to your father’s empire, you’re not exactly predisposed to share. Especially not with some girl who knows nothing about your culture or family name, or the world of the Bratva in general.
But then our father was killed, and Violet became the only person I had left. And I found out that the point of a sibling is that they care about you. Whether you deserve it or not, they’re on your team.
Along with Violet comes Anton—my father’s top lieutenant, now Violet’s husband. He’s also a good person to have in your corner.
After my father was murdered, we spent eight months in a bloody battle with the other half of the Turgenevs. The sharks smelled blood in the water, and we had to put down revolts from the Averins and Golubovs, too.
Anton took the brunt of that. Before you can have peace, you’ve got to win the war. Anton crushed every challenger who tried to take advantage of the power struggle in our family. He helped Violet and me secure our places as the head of the Paris Bratva.
Only now can we finally turn our attention back to what my father wanted: to make our empire legitimate. To begin transitioning the Turgenevs from mafia kingpins to business magnates.