Page 48 of The Lies Between Lovers

Vaslav cracked a smile. “That’s enough, da. Would you rather I lie? I’m good at that, too.”

“No, but—”

“Then don’t ask.”

Vera blinked, and while her cheeks went ruddy with her frustration, she didn’t take it any further.

Antonovich was a minor inconvenience to Vaslav at the moment. Whatever little scheme or plot he was trying to pull was already as impotent as the man who used his fists to keep his partners in line. Viktor had clearly stumbled on information regarding Vaslav’s personal life, and like any vory with a desire to further his position in the mafiya, started looking into what he could find to connect the dots regarding Vera. Except the man was clearly behind if all he knew was that Vera could be connected to his ex-wife, she had been seen with Vaslav, and a failed attempt at a break-in at her Noble Row villa.

What would the prick have wanted to confirm with his ex-wife about Vera? Other than the fact she wasn’t currently in Russia, which would make her home vulnerable to a break in?

Pathetic.

If he had any more information, like the kind that would suggest Vaslav was determined to call this woman his wife, Viktor wouldn’t have dared breathe near her. He believed that, at the moment, Viktor was digging for what would make Vera important. Not that he’d gotten far enough in his efforts to complete the picture.

Vaslav could—and would—have the man found and killed within seventy-two hours, and he seriously doubted there was a single thing Viktor Antonovich would be able to do about it. He was the annoying fly on the wall that couldn’t even carry information from one room to another because it was too stupid to find its way out of the one it was already in.

Harsh, but not untrue.

“And I’m not really fond of liars,” Vaslav added. “So I try not to be one even if I am good at it.”

Vera dragged a hand through her dark strands to push them back from her face when she huffed out an exhausted sigh. “You know what, I’m tired. Let’s go back to that.”

“I told you, you’re welcome to go—”

“I don’t really want to go home right now. I don’t want to be alone. I already spend a lot of time like that, I guess.”

He didn’t need her to say it again.

*

Vaslav rarely stepped into the upper corridors of the massive Federal Colonial he called home, and it made Mira’s job easier when she only needed to dust and clean the floors occasionally. Despite having the entire master quarters redone after Irina’s passing, he’d become accustomed to the ease he had living on one level of the three-story house. Yet, after Mira had shown Vera to the guest bedroom at the far end of the second floor, Vaslav found himself yanking sheets and comforters out of the linen closet to make the bed in his own room on the same level for the first time in years.

Though the hardwood floors, stained the same dark black as the four-poster bed with swooping wing-like curves carved into the head and foot boards, were all new, he could still picture the way the room used to look. To a point. Maybe it was more the nostalgia he felt running his fingers over the edge of the six-drawer dresser and matching armoire where the tall mirror reflected the room and himself back to his studious gaze.

All the pictures were gone.

The space was as sterile as the guestroom down the hall, and certainly didn’t feel lived in to him. Yet, he felt the life beat through it. Like a heartbeat left over from the past, he swore the walls and floor pulsed with it.

The longer he stayed in the room, the easier it became to not feel so suffocated by the walls all around him. He even headed back downstairs after a while to bring up the toiletry bag and clothes from his den and attached bathroom to have upstairs.

Eventually, a confused and quiet Mira came to stand in the doorway of the bedroom, lingering there between his private space and the attached quarters that doubled as a library and lounging space.

“What?” Vaslav asked the woman as he made the bed without much grace to the way he pulled the sheets over the brand-new mattress that had never even seen a body on it before.

Mira took a hesitant step into the room while keeping her hands clasped at her front, saying only, “The young lady seems to be asleep. I was going to ask her if she’d like a late breakfast or an early lunch, but—”

“Leave her be. She’ll come around when she’s ready.”

No doubt, Vera wouldn’t crack her eyes open for another few hours, anyway. After a day of flying and then a night at a dying man’s bedside, she earned a bit of uninterrupted sleep. Even if Vaslav did wish he had enough of a selfish streak to keep her awake while he was. Wasn’t it bad enough that he had already come upstairs, determined to sleep in a room he hadn’t even seen the inside of in years, just to be nearer to Vera?

Mira replied with a hushed agreement, and then turned to leave before stopping and glancing over her shoulder one more time. “I’ll bring you up clean pillows, da?”

“Spasibo.”

Then, even more hesitantly, Mira asked, “Is she going to be staying for a while?”

Vaslav had to consider that, and only because he didn’t know the answer, he told her, “I would like to hope so.”