My mouth goes dry. “Is there someone else?”
Lev closes his eyes.
My heart drops so fast I feel sick. “Oh my God.”
“It wasn’t planned.”
“Who?”
“Katya.”
“Who?”
He swallows audibly, his eyes dropping to his shoes, but he doesn’t say anything—yet again.
A thought enters my mind so ugly, so impossible, that I reject it instantly.
Then I see his face.
“Whois it?” I demand, my voice sharp and fragile. The blouse slips from my fingers and falls onto the floor.
“Vika,” he almost whispers. He says my stepsister’s name like it hurts him.
And for a second, the whole room becomes too bright. The gold lamp by my bed. The polished mirror. The open suitcase. The neat rows of lingerie I bought because I thought my fiancé would wantmein Russia. The velvet box containing earrings his mother had sent for me to wear at dinner.
All of it turns into something that feels humiliating.
My skin feels too tight. “Vika,” I utter my sister’s name.
Lev takes a step toward me. “It just…happened.”
I step back so quickly my hip hits the vanity. “Don’t.”
He stops.
“Don’t you dare come closer to me.”
His face hardens, just slightly. There he is—the real Lev, under all that polish. The man who likes obedience better than emotion.
“I know you’re hurt.”
“You know I’m hurt?” I look at him, almost amazed. “You’re ending our engagement the night before our flight because you’ve been sleeping with my stepsister, and you know I’m hurt?”
“We didn’t mean for it to happen like this.”
“We?”
His mouth tightens.
The word hangs between us.
We.
So they’ve talked about me. Together. In whispers. In bed. In the dark. Maybe they have pitied me. Maybe Vika has tilted her pretty little face and asked if I will be devastated. Maybe Lev has kissed her shoulder and told her I’m stronger than I look.
My stomach turns, sickness and rage mixing. “How long have you been fucking her?”
Lev looks away again.
