Champagne Venom (Orlov Bratva, #1)(81)

Nikita steps into the doorway, blocking my view. She’s silhouetted by the chandelier in the dining room, but I see her hand reaching towards me. “Hand it over.”

“Smoking is bad for your lungs,” I warn as I pass the cigar over to her.

She takes a dramatic puff just to spite me. “If it’s bad for my lungs, it’s just as bad for yours.”

“I’ll die in a shootout long before my lungs give out on me. You probably won’t be as lucky.”

She snorts. “Dying violently is your version of ‘lucky?’ Remind me not to take you with me to Vegas.”

Chuckling, we pass the cigar back and forth, letting the smoke and tension swirl and simmer around us. Finally, she sighs. “She’s pretty. I’ll give you that.”

“She’s fucking beautiful,” I correct, snatching the cigar out of her hand.

Nikita scrutinizes me. “Is this for real?”

“Which part?”

“You and Little Miss Sunshine in there,” she says. “I thought you married her because you knocked her up.” She squints and leans in, searching my face for signs of lies and half-truths. “You weren’t trying to knock her up, were you?”

“Of course not,” I scoff. “Do I look like a fool to you?”

Niki leans back and crosses her arms over her chest, still puzzling over me. “I get the marriage.

You've always been a slave to the family rulebook,” she remarks. “But what I can’t quite put my finger on is the weird thing between the two of you.”

I keep my face schooled and steely as the cigar smolders between my fingers. “There is no ‘weird thing.’ There’s no ‘thing’ at all.”

My denial brings a smile to her face. “Have you gone and made the ultimate mistake, brother?”

“Nikita…” I warn.

“Have you caught feelings for the girl?”

“You know me,” I say—which I’m cringingly aware is the worst non-answer I could possibly give.

“I do know you.” She nods triumphantly. “I know you well enough to know that you wouldn’t marry a woman you didn’t trust. Even if it was a sham of a marriage. Even if the whole damn thing was a mistake or a cover-up or an oopsie-daisie, I-forgot-about-Plan-B kind of deal.”

I raise an eyebrow, waiting for her to continue.

“But I also wonder if your… infatuation with her may have clouded your judgment.”

That flips a switch in me. I go from in denial to on the offensive. “What are you suggesting?”

“She comes from nothing, Misha,” Nikita hisses, leaning back into me. “She has nothing to lose and everything to gain.”

“You think I got played… by her.” The words drip with as much indignation as I can muster.

She shrugs. “I mean, the first time you fuck her, she gets pregnant. Pretty damn convenient, don’t you think?”

“When you roll the dice as many times as I have, you’re bound to score eventually.”

She wrinkles her nose in disgust. “Ew. I am not here to talk about your sex life. But even you know how many of the women you’ve slept with were only there because of who you are.”

“And I spotted every single one of those opportunists from a mile away.”

“Opportunists come in all different forms, even if you are careful not to come in all kinds of opportunists,” she says primly.

It’s my turn to wrinkle my nose. “Get to the point, Nikita.”

“Fine. My point is this: just because that one in there is convincing, doesn’t mean she’s sincere.”

“Paige is no con artist.”

If Nikita knew about the second bank account Paige opened, she’d be waving that in front of my face right now. I hate that it’s been lurking in the back of my head ever since I found out—mostly because I know that the old Misha, the pre-Paige Misha, would’ve exiled any other woman to fucking Siberia if I found out she was siphoning my money away.

But I didn’t. And I won’t.

Because Paige isn’t any other woman.

She’s mine.

“Which head are you talking out of?” she asks, looking pointedly at my face and then shifting her gaze

lower.

“Are you suggesting that our mother has a hard-on for Paige, too?” I spit. “Because they seem to be getting along just fine, and I’m fairly sure they’re not fucking.”

Nikita rolls her eyes at my sarcasm. “Our mother gives everyone the benefit of the doubt. Right now, she’s high on the knowledge that she’s going to have another grandchild. You can’t take her opinion seriously.”

“How stupid of me: I forgot that your opinion is the only one that matters.”

She crosses her arms, looking as defiant as she used to when Maksim and I left her out of all our mischief when she was a little girl. “You should have told us, Misha. You just should have. After everything, we deserved to know.”

“Sorry I didn’t tell you immediately,” I drawl. “You’ve missed out on a month of judging Paige. How ever will you make up for lost time?”

Her eyes gleam in an uncanny mirror of mine. “I don’t want to judge her; I want to protect you.”