Painted Scars (Perfectly Imperfect, #1)(20)

Everybody stares at me, and then their gazes move to Nina.

“Hi!” She smiles and waves.

Nobody comments. Good.

“We had a municipal wedding this afternoon, but decided to delay the church wedding till summer.

Nina wants to have an outdoor ceremony.”

“Yes. It will be by the lake.” She kisses me on the cheek. “Thank you for humoring me, honey.”

“I know this is a bit sudden, but it doesn’t change things. If anyone dares to disrespect my wife, they will not like the consequences.” I make sure to pin every man sitting at the table with my gaze until I come to my uncle. “Doesn’t matter who they are. Is that clear?”

“Yes, Pakhan,” everybody says in unison.

“Nina, you already know Maxim and Dimitri,” I say, and they nod. I turn my gaze to the other side of the table next.

“This is Leonid, my uncle.”

I watch for his reaction, but Leonid is far from stupid. He nods, his face a perfect mask of politeness, but there is no missing the evil glint in his eyes.

“On Leonid’s left, Mikhail, the brothers Ivan and Kostya, and Sergei. On Dimitri’s right are Yuri, Pavel, and Anton. These are my closest men, and I trust them with my life. And from now on, with yours as well.”

Nina turns toward the men at the table. All of them fist their right hand, hit their chest in unison, and nod while she watches them with wide eyes. Her face is controlled, but from her stance and the way she’s squeezing my forearm, I know she is in a bit of a shock. As it appears, my little flower didn’t understand what exactly she’s gotten herself into before tonight.

“Let’s eat,” I say and nod to Varya who is waiting by the door. She motions with her hand to Olga, Valentina, and Galina to bring the food.

The dinner passes as I expect, mostly in silence. Every few minutes someone throws a quick look in Nina’s direction, which I’m sure she notices but pretends not to. And Nina is very good at pretending, almost disturbingly good. I was expecting her to overdo it, act out too much, giggle. There is none of that. She leans closer between bites to ask something, and touches my hand every now and then. Everything seems so genuine that even I, knowing it is all for show, find it hard not to believe in her act.

“I changed my mind,” she whispers in my ear and breaks my train of thought. “We’ll keep this table. It’s monumental.”

“I’m glad you feel that way.”

“But the drapes will have to go, honey. That shade of brown is so depressing. My fengshui guru says we should always throw out the things that depress us.”

The sound of her voice is completely serious, her face a picture of perfect sincerity, but her eyes are laughing at me. I lean toward her.

“Then we’ll burn them,” I say and kiss her.





Chapter 8


Something is not right. I remember Roman mentioning an important meeting planned for this morning.

It’s after nine, and he still hasn’t come out of his room. I heard his phone ring around eight, and then him speaking to someone. Fifteen minutes later Valentina came to bring breakfast, saying that Roman instructed her to leave it with me.

Maybe I should check on him. I put away the paintbrush on the small plate I keep near my canvas, wipe my hands, and turn to head to Roman’s room. Suddenly, his door opens, and he wheels himself out and toward the kitchen. He’s wearing only sweatpants, his upper body fully on display, and I can’t stop staring.

Roman doesn’t even notice me approaching. Instead, he heads to the set of drawers near the sink and starts rummaging through the top one. When he doesn’t find what he’s looking for, he mumbles something in Russian, shuts the drawer with a bang, and moves to the next one.

“Need any help there?”

“Nope,” he snaps.

I watch him fish out a white bottle from the drawer, take out two pills from it and swallow them.

He looks at the bottle again, takes out another pill, and throws the bottle back into the drawer. While he’s grabbing the water from the fridge, I take the opportunity to have a look at the label to see what he took. It’s painkillers. Finally, he turns his chair to face me, and I gasp.

“You look like shit.” His face is pale and his eyes bloodshot. “Did you get any sleep at all?”

“Not really.”

I follow him to his room and watch as he enters the walk-in wardrobe and comes back with a pair of pants and a shirt on his lap.

“What are you doing?”

“I have a meeting in twenty minutes. Please leave, I have to change.”

“You are in no state to go anywhere, Roman.”

He ignores me, puts his clothes on the bed next to him, and starts to stand up from the wheelchair, but the moment he tries to straighten, a hiss escapes his mouth and he drops back down. “Fuck it!”

“Well, I guess this means there won’t be any disrobing involved in the near future,” I say. “Come on, let’s get you into bed.”

“Bed won’t work. My knee is stiff, I can’t straighten the leg.”

“How about the sofa? We could put something under your leg and watch a movie.”

Roman looks at me like I’m insane. “I can’t spend the day watching movies. I have a criminal empire to run.”