by SR Jones
Cassie’s face falls at his next words. “Do you still work at Ophidias? Good. Yes. No, thank you. Listen, can you bring a selection of bags and shoes over? Thanks, great. Mostly Chanel, but Ferragomo shoes are fine too. No fucking cheap shit, okay? Only the best.”
He hangs up, and I watch as Cassie’s excitement fades. She’s a strange one. Most women would be more excited about the bags than the Opera.
“I can’t take a Chanel handbag,” she says.
“You can,” K argues.
“Do you know how much they cost?” she holds her ground.
“Yes, and your point is? You’re going to the Opera. You don’t have any suitable bags.”
Ouch, sometimes K can be a dick. I like that about him, though. You always know where you stand with him. He doesn’t sugarcoat shit.
“Oh, you mean I look too poor?”
“Yes,” he says.
“Konstantin!” Maya exclaims.
“Darling.” Damen’s low rumble is an unusual warning. So far, I’ve not seen him say anything to her about her behavior.
Maya glances at her husband and flushes, but she shuts up. Immediately. It’s clear who really wears the trousers with those two. Damen gives Maya a fuck ton of leeway, but it’s just that. Given. Funny because I’d have thought she’d be the one in charge. She’s a force of nature, and Damen seems laid back enough to let her whirlwind all over him.
K scrubs his face. “Why do you have to make everything a battle?” he asks Cassie.
“I don’t know, maybe because you always make me feel I’m not good enough,” she states. “I felt so close last night, and then you pull this shit and do to me what you accused me of.” Then she turns and leaves.
“Fuck, that woman. I don’t understand what the hell she wants half the time.” K paces, but his face is upset, not angry.
He cares.
This thing between these two is going to change everything.
I sigh and shake my head to myself.
Konstantin pivots and marches after Cassie.
“Konstantin, may I say something?” Maya asks, stopping him in his tracks.
Damen starts to shake his head, but K holds his hand up. “Let her speak. Who better to explain the myriad mysteries of the female mind than another of the species?”
His tone drips sarcasm, and Maya starts to roll her eyes, but reins it in.
Damen sighs, catches my eye, and we both grimace. This could end any plans for the opera if these two go at it and end up falling out. Damen would have to defend Maya, and then we’d end up having a big old row between all of us, when we are meant to be forming a plan against those attacking us. This is why falling for the fairer sex is a bad fucking idea. They make men stupid.
“Cassie isn’t used to this life, right? I don’t mean the other stuff; I mean the money,” Maya says gently.
“No, she’s not.”
“It can all be a bit overwhelming. We’re used to this. We think nothing of buying Chanel suits or Hermes bags.”
“Some of us fucking do,” Damen says ruefully, and the ice breaker works as we all laugh, and some of the tension leaves the room.
“Imagine, your idea of a lot of money for a bag, and I mean a lot, is like one hundred euros, or pounds, and then your boyfriend says he’s going to buy you a four or five thousand pound bag. It’s probably more than her car! I get why she may be feeling overwhelmed. She probably thinks we all look down on her for her clothes too. Can I go talk to her? I can ask the woman coming over to bring some cheaper things, which will still be perfectly fine for the opera, if you don’t mind.”
K sighs, but I can see the relief there that he can leave all this shit to Maya. “Knock yourself out; I’m done with trying to help her.”
He pours a large drink as Maya leaves the room and downs it in one go before topping it up then offering the rest of us one.
“How the fuck do you deal with a woman day in and day out?” he asks Damen.
Damen shrugs. “The good far outweighs any bad, my friend. Maya … she’d cut off her limbs for me. You know who else would do that? No one.” He pauses, considers, and then adds, “Alesso, maybe, but that’s it. Maya would bleed for me. Hell, she’d shave her hair off for me, which would be worse to her than a limb.” He laughs, then sobers. “That woman would do anything for me. I’ve never had that. And I’d do anything for her. Before me, she never had that either. She has it now, from Stamatis too. We’ve got one another’s backs, totally. Plus, she makes me laugh, every damn day. Nearly every day she does something for me that makes me smile. Maybe it’s something simple like bringing me a drink when I’ve been stuck in my office for hours, or she might make me a special meal.” He grins ruefully. “She can’t cook for shit, but she puts effort into it, and it means something. I don’t know… Having someone in your corner, it means a lot in this world.”
His words take me back. I was expecting jokes, or something dirty about how hot she is in bed. Instead, he spoke from the heart, which isn’t something you get often in our kind of company.
It makes me think. Maybe it would be good to have someone in my corner, on my side. Someone I could rely on day-to-day for the little things. I do everything by and for myself. It’s fucking lonely if I’m honest. I screw nameless, sometimes faceless women, whose features simply blur into one, and I never have more than a fleeting connection with them.
What would it be like to have someone who would bleed for me?
