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Mariya doesn’t know about that, though. I should probably keep it that way unless I want Yakov to ban me from speaking to his sister.
She snorts and rolls onto her stomach. “Yes, he would. He probably tried. I bet Nik talked him out of it. Nik is the only reason I’m still here, I’m pretty sure.”
“Nikandr?”
She nods. “He was the only one who would talk to me on the phone. Yakov’s always too busy. I think Nik likes having me around. Yakov… not so much.”
It’s hard to believe the girl next to me is the same one who called me a “bitch” at breakfast. This morning she was on the defensive, prickly and unapproachable. Then I told her I liked her bra and, boom, instant best friends.
I wish all relationships could be fixed that easily.
“It’s not that Yakov doesn’t want you around. Things have just been… tense lately. He’s stressed.”
“Because of you?” she asks.
“It doesn’t have anything to do with me. Well, not really. I don’t—” I frown. “I hope he’s not stressed because of me.”
I don’t know enough about what is going on outside the walls of this house to be sure.
“Maybe you’re here to help him de-stress, then.” She opens her eyes long enough to wag her brows at me.
“Gross. You can’t say things like that about your brother.” I pretend to gag. “And if it makes you feel any better, Yakov would get rid of me if he could. I’m just stuck here for the time being.”
“Yeah, right. You wouldn’t be here if Yakov didn’t want you here. My brother doesn’t do anything he doesn’t want to do.”
I groan. “Is that the official family motto or something? I haven’t seen it carved on any of the walls.”
Mariya laughs. “It is just the Kulikov way. The boys get to do whatever they want while I get hauled around and bossed around. No one cares what I want.”
“That’s not true.”
“It is. No one asked if I wanted to leave one month after my dad died.” She lifts herself onto her elbows and stares out across the pool. She and Yakov have the same nose, I notice. “He died and then I was ripped away from my brothers. Who never called me, by the way. I was in Moscow for five years, but this house always felt like home. I always wanted to come back, but Yakov wouldn’t let me.”
I want to defend Yakov. I don’t know everything, but I know enough. Things were hard for him after his father was murdered. He held the man in his arms as he died.
But Mariya doesn’t want to hear that right now. She’d probably clam back up and shut me out again.
“That must have been really hard. I can’t even imagine what it would be like to restart in another country after losing someone you loved. I’m sorry that happened to you.”
She gives me a tight smile. “Thanks.”
I’m about to tell Mariya that she should tell Yakov what she just told me. Hearing each other’s perspectives could go a long way in fixing things between them.
Before I can, Mariya’s phone vibrates. She checks it and then jumps up. “I have to go meet someone.”
“Oh. Okay. Does your brother know where you’re?—”
“Nice talk,” she calls over her shoulder.
It could be another insult disguised as a compliment… but I don’t think so.
I smile as she runs for the patio doors. Maybe I’ll have a friend in this house after all.
41
YAKOV
My fist cracks across the man’s battered face. He drops to his knees in the blood of the dead Gustev soldier next to him, spraying blood onto my shoe.
