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She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes and then wiped away the tears. “This hurts,” she said, holding out her hand to keep me from gathering her up and consoling her. “But I have faith he’ll come around. He loves me.”
“Of course, he does.”
She sniffled a bit more, and her voice broke when she spoke again, but no more tears fell. “I’m going to live the life I want with the man I love. It’s the right decision, and everything will work out in the end.”
She walked into my open arms, and I held her close. “We have obstacles,” I said.
For some reason, that made her laugh, and she looked up at me with so much love in her eyes it took my breath away. “That’s an understatement. But I’ve always liked a challenge.”
“I’m right there with you, baby,” I said. “Bring on the challenges.”
She laughed again and stood on her toes for a kiss. “Together,” she said. “For every single one.”
Epilogue - Evelina
Three months later
I ignored Leo’s call, just like I’d ignored the last one. He knew he was supposed to send me his questions by text because most of the time, I was meeting with florists or trying on dresses and didn’t have time for them. I’d be up in New York again in a week, and if there was a real emergency, I would have already known about it. My brother was the figurehead, but it was my operation, and I kept cameras on everything.
It was the perfect compromise. Leo had to expand his horizons and deal with people and not just computer code, and I got what I really wanted most of all in life.
It turned out it wasn’t leading my own faction in our family business but being with the man I loved. Mikhail was so supportive; he even offered to move back to Moscow full-time, so I didn’t have to give up my detective business.
Once he understood I could do almost everything online, from anywhere, he stopped acting like I was making a big sacrifice for him by staying in Miami. Well, I let him think that sometimes because I loved how sweet he was about it.
As much as I loved the Everglades compound and how romantic and secluded it was, once I started planning the wedding in earnest, no one wanted to drive all the way out there to meet me. It was a huge pain in the ass when I wanted a simple bag of chips late at night. After a few glorious weeks there, like a pre-wedding honeymoon, we had to throw in the towel.
Good thing Mikhail had a beautiful, airy mansion on the waterway, not too far from my cousin Ivan. The views weren’t as wild, but they were still stunning, and plenty of wildlife visited the pretty fishing pond on the property. Just not usually the dangerous kind, which was fine with me. The cook who worked for him in the Everglades turned out to be his full-time cook, and she’d grown so adept at traditional Russian dishes that all my cousins and their wives were splitting Sunday dinners between our house and Ivan’s.
And it made it much easier for the wedding planner to come and help me understand the seemingly important differences between salmon pink and coral. My maid of honor, Kristina, wanted coral, but my other best friend and cousin-in-law, Kira, thought salmon was more subtle.
My phone rang again. “Damn it, Leo, I’m in the middle of something,” I shouted, reaching for my phone. I clamped my lips together when I saw it was my father instead.
“Yes, Papa?” I asked.
Things had been strained between us since he left Miami. I had last seen him when he flew into New York to help celebrate Leo taking over the new territory. He’d almost choked on his champagne, but he’d acknowledged that none of it would have been possible without my hard work. He still refused to speak to Mikhail, but I hoped and prayed he’d come to our wedding. There was so much planning to do it might not be another year which would give him plenty of time to learn to accept us being together.
“I was just looking through an old photo album,” he said. “There are some cute pictures of you and Kristina if you want them.”
“Sure,” I said. “Thanks.”
“Do you remember Mrs. Obolensky? Has a daughter your age?”
Ugh, that was Natalia, the girl Leo sexted with. “Yes, I remember her.”
“Okay, well, she said that sometimes people put up photos of themselves as kids at weddings. Maybe you’d want to do that.”
I was stunned into silence. He’d never brought up the wedding before. I swallowed the lump in my throat to answer. “That sounds like a great idea. Thanks, Papa.”
He grumbled. “There’s some of you as a little kid with Mikhail, too.” My lips pursed. Was he trying to make a point? “Evelina, don’t get all pouty,” he said, and I loosened my lips. “I’m sincerely trying, okay?”
“That means a lot to me,” I told him.
“You mean a lot to me,” he said, promptly ending the call.
I swiped the tears out of my eyes, finally brave enough to do the thing I’d come into the bathroom to do.
A few minutes later, I stared down at the double lines on the test. So, this was why I burst into tears at the drop of a hat and had been puking almost twenty-four-seven. I didn’t know what to think. Absurdly, my first thought was of Kristina and Kira and all the work they’d been doing to help me plan the wedding. They’d be disappointed to have to cut corners. Then I thought of Papa, who had just shown the first inkling of acceptance. How would he feel about his first grandchild being born “early?”