Then I remember I did once, and it all got fucked up. Now I hate her, and she hates me. Not that I know where she is. She apparently left Russia years ago, and I’ve not heard from her or about her in ages.
Dasha.
It’s ironic because her name means God’s gift, and my name means similar, given by God. We were fated to be together and then torn apart by the Devil himself—me. I betrayed her, and then she betrayed me back twice as hard.
I was young, stupid, and what I did was a drunken mistake; what she did? Cold, calculating, and it got me the beating of my life. I still have the scars and will carry them with me forever, along with the others, ones my father gave me.
Yes, Dasha ran, and probably good for her that she did. She was beautiful and young. So very young and naïve. We hadn’t even slept together as I wanted to wait until she was eighteen. Then, I fucked it all up.
I sigh and gratefully accept the drink Konstantin offers me. Today is going to be very trying. I fucking hate the opera.
**
Four hours later, I’m stuffed in a suit and shiny shoes, feeling all kinds of uncomfortable. I’m a jeans and t-shirt kind of a guy. This sort of thing feels restrictive and false.
The women are still prettying themselves up, and we men are waiting for them downstairs, sipping at vodka.
Heels clacking in the hallway have our heads turning to see Maya enter the room. She looks regal. Confident in her body and her attire. She’s wearing a black dress with jeweled straps, high heels, which only add to her height, and her hair is in a loose arrangement, probably to show off the huge chandeliers in her ears.
“You look beautiful,” Damen says, going to her and kissing her cheek.
“Thank you,” she says, smiling.
The low rumble of conversation begins again, and it makes my skin itch. I hate shit like this. Fuck me, it’s so stilted. I want to take my gun out and shoot up one of the vases or something just to punctuate this monotone rumbling of polite droning.
There comes the sound of more heels clacking outside the room, and I half glance at Cassie and then turn back.
Holy shit, where was she hiding that body? She’s wearing an emerald green dress with a deep slit at the front, nipped in on one side of her waist with a jewel, and the fabric flows to the floor.
Her curves are insane. I tend to prefer slim women, model types, but no straight guy could look at Cassie’s body and not be interested.
K glances at her, and his expression morphs into something I can’t read, and I’ve known t
he guy a long time. He watches her as she enters the room. She’s unsure, despite being the most alluring woman I’ve seen in a very long time.
She walks to him, not confident in her heels, and smiles when she reaches him. He reaches for her, tips her chin up, and says, “You look beautiful, Cassie. Truly beautiful.”
“Thank you, Konstantin. You’re looking kind of hot yourself.” She turns to the room and makes a gesture with her arm to include all us men. “You all look hot!”
We finish our drinks and head out to the car. This is a fucking charade, and I don’t understand why Damen doesn’t put his foot down more with his wife. We’re all armed, which took us ages to sort out with security, and now we’re heading off to a busy event when there’s a very real threat against us, from the Armenians, no less. Yes, they have little presence here in France, and yes, Damen thinks he knows where they are, but still. Personally, this is a step too far. Or…it could just be because I hate things like this. The fucking Opera, please. We’re not Opera people.
It’s not my job to second guess K, though. It’s my job to do what he says, try to protect him, and fight by his side. All of which I will do to my very last breath because K? He gave me a life worth living. I have prestige, money, power, and a reputation in Moscow as a deadly, high-ranking member of K’s crew. It’s a long way away from the street thug I had to be in St. Petersburg. It’s a long way away from the young boy who found himself fawned over by men who were so much older and disgusting.
Nobody will touch me without my permission now. No one will beat me without fearing what I’ll do in retaliation.
K did that for me, so I will do this for him. It’s a small thing to sit stuffed in this suit for a few hours, I tell myself. If I start to feel trapped and panicked, well, I’ll simply think about something else.
We arrive at the Opera, and sure enough as we step out of the car, a dapper gent appears as if by magic and leads us to a side door, away from the main entrance and the crowds there We head down a back corridor, and I glance at Damen. How good is he with a gun? Christ, I wish Andrius were here. I’ve never seen anyone who can shoot with the deadly, calm accuracy of that man, and that includes the boss.
We get drinks and are told we can take them with us. I’ve never been in a theatre where you could take your drinks to your seat.
“Are you sure?” I ask the woman showing us to our seats.
“You’ve booked a box,” she says. “You can drink in your own box.”
“A box?” Damen looks to Maya and shakes his head.
“What?” she hisses. “You’re all massive. Can’t see any of you fitting easily into the tiny rows of chairs in the main auditorium.”
She has a point.
We settle into our plush seats, and I relax another notch. Up here, I can see the whole theatre. We aren’t sitting ducks the same way we might be in the audience. It’s a damned good bet that myself, Reece, Damen, and K will be mostly watching the crowd and not the production.
“How long is this?” Damen mutters.
