Page 102 of Cruel Demands

“I assume there is a reason you cannot.”

He launches into an explanation involving ventilation, preservation standards, and historic structural protections. I listen long enough to understand approximately half of it before someone touches Mikhail’s arm. An elderly woman stands beside him. Mikhail turns immediately, takes both of her hands in his, and bends to hear her over the orchestra. She says something that makes him laugh, then swats his arm like he is a badly behaved grandson. He looks delighted.

I stare in open suspicion. Four days ago, this man frightened me against an office door because I asked about Viktor Orlov. Now an eighty-year-old woman is pinching his cheek. I feel like I’m watching a lion allow someone to put a birthday hat on its head.

A factory worker in an inexpensive suit approaches next and shakes Mikhail’s hand with both of his. He speaks rapidly. Mikhail listens without interruption. Not the blank, fixed attention politicians use while waiting for an opportunity to escape. He asks a question, then another. The man’s shoulders relax. Mikhail remembers the name of his town, the factory where he works, and that the man’s wife was ill last year. I can tell from the man’s face.

He speaks to wealthy men without seeming impressed by them. He remembers assistants’ names. He crouches to greet a little girl whose mother works with one of the education programs and accepts a paper bracelet from her as though she has presented him with a state decoration. It is bright pink and covered in crooked silver stars. He puts it on.

I look at Viktoriya with open shock. “Children like him,” she says with a shrug.

“Why?”

She gives me a look. “Taylor.”

“I’m asking a legitimate question.”

“No, you are not.”

Mikhail keeps the bracelet on during his speech. He talks about teachers leaving smaller districts because salaries cannot compete with Moscow, children sitting in classrooms where heating systems fail in January, and administrators forced to choose between repairing a roof and replacing equipment. He doesn’t speak as though the people in those photographs are tragic objects of charity. “This is not generosity,” he says. “These schools educate our children. These teachers remain in communities where they could earn more elsewhere. Maintaining those communities is not charity. It is an obligation.”

Applause rises around me, and I clap too, though more slowly. The speech could be sincere. That’s the problem. Before this week, I would have assumed the story about the teacher who bought classroom supplies herself or the school that waited months for heating repairs was selected because it made wealthy people open their wallets. Maybe it was. Mikhail knows exactly when to pause. He knows when to lower his voice and when to make people laugh. He knows precisely how long to look at a person before they feel as though he’s speaking only to them.

But the little girl’s bracelet is still around his wrist. The elderly woman didn’t look impressed by the governor. She looked fond of Mikhail. The factory worker looked relieved. A lie is easier to recognize when every part of it is false. Mikhail’s lies are built from real things. Real people. Real suffering. Real emotion. Maybe that’s what bothers me. I can’t tell anymore where the performance ends.

After the speech, guests begin moving toward dinner. I’m checking table assignments and helping a couple who have somehow managed to lose both their seating cards when a man stops in front of me. He is broad, red-faced, and old enough to have learned manners before apparently deciding they were optional. His card identifies him as Lev Aaronovich Belov, and I recognize Belov from the benefit sponsor paperwork. His development company contributed enough money that Viktoriya made me double-check the amount twice.

“You are in the wrong place,” he says in English.

I glance behind me. “Am I?”

“The staff entrance is through the kitchen.”

“I work for Governor Korolev’s office. I do not work for the conservatory.”

He stares at me, then smiles. It’s not a pleasant smile. It’s the expression of a man whose furniture has started speaking to him. He holds out his champagne glass, and for a second I think he’s offering it. Out of instinct, I hold out my hand even though I do not want his half-finished champagne, and then I realize the glass is empty. “Oh, that is not⁠—”

He releases it before I have a proper grip. I catch it awkwardly against my chest and huff in relief when it doesn’t shatter on the floor. “Take this,” he says. “And find me another.”

I look at the glass, then at him. “Let me find you a waiter.”

“And when you have done that, find my table.” He pulls out his phone as though the conversation has concluded.

“Your table is listed by surname.”

Lev whirls around—as much as he can, a rotund man—to find Mikhail standing a few feet away with a pleasant smile on his face that doesn’t reach his eyes. He’s still wearing the paper bracelet the little girl gave him.

“Belov,” Mikhail says. “That puts you quite a few tables away from me. Pity. I was so looking forward to hearing about, what was it?”

Lev clears his throat. “Women’s professional advancement.”

I stifle a laugh, and Mikhail cuts his eyes at me. “He was telling me only last month that more women should hold leadership roles in regional development.”

Lev stands straighter. “I mean that.”

“I am certain you would never disrespect a female member of my staff on purpose. Did you feel that way, Miss Hayes?” Mikhail asks, finally addressing me. It feels like a trap. I realize for the first time in this interaction that there are eyes on us, that people have begun to pay attention. I look behind Lev at Viktoriya, who nods at me. I realize that this isn’t my trap. It closed so smoothly that I missed it.

“I—” My voice cracks.