by Amy Faye
After waiting an extra five minutes for any late arrivals, I start telling the kids all about my spiders. Last week, I brought some dinosaur bones and explained to them that we now think dinosaurs had feathers instead of scales.
“This,” I say to them, picking up Betty’s case. “Is my best friend.” The kids all giggle. I glance over to Blake, and he’s just watching me with those big eyes. There’s a funny smile on his face.
“Her name is Betty, and she’s really nice. Does anyone want to come pet her?”
A few hands shoot up. I let them come up and stroke Betty, reminding them to be gentle with her.
The spiders are a huge success. The kids have so many questions after, and once it’s time to find books most of them want books about spiders or insects. Blake even helps the kids pick out books, getting down on their level and asking them about what they like to do.
He’ll make a great dad one day.
My heart swells with love just watching him, and that scares the hell out of me. Me? Falling in love? Perish the thought.
Finally the kids are done, they check out their books, and Blake and I set to cleaning up the mess left behind. “So, what did you think?” I ask him with a wink. “Want to come help me with this again?”
“Absolutely!” He says, coming up to me. He grabs me by the shoulders and looks into my eyes. “And watching you, I realized something. Something that’s kind of scary.”
I hold my breath. “Oh?”
“I realized I love you.” His head dips down and his lips press against mine. I melt into him, but only for a second. I don’t want one of the kids to see me kissing him.
When I pull away I feel dizzy. “Wow,” is all I can manage to say.
“I promise you, I will do everything I can to keep you safe. Safe from my family, and from anything else that may stand in your way.” He squeezes my hand.
Once the library is cleaned and I have the spiders safely back at the museum, Blake helps me into his Lexus. He takes me back home to pack before we take off towards the airport.
“Where does your family live?” I ask.
“In Texas, mostly. But we all travel a lot. I rarely go back home.”
“I see. So did you get us first class tickets?” I joke, elbowing him with a sarcastic smile.
He returns the smile with a wink. “Something like that.”
We turn off into a different parking lot than I’ve ever seen before, then he helps me out of the car. “Where are we going?”
“This way,” he says. I follow him, and then we’re in a huge hangar with a private jet waiting for us. My mouth falls open.
“Do you think this will be just as good as first class?”
I sputter, then hit him in the chest and laugh. “Yeah, probably!”
9
After a long flight into the night, we have a long drive from the airport to Blake’s family’s house. The sun is up by the time we reach it, and I’m more tired than I could ever explain.
The house we pull up to is large, just like Blake’s. It’s painted mostly white and the front is beautifully decorated with roses and other flowers and shrubs. There’s a man working in the garden in the increasingly hot sunlight, but he barely seems bothered by the heat.
Meanwhile, my Northern ass is already sweating. “God, is it always this hot here?”
Blake chuckles. “It’s usually a lot hotter.”
“We’re never moving here.” I like being warm, but being too hot just makes me feel like I’m choking. I can’t wait to get inside, even though the outside is so beautiful.
The first person I see inside is Dante, who is sitting by the front window and reading a book. He looks up, then stands and comes over to shake Blake’s hand, and then mine.
“I really want to apologize again for how my family can be,” Dante says.
I hold up a hand to stop him. “I saw how you looked after that fight. I know you wanted nothing to do with it. As far as I’m concerned, you’re not the problem here.”
His sad eyes look suddenly relieved. “Okay, thank you.” Then he backs away as he hears a set of doors open.
Blake is bringing in our suitcases as Seth and Lance come bursting in from the back. Lance has a huge grin on his face as he steps up to Blake and shakes his hand. “Good to see you back home, Blake. It’s been a long time. I hate chasing you around the country.”
“Yeah, I know.”
Then Lance turns to me, and grins down at me, too. “Hey, kiddo. I hope there’s no hard feelings. I just know that Blake can be a little sensitive, and I have to look out for him. As far as I’m concerned, if he’s happy, I’m happy.” Then he holds out his hand to me, too. I take it, firmly.
“I understand,” I say. And I do. I get why Lance and Dante act the way they do, and it isn’t solely out of trying to keep Blake safe.
It’s also because they want to appease the petulant child they call a brother. Seth.
Seth, for his part, keeps his distance. He doesn’t try to come shake either of our hands, or welcome us to his family home. He just watches us, glaring at us, and then finally asks us a question. “Why are you even bothering? You know you’ll never change mom’s mind.”
“If mom doesn’t change her mind, then she’ll never see me again. And neither will you.”
Seth mock gasps and presses a hand to his chest. “You mean you’d abandon your family for some normal little whore? What even makes her so special?”
I grab Blake’s hand to stop him from storming over to Seth and pounding his face in, but I don’t need to. Because all of the boys are suddenly distracted by someone at the top of the stairs.
She’s a slender, beautiful woman. She looks middle aged, with long silver hair that ends with bright red tips. It’s a striking and bold look for someone her age. “Boys, don’t fight in my foyer. And Blake,” she says, then comes down the stairs. “Come greet your mother.”
Blake drops my hand and goes to her, letting her go up on her toes to wrap her arms around his neck. She kisses his cheek, then steps back and takes a good look at him. “You look older,” she says.
“It’s been a long time, Mom.”
“Too long.”
He shuffles his feet awkwardly, then turns and gestures towards me. “Mom, this is Cassidy. This is the girl I told you about on the phone.”
She regards me with cold eyes, looking me up and down. I’m being thoroughly undressed and assessed by the woman. I try to put a stop to it by stepping forward and offering my hand.
She turns back to Blake, ignoring me. “Well, let’s set you two up in some rooms.”
“Just one room will do, Mom.”
She frowns, shaking her head and going back up the stairs.
10
The bedroom that Blake and I are sleeping in is probably about the size of my whole house, with its own private bathroom and everything. It’s beautiful and decorated in a sort of tan and gold color scheme.
“Wow,” I say, turning to watch Blake as he brings in the luggage. “Your house is really beautiful.”
“Thank you,” Margaret answers for Blake. “Now, are you sure you two don’t want separate rooms? It’s a bit improper to be sleeping together.”
Blake rolls his eyes. “You let Seth sleep with his high school girlfriend after their second date and practically let her live here for months. This is your third time asking if we want to sleep in the same room. Yes. We do. Don’t ask again.”
He gives his mother a warning glare, which she returns with an icy smile. “Well, I only wanted to be sure. Anyway, you two settle in and I’ll go see about lunch. I don’t know about you, but I’m starving!”
The second Margaret leaves the room, Blake shuts the door behind her and pulls me in for a tight hug. My face presses against his hard chest as he breathes, slowly, with me against him.
“It could be going worse,” I say. “Two of your brothers don’t hate me.”
Blake runs his fingers through my hair. “We only need to
get my dad’s approval. His opinion is what matters. Once we get that, if we get that, you never have to see any of them again.”
“And if he doesn’t approve of me? What will we do then?” I think about losing Blake and my body goes cold. In just a few days, I’ve grown so attached to him.
He’s silent for a moment. “If that happens, then we’ll run away together. But losing you isn’t an option.”
Shaking my head, I look up at him. My hands pull him down by the neck for a kiss. “I’m no sure going no contact with them is the best answer just yet. Maybe I’ll be able to impress them.”
A disgusted look comes onto his face. “You don’t need to impress them. You’ve already impressed me.”
“I just mean that we might be able to make this work.”
“You’ll see, Cassidy. Eventually you’ll understand why I don’t want you to be around them too much. They’re like a poison.”
The door to the room opens slowly, and a woman with a long nose and close set eyes peeks in. Her hair is done up in a tight bun, and she’s wearing a long black dress. “Sir, your mother says that lunch is ready,”
“Thank you, Deirdre.”
“Yes sir. She also wanted me to let your know that Mr. Yovanovich will be joining you.”
Deirdre leaves the room. Blake squeezes my hand. “I’m going to clean up a little bit. You should, too, since Dad will be at lunch with us.”
“Should I change?” I ask, looking down at my old pink sweater and loose jeans.
Blake considers me for a moment, then smiles. “No, I think you’re fine for lunch. And I want him to see you as you truly are.”
He walks away, and I immediately veto that decision. Digging into my suitcase, I pull out a blue dress that I wear when investors come to the museum. It’s not too tight, and it isn’t revealing, but it does look nice and is the most expensive dress I own.
I pair it with some cute shoes and then check myself in the full length mirror on the bathroom door. It’s an acceptable look, I suppose.
Pulling my hair into a ponytail, I turn as I hear my phone chime with a text notification. It was Alina. I couldn’t help smiling as I read it, even as I wanted to punch her lights out. ‘You met his parents? After only a few weeks? Very serious, I see! Must be his cock. ;)’
My fingers seem to move as the words appear in my head. ‘Wouldn’t you like to know? Oh, and you can go fuck yourself, too, by the way.’
My smile spread wider, into a grin, and I waited. She’d text back. She couldn’t help herself. Something moved near the door, and I looked up, even as my phone buzzed in my lap.
Blake’s smile hadn’t faded, but now even after he’d told her not to change, he’d gotten a new set of clothes. Formal. Great, now I’m the under-dressed one. And of course, it’s only going to get worse when I have to go with him to meet his father.
He’s married to Margaret, after all, and she’s already made up her mind about me. I just have to hope she decides she was wrong after all.
11
The first thing I notice as I followed him down into the dining room is how different things looks from when I’d walked through before. I don’t know what I’d expected, with Anatoly coming to eat. For most families, mine included, it’s not that strange to have the father join them for dinner.
But I was under the impression that the Yovanovich clan was not a totally ordinary family. There was plenty to like about that, of course. I don’t want to live a totally ordinary life, and I know that Blake wouldn’t be able to handle it, either.
First of all, the boys are already seated, and they’re already all stiff and quiet, looking down where plates might have been. I check each of their faces in turn to gauge what I should be feeling; all I get is all I ever got from them. Fantastically high cheekbones fail to describe it, but they’re like statues made out of marble.
Three statues staring at the table as if their heads were bowed in prayer. Blake is the only defiant one as he pulled up beside me. His face stands resolute as he looks out over the rest of them. For a moment I expect him to be serious. The very idea drives home how afraid of his father I ought to be.
His eyes meet mine for an instant, and then he winks, a smile spreading across his face for an instant. It’s gone almost as quickly, as he guides me to a chair right at the left hand of the foot of the table. He pulls it out for me, which earns me a look from Seth. If he had anything to say, though, he saved it.
There are three bottles of wine on the table. The candles on the table make everything seem that much more formal, and drive home the point that I’m the only one wearing everyday clothing. I silently curse Blake a third time.
***
He took a seat at the foot of the table and gave me a reassuring smile. I hoped that I would feel as reassured as he clearly hoped that I would, but something told me that I was going to be sick. I managed to keep myself under control by sheer force of will and took up a posture of silent repose that matched the one that the other boys had adopted.
There was only a moment’s wait before Margaret came in. She had a glass in her hand, the liquid inside a bright neon orange. She drank deeply from it and finished what she could as I watched. Then she pulled out a seat in the left hand of the head, a position that mirrored my own.
Then, as if she needed to drive the point home somehow, she looked up at me. There was nothing in her expression at all, but anyone who looked at her would have no trouble telling that it was a carefully practiced expression of neutrality.
She still didn’t like me, and she wasn’t necessarily afraid of letting me know. It just wasn’t the time or place to get into that particular argument. She’d find other times and places, though. That was clear.
There was another long moment of silence. For a moment, I expected someone to say something to Margaret; she looked a little bit less solemn than everyone else, and given how things had gone so far, I almost expected that she and Blake would be at each other’s throats.
I dared a glance at Blake’s face, and he had folded up, all of a sudden, into the same demure, respectful pose that everyone else had taken up. That, more than anything, was strange. I looked around for the cause, or some explanation, but none came.
Then, a moment later, the door opened and a man stepped in. If there had been a moment where I wondered why everyone was acting like this, before Anatoly even came into the room, the sight of him immediately answered the question.
He looked like Santa Claus, in a way. He had a full beard, almost stark white. There were flecks of gray left in it; some of them might even have been called streaks. That was where the comparison ended. His hair was close-cropped and military, and his eyes stared hard at whatever he touched, like he might be able to burn a laser-line through the room as he looked over across it.
I averted my gaze before he could see me. At least, I hoped he wasn’t able to see me, because otherwise I was afraid he’d take it wrong.
Before I’d seen him, I was afraid of Anatoly because he was Blake’s father, and there was always the unspoken idea that she was just Blake’s… woman, or whore, or whatever the hell they wanted to call her.
But now, she realized that she’d underestimated her situation. She ought to have been afraid of Anatoly because of who he was.
His face had the same high, remarkable cheekbones of his sons, but his face was deeply lined with age that ended up looking more like the scars of battle than the graceful age of sagging skin, and his expression was angry, in a way that seemed like he was always angry.
He walked through the room like someone who was inspecting a military camp, and then leaned over, never relaxing for an instant, and pressed a kiss into Margaret’s neck. She flushed and leaned into it as if she couldn’t help indulging herself this one time.
Then he turned, stood at the head of the table and leaned down.
“Good afternoon,” he said. His voice was low and rough, and matched his face perfectly. And then he turned and fixed those intense
, terrifying eyes on me, and I felt my heart stop in my chest. “You must be Cassidy. I hear that you’ve been seeing my son.”
12
I sat there in silence the whole meal. Most people seemed to have the same position. Anatoly, though? If he noticed the mood, it didn’t have any effect on him. He started off serious and intense for about as long as it took for me to get myself terrified of him.
Then it was off to stories about Russia, stories that from every indication I began to suspect that he would tell at any time, to anyone, regardless of whether or not they were interested.
He’d done a lot of traveling. Even for a man his age, it almost seemed impossible. The boys seemed bored by it, and Margaret indulgent, but I had to be honest: Shackleton, the explorer who had made it most of the way to the South Pole only to get ice-locked and had to come back up with no supplies and no rescue for a year, probably didn’t have this many stories.
So I listened and ate, and listened and ate, and listened a little more. I nodded where appropriate, but otherwise, I was more than satisfied to stay silent and let him talk. And that seemed to satisfy him just fine, as well.
When the food was eaten and the plates cleared away, I wasn’t that surprised that he had decided by then that he was in charge of the conversation.
“Oh! That reminds me, you should come to the study. You must.”
I looked over at Blake, who just raised his eyebrows as if there wasn’t going to be any way to rescue me from it.
“Okay, sure,” I said, not sure what I was in for, except that it was going to be something interesting. That was what I kept telling myself, anyways, because otherwise I’d have to accept that I was about to go from a terrifying Russian arms dealer’s dining room to his study, deeper and deeper into the private life of a guy who probably knew a thousand people who would kill me in a heartbeat.