Satin Princess(35)

“That’s because you had a built-in best friend. A partner-in-crime,” she says. “I used to hope and pray my parents would have another kid when I was young.”

“He can be a pain in the ass. That’s more of the rule than the exception, actually.”

“But you have his back and he has yours.”

The statement makes me grimace. Once upon a time, I might’ve agreed. Now? I’m not so sure.

“Mostly,” I mutter.

Jessa wrinkles her nose. “What does that mean?”

“It means he can be an idiot sometimes.”

She stares at my face, trying to glean the secrets buried there. Good fucking luck, I think.

“You wanna tell me what you’re so pissed off with Yulian about? Does it have something to do with Marina?”

“He was the one who found her body,” I say grudgingly.

“But then… how is she alive?”

“He claimed she was maimed when he found her. Her face was unrecognizable. So he burned her body and we buried what remained.”

She shudders a little. I have to remind myself that Jessa isn’t used to this kind of blunt, detached talk about death.

“So he made a mistake.”

“A mistake that would never have happened if he thought first and acted later.”

“He was probably just trying to protect you.”

She’s right, but not for the reasons she thinks she is. I go quiet for a moment as the implications of why he was trying to protect me sink in: he thought I'd mutilated my own wife. He thought he was burning evidence.

Jessa exhales quietly and her hand tightens across my chest. “At least you know you have a brother who’s willing to do anything for you,” she suggests.

“It shows how little he knows me that he thinks I’d ever do something that savage. Even to her.”

“No one can know a person wholly like that,” she says. “You should cut him some slack.” I look away, but Jessa scoots closer to me. A moment later, I feel her hand against my jaw. “Not everyone can be as controlled and wise as you, you know?”

“Very true.”

She snorts and I bask in the warmth of the moment. The ease with which we can be together. It’s as if the last few minutes of our conversation have loosened up the knots that run through my body. I’m still pissed with Yulian, but the anger is more measured, more contained.

“What was your mother like?” She asks it abruptly, like it just occurred to her, but something tells me she’s been wondering about it for a while. Like there’s some story of my past that could explain me or explain us or explain everything.

“I never really knew her,” I tell her. “She was born in Russia. Always wanted to go back, but then she met my father and everything changed. Not for the better.”

“Were they ever happy?”

“Fuck if I know,” I scoff. “All I ever saw was ill-matched people who were ready to bite each other’s heads off. They divorced when I was very young and my mother set off to explore the rest of the world.”

“You mean she’s out there somewhere?”

“Probably sipping coconuts by the beach,” I mutter.

“Sounds like a nice life.”

“Nice if you have a lot of money and even more free time.”

“Does she have money?”

“She gets a monthly stipend. It was part of their divorce agreement.”

“And your father didn’t mind paying it every month?”

“He barely noticed. It was an easy price to pay to get rid of her. His words, not mine.”

“Hm. Well, it’s a better ending than I expected.”

I snort. “You expected that my father would kill her?”

“Well…”

“We don’t kill just for the sake of killing,” I tell her, trying to be as patient as possible. “We don’t kill for sport, either. At least, I don’t.”

“I believe that,” Jessa says in a small voice. Then she adds, “So… you don’t have any contact with her?”

“She calls me when she needs money or help with something,” I say. “That’s the extent of our relationship.”

She frowns. “That must be hard.”

“Why?”

“Because… well, because she’s your mother.”

I shrug. “I suppose. But we had very little to do with one another even when I was a child. She wasn’t interested in being a mother. My father wasn’t interested in keeping her around. Her leaving was a win for all of us.”

“He got bored?” she asks tentatively. “Or he met someone else?”

“Probably both. I never asked. More than anything, I’d say I think he realized marriage was not for him. He had two sons, an heir and a backup. He didn’t need anything else.”

She looks conflicted for a moment. “Is that how you feel, too? That marriage is not for you?”

“Considering how my first one went, that’s where I’m leaning.”

She hesitates for a second. “It’s not ‘went.’ It’s still going.” I raise my eyebrows, and she just gives me a helpless shrug. “I’m just saying. Your first marriage is not over.”