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34
CLARA
This has been one of the most perfect nights of my life. It’s certainly the most perfect date I’ve ever been on.
The stroganoff was exactly as he predicted—to die for—and the strawberry dessert introduced me to a whole new way to eat the fruit. I managed to keep Demyen from noticing I wasn’t drinking my wine, and we both managed to have a lovely, proper evening, as if we never snuck into their bathroom for a quickie.
We’re pulling up the long driveway of the villa compound, and Demyen has me laughing over some stupid joke he just told. He claims he read it in one of Willow’s books.
I’m about to tell him one of my own lame riddles when he frowns. He slows the car’s speed and peers through the windows at the main house.
“What’s wrong?” I ask. I can’t see anything that looks out of place.
But I do have that feeling again. The same kind of feeling that warned me about the spy that Princess saved me from.
Demyen’s frown deepens. “Could be nothing. I just noticed there’s a few lights out. And I don’t see some of the guards I usually do at their posts.”
He parks the car inside the garage instead of leaving it in the driveway. “Just in case” is the only explanation he gives, but I’m not about to question anything.
He’s right—something feels off.
I look to him and he grabs my hand. “Willow,” he mouths, to which I emphatically nod. I need to check on my baby girl. I need to know that we’re just being overprotective and she’s completely fine.
We get as far as the living room of the main house.
Sitting on the couch is Oleg, smoking a cigar and making himself right at home.
“Well, well. Would you look at this?” He eyes me up and down. Then casually turns to Demyen. “I want to say I’m surprised. But I’m not.”
Demyen starts to say something, but Oleg lifts a hand to cut him off.
“What I am ispissed. Fuckingpissed, Demyen!”
A vase goes sailing through the air and crashes against the wall. Oleg takes a long pull from his cigar. He also takes his sweet time letting the smoke back out through his nose while he stares at me.
I hate it.
“You fuck her?”
I wince. Demyen notices and his pensive expression immediately darkens. He pulls me close to his side and keeps an arm around me.
Oleg rolls his eyes. “I said, did you fuck her?”
“What’s it to you?” Demyen snaps. “You shouldn’t even be here.”
The elder Zakrevsky clicks his tongue as he stands, stamping out the cigar directly on the end table. “Such disrespect. You’ll do well to remember, boy, that I am your father. Show some goddamn respect, especially when this is technicallymyhouse.”
Demyen gently rubs my back, trying to reassure and calm me even as he faces his own father down. “You left. You abandoned your house and the people in it. So now, you’re inmyhouse, and you’ll abide bymyrules. Starting with: back thefuckaway from Clara!”
I didn’t expect him to shout the order. From the looks of it, neither did Oleg. The man winces, stares at us dumbly, then gives himself a little shake.
But—and I can’t believe I’m seeing this—he does take a step back.
“I told you,” he snarls through gritted teeth, pointing at Demyen with the dead cigar, “to bring her sorry ass back to me. Did I not tell you to do that?”
Demyen shrugs. “Must have slipped my mind.”
A string of curses I can’t even begin to translate pours from Oleg’s mouth. He looks like he wants to backhand Demyen into submission. Instead, he runs a frustrated hand over his beard and glares at his son.
