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“We’ve talked about this, Melik,” Serj chides his son. “The Drakos family has made a generous offer—”
“To pillage what is rightfully mine!” he spits. “Barbarians at the fucking gates—”
“Melik!”
Even I flinch at the booming sound of Serj dropping his “civilized rich guy with the big house” act and revealing the street-brawler hiding underneath.
“You will leave us,” he snarls at his son. “Now.”
Melik glares at me, muttering something in Albanian before he whirls on his heel and storms out of the room.
Serj sighs heavily. “You have my sincere apologies, Hades.”
“It’s not a problem.” I shrug. “I sometimes have that effect on people.”
“He’s upset about the direction I’ve chosen to go. Please, forgive him.”
“Of course, Serj.”
Fuck off, Melik.
“And he’s angry about a girl. There was a marriage proposal recently concerning the daughter of a would-be ally that…” Serj’s brow furrows.” Well, is no longer favorable to a traditional man like my son.”
“I’m sure there are plenty of other fish in the sea for a man like Melik.”
The older Mirzoyan pointedly clears his throat. “Yes, well. Anyway, I wanted you to come here today, because I wanted to ask a favor of you.”
He wants me to bring Vanya to this fucking gala tomorrow. I already know this.Healready knows I know this. But Serj is so old school that we’re going to do this whole “allow me the honor of taking your daughter to the dance” bullshit routine. Whatever.
“Anything I can do, Serj.”
He nods. “The Crown and Black gala tomorrow evening. I do some business with Gabriel Black, and as such, I’ve received an invitation. Unfortunately, I have a work engagement. But it would break my daughter’s heart not to go. She so loves these things.”
I smile benignly, grinding my teeth on the inside.
“Would you do me the honor of taking her as your date? She’d be over the moon to walk in there on your arm, my friend.”
In every other situation but this one, I would say no.
I somehow got through four years of Harvard almost perpetually drunk or fucked up on coke, which I don’t touch anymore. There’sa lotof those four years I don’t remember as anything more than a haze.
But I remember Vanya.
Back then, the image I had of Vanya Mirzoyan was that of a fairly vapid, hard-partying trust fund mob-princess type. I sort of remember her trying to get with me a few times, and me saying no every time.
But I absolutely remember the time she cornered me, when I was too drunk to say no, even if every cell in my body was screaming it.
I don’t get drunk out of my mind and have sex, because I fucking despise it. It brings back all of those dark memories from when I was younger.
I was beyond wasted the night Vanya shoved me into a dark bedroom at a party and tried to blow me. I was so drunk and so petrified by the flashbacks that I sort of lay back and just let it happen until I simply couldn’t take it anymore. I finally bolted from the room, and we’ve never spoken since.
So, no, escorting her to a fucking gala isn’t exactly high on my wish list.
But the other reason, for reasons I’m not sure I’m even ready to think about, is that Elsa will be there too. She’ll be there, and she’ll watch me walk in with some other woman.
And I have a feeling that’s not going to go over very well.
I might be possessive as fuck, probably to a psycho degree. Frankly, I’m surprised hasn’t scared her off yet. But she’s got that streak too. I’ve seen it in her eyes when the subject of me with other women, or my past, has come up.
