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I wasn’t sure she would give me any answers, but there was no harm in trying. “Do you know where Nikolai goes off to every morning?” I shrank when she looked at me, her smile vanishing. “He doesn’t tell me anything.”
“That’s because women don’t get involved in mafia business,devochka.”
I propped against the counter. Cold from the tiles seeped into my skin and made me shiver. “I don’t care about the mafia. I’m only worried about my husband.”
Arina pursed her lips. She seemed lost in thought for a moment as if trying to decide if to tell me or not. Then she shook her head, deciding against it. “Go upstairs, child. I’ll bring your chocolate to you.”
“I’d rather have it here.”
“No.” She raised her voice at me. Super weird. Arina never raised her voice, even when she was being arrogant. She swallowed, realizing what she’d done. “Please go upstairs.”
She seemed determined to safeguard whatever information it was she was holding from me. There was no point arguing so I returned to my room, found my denim from the other night and removed the paper with the number.
I’m sorry, Nikolai.
But I had to find out myself if no one was willing to tell me what was going on. I sneaked to the maid’s quarters, found a cell phone in one of their purses and dialed the number.
I held my breath as the line bleeped, my anticipation made my stomach coil.
Someone answered after a few more bleeps and I clutched my chest so my heart wouldn’t explode. “Hello?”
“Who am I speaking to?” The voice was deep, though not as deep as Nikolai’s.
“Giselle.” My tongue darted out of my mouth to lick my dry lips. “Giselle Cruz. I found your number in my pocket.”
“I’ve been expecting your call,” he said as a matter-of-fact. “I wasn’t sure you would call, but I’m glad you did.”
“What do you want from me?”
“I’m very excited about your existence,” he answered. Maybe it was a figment of my imagination, but he sounded amused for some reason. “I’ll send an address to you. Come to me if you wish to find out more.”
“What if I don’t?”
He grounded his teeth loudly. “Then I’m sorry I won’t consider us family when I kill your husband.”
My breath caught and adrenaline flowed through my veins like poison. “Why would you kill him?”
“First, because he is a bastard,” the man said. “The second reason would be because his bastard brother killed my father, and he helped him do it. Save his life or leave him to my wrath, the choice is yours. One more thing though, Nikolai must never know we spoke.” He hung up.
My hands trembled, moist with liquid fear as I put the phone down. Whoever the man I spoke to was, he sounded unhinged and with good reason. I didn’t blame him for wanting to get revenge for his father. I wasn’t even in the mafia, but I think I would ride to the grave for my loved ones.
The problem though was that I was selfish. Despite his reason, I couldn’t lay down Nikolai’s life at his feet. No way!
I jumped when the phone bleeped minutes later, his address displaying on the screen. Finding a piece of paper in a nightstand at the corner of the room, I wrote an apology for taking the cell phone and the address he’d sent.
I wasn’t an idiot. I needed Nikolai to know what happened if I didn’t make it back. I hid the phone in my bra, climbed down from the window in the room, and using the escape routes I’d marked, I found my way out of the manor.
Hailing a taxi, I showed him the address and it took all of an hour for a monstrous white building that looked identical to Vadim’s mansion to loom in the distance.
Bile burned the back of my throat when the taxi pulled over in front of the black, wrought iron gate. I paid for the taxi, and got out of the car.
My legs were shaky with each step I took as I entered the gate. Sculptures of arch angles lined both sides of the narrow pathways and dead fig leaves scrunched under my feet, the sound mingling with the whisper of the afternoon breeze and coating my skin like ice.
I’d made it halfway through when two men in suits walked up to me from nowhere. They were tall, humorless and reminded me of Nikolai’s bodyguards. I’d thought I knew fear when Nikolai kidnapped me, but what I felt in front of these two men was terror. Nikolai would never have hurt me, but I had a feeling these men would.
My heart pounded violently, and tears prickled my eyes. I wanted to spin around and run, but I didn’t. I had to protect my family.
“Ms. Cruz?” one of the men said, his voice a deep baritone that sheathed through me like a dagger. His long, curly, brown hair and mustache fluttered with the wind, his small eyes hidden beneath a layer of thick, long lashes. The guy looked like a grizzly bear.
