Lying and Kissing(69)

Then I heard my name. He was talking about me...and I had a pretty good idea who with.

He ended the call. “My father,” he said apologetically. “I said I was with you...now he wants us to come over.”

“Now?” I asked. It was already late.

“Now.”



 



Vasiliy’s house had once been the home of some duke, a residence well outside from the city before Moscow had expanded and almost swallowed it up. It stood alone on a hilltop, old and grand and subtly distant from everything around it.

At the bottom of the hill there was a guard house where, even though Luka was family, the underside of our car had to be checked for bombs. The road itself snaked around the hill, its hairpin bends making it impossible to go faster than ten miles an hour. That gave Vasiliy’s guards plenty of time to get ready if someone sped past the guard house.#p#分页标题#e#

The first floor of the house itself had no windows, just solid slabs of heavy stone. Good in the olden days for keeping peasants with pitchforks at bay and now equally useful against rival crime gangs. No one would be allowed to hurt Luka’s dad.

“He barely leaves,” muttered Luka to me as we approached the house. “Except for really big deals.” He shook his head. “It’s sad. He’s almost a prisoner here.”

When we got inside, even Luka got a pat-down. “In case someone strapped a bomb to me, and blackmailed me into walking into the house,” he explained. He looked ridiculous, standing with his arms outstretched as the much smaller bodyguards patted his chest and back. It would have been funny if it hadn’t been so completely terrifying. How much fear do you have to live in, for your own son to become a potential threat?

And then the guards turned to me. “Lift your arms,” said one.

Luka shook his head. “That’s not necessary.”

“You know the rules,” he was told. The guards looked almost apologetic...but firm.

I nodded my consent.

Two sets of hands worked quickly and efficiently over me. They were professional about it, not copping a feel. But that didn’t change the fact they were both men—big, ex-military men, almost sandwiching me between them as they checked me. It was difficult to hold still, especially when it came time to check my chest and one of them ran the backs of his hands over my breasts. I could see Luka glaring at them.

They stepped back and nodded respectfully to me. I grabbed Luka’s hand and, together, we walked inside.

The first floor must have been the servants’ quarters originally and it seemed to serve much the same purpose today. I caught glimpses of guards sleeping in bunks and rooms that seemed to be filled with nothing but racks of guns and body armor. God, he’s got an army protecting him. The walls and floor were bare stone.

It was only when we reached the top of the stairs and entered the second floor that the house suddenly changed. Here, it was all wood paneling and ornate windows (though I suspected the panes had been replaced with bulletproof glass). And coming down the wooden staircase from a higher floor was Vasiliy himself.

He was dressed in a suit again, but this time a little more casually than when we’d met in the old factory. His crisp white shirt was unbuttoned at the neck and he’d discarded his jacket and tie. With his ramrod posture and sheer height, he cut an imposing figure as he strolled down the stairs, whiskey glass in hand.

First, he greeted Luka, kissing each cheek. Then he turned to me. “Arianna,” he said slowly, as if testing the name. Then he gripped my arms and kissed each of my cheeks, too. I caught my breath as he did it. It wasn’t just the knowledge that he hated me, underneath the false welcome. It was the size of him, the strength of his fingers as he held my arms.

“I have figures I need you to look at,” he told Luka, speaking in English for my benefit. His eyes never left my face for a second. “On the screen in my study. You know the way.”

Luka looked doubtfully between the two of us. He was being sent away so that his dad could talk to me, and we both knew it. I nodded to him that it was okay, even though I was terrified. I couldn’t let Luka fight my battles for me.

“Come,” said Vasiliy, slipping an arm around my shoulder. And he led me deeper into the house.





We turned so many corners and went up and down so many short flights of stairs that I soon had no idea where we were or what floor we were on. The house was a complete maze of dark wood paneling, and the fact it was night, with the only light coming from occasional wall lights, didn’t help. Vasiliy strolled through the darkened hallways, oozing calm confidence, while I could only stumble nervously alongside.#p#分页标题#e#