None of us says anything for a second.
Sofia looks pleased. Nikolai goes quiet.
Katerina goes still beside me, and I can feel the tension in her without touching her.
I look at her profile. She’s staring straight ahead like if she moves too fast, the whole moment will crack open.
Then she says, brisk and controlled, “We should go back.”
She gathers the children at once, one hand finding Sofia’s shoulder, the other reaching for Nikolai.
The spell breaks.
As we start back toward the table, I say quietly, “You don’t have to marry him.”
She gives me a look that’s tired, sharp, and much too honest all at once.
“No,” she says. “I’ll just tell my father a dangerous man I used to sleep with advised against it. I’m sure that will solve everything.”
I take the hit because I earned it.
But I say, “I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
That ends it.
We walk the last few steps in silence.
At the table, Vika is still smiling too brightly, and Elena looks like she would rather set the restaurant on fire than sit down again. Arkady rises halfway when Katerina returns, eager and unpleasant.
I look at him once, and he sits back down.
Katerina notices that.
Her eyes flick from Arkady’s face to mine and back again. She doesn’t smile, but I can see the recognition in her expression. The old man was halfway up, full of oily manners and borrowed confidence, and now he’s sitting down like his knees remembered their age all at once.
I take my place at the table without asking permission from anyone, which is apparently enough to ruin the seating plan Vika had imagined for herself. Elena sits to my right before Vika can recover. Katerina ends up across from me with Sofia beside her and Nikolai between her and his grandmother. Arkady is on Katerina’s other side, which means he now has to speak to her over the edge of my patience.
She hands Sofia back toward her chair, settles Nikolai with a quiet word, then looks at me and says, in the driest tone I’ve heard from her all day, “So. You’re just joining us for lunch?”
“Yes, me and Elena both,” I say glancing at her. To Elena’s credit, she keeps her face neutral.
Vika turns to her slowly. “Do you always travel with him?”
Elena folds her hands. “Occupational hazard.”
Arkady lets out a strained little laugh, the kind men make when they realize the women at the table are now more dangerous than the men.
Katerina gives me a look over the rim of her water glass. “You weren’t invited, you know,” she says.
Roman doesn’t even look at her. “And yet here I am.”
Vika scowls at Katerina. “Don’t be rude, Katya.”
Arkady clears his throat. “Well… The more the merrier.”
Sofia looks at Roman. “Are you rich?”
