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“You’re seeing ghosts.”
My brow furrows. “No, I’m not. I literally just saw her.”
He ignores me and walks back inside after he throws his cigarette to the floor, stomping out the butt.
My mouth hangs open while I process what the hell is happening. “You saw her, right?” I ask, turning back to Mikhail.
He doesn’t say anything; his eyes just fall.
“Mikhail,” I demand.
“I think it’s best if we go inside.”
First Max, now Mikhail? It’s like they’re both refusing to admit they saw her too for some reason.
Mikhail’s hand holds the small of my back while he leads me back inside. How is he able to act as if nothing happened before we came back inside? Are we both just going to ignore what we saw?
Laughter fills the room when we enter, but I don’t feel happiness. I feel like I’m dying with questions. Rosalie is quick to appear but disappears like nothing ever happened. That’s not normal—I know that much.
I take a seat on the bench with Mikhail. Max takes Mira from Nina’s arms and sways her in his large arms. I watch him in awe.
Nina’s baby, Mira, was born about a week ago, right after the ball where Giovanni was shot by Mikhail. The two of them act as if it never happened. I can’t tell if they don’t have the energy to hash out their differences or if they’re putting their differences aside for me and Nina.
The second Max grabs Mira, it’s as if he forgets all his worries. He only sees her. When I look at Max, I don’t usually see a family guy in him, but I do now.
“You look just like her, you know?” Giovanni says to me, finally breaking the awkward feeling. I’ve always wanted to know more about my mother, but Dad told me it hurt to talk about her.
“Do you have a picture?” I ask.
Giovanni reaches into his pocket and pulls out a picture of our mother.
“Wow,” I say. I really do look just like her. “It’s the hair,” I tell him with a laugh.
“Different colors, but ...”—he pauses as the corner of his mouth tugs up—“very curly.”
I take the picture in my hands and see another behind it. The second one is a photo of me at the house in Russia. I think I’m fifteen in the picture. So many things have changed since then.
“How did you get this picture of me?” I ask.
“Kirill.”
Finally, I ask the question I’ve been dying to know. “Are you the Suits?”
Everyone directs their attention to me.
I’m not asking this out of nowhere—Max is wearing an embroidered heart. I can’t even begin to understand the meaning behind it.
“Yes,” Max admits with a grumble.
The only reason I’m not completely intimidated by Max is because he has a gentle face. His jaw is sharp, but there’s something about his eyes.
“Do you mind if I ask the meaning behind the group?”
“Not at all,” Giovanni chimes in. “It started with Max. It was a way for people to decipher business deals between him and his father. Since they shared the same last name, he didn’t want people thinking the business transactions would benefit him. While Max’s father is still alive, it’s a way for him to take over profits under a different name. I followed the idea while my father was still alive. Max’s friend Marco was by his side through everything, and he decided to follow his idea. He has diamonds.”
It’s getting kind of difficult to keep up with all the information being thrown at me. It makes sense, but it’s a lot. “And Mikhail took over clubs,” I say.
“He did. Probably because of Kirill, but I’m not sure if he knew the meaning behind it at the time. He was trying to get under my skin when he took the name.”