“Longer than usual because there’s a ballet section too,” Maya says.
“Are you trying to get into trouble?” Damen asks, his voice low, but I hear him.
“Maybe I am,” she replies with a smirk.
He grins, and I look away, not wanting to see their happiness for some reason.
“What’s this ballet bit about?” Cassie asks. “I’ve always wanted to see the ballet.”
“Well, the two often went together, but now most Opera houses purely have the opera. In Paris they also have the ballet, and today’s performance has both. The ballet isn’t simply a part of the opera, but its own performance, which is why it’s longer than usual.”
I settle into my seat and glance behind me. The two paid men K bought with him from England are standing at the back of the box, arms crossed in front of them, alert.
Fuck it, I take a sip of my drink. Damn, that’s good whisky. I won’t have much. Need to keep my senses about me. Reece, I notice, isn’t drinking at all. K has a whisky, but he only sips at it now and again. Damen has a beer, which makes me smile. I bet Maya wishes he’d drink something else.
The opera starts, and even I admit it’s beautiful. The voices of the two main singers transcend normality and make me think of heaven and hell, and angels and demons. They make me think of my past.
I shift in my seat, suddenly uncomfortable. The ballet makes me think of my past. Of Dasha. She dreamed of being a ballerina, but I expect that dream got dashed on the rocks of reality. She’s probably working somewhere in a dead-end job like most of the people from back home.
The thought makes me feel victorious yet sad. It’s a strange combination.
The opera goes on and on, and then it’s the interval, and then more opera. It finally ends, and I wonder if I blinked and missed the ballet dancers? I stretch my legs and prepare to head home, thank fuck, but the curtain goes up again.
Another damn encore? How many do these bigheads need?
The strains of a violin begin. A melancholy melody lifts high to the rafters of the auditorium. A shiver passes over me, some strange portent of things to come. I shake it off and tell myself not to be stupid.
Ballet dancers enter the stage from the right, ten of them, all regal like a row of swan queens. They dance and pirouette, bend and leap. I’m so bored. The opera got to me in places, but this is boring.
The lights dim, except for the center of the stage, and dramatic music comes from the orchestra pit. The dancers all bow down as one, and a new dancer walks onto stage.
She’s doing that strange ballet walk; there must be a name for it, but I don’t know it. She stands in the center of the huge stage, hundreds of eyes on her as she lifts her arms above her head, a doll in a music box, and looks up.
My heart stops.
It can’t be. I lean forward and stare, and then turn to Maya who has some of those little opera glasses.
“Give me those glasses,” I demand, reaching for them, gripping her hand as I try to get them. I’m not even thinking, unable to.
A hard smack to my hand has me looking up into the livid features of Damen. “Don’t fucking touch my wife or talk to her like that,” he growls.
K swivels in his chair to look back at us and shoots me an annoyed glare. Shit, I need to dial the aggression back.
“Sorry,” I say to Maya. “Really. It’s just… I think I know that girl, on the stage.”
K’s expression turns from irritated to curious.
“Please, may I?” I gesture to the glasses.
“Of course,” she says with a smile.
Damen is still looking like he wants to rip my head off, but I ignore him and take the opera glasses.
I focus on the stage, and everything fades away. I can’t hear what Damen is saying to K. The music is all I hear swelling to a crescendo as I stare at the face of a woman I both love and hate.
Dasha.
**
“You could have started a fucking war with that shit. What the fuck were you thinking?” K asks in a whisper as we stand to leave, the final curtain drawn.
“K, I’m sorry. Like I say, I recognized the dancer. From the past. From St. Petersburg. I’ll make it right with Damen, but can I have ten minutes?”
“Ten, no more. We’ll wait by the bar.”
He’s clearly still pissed, but fuck me. Dasha. I need to see her. It’s as if an invisible string is pulling me to her. I need to see her like I need to suck in my next shaky breath.
She’s the past colliding with my present in a way I never expected. All those old ghosts are stirring, and it makes me uneasy. I can’t believe it’s her, or this is real. I need to know for sure.
I head backstage, pushing roughly past the security guy who tries to stop me. He moves to come after me, but I hear the low murmur of conversation and turn back to see the man who let us in talking to him.
There’s a group of people up ahead. I see the opera singer, a slender woman
, nothing like the big fat soprano I imagined. There is a man with people fawning over him, and who he is, I don’t know. And then I see her.
Petite and slim, so very slim, and regal as if she’s the queen of all she surveys. My Dasha.
She’s covered in a sheen of sweat and signing a few autographs. People tell her how wonderful she is. What an incredible dancer she is. She has a smaller crowd around her than the opera singer, but she’s still got plenty of adoring fans, it seems.
A man approaches her from down the darkened corridor. He’s tall, probably around six-foot-four or so. He appears older than Dasha by a lot of years, in his fifties possibly, and he’s slender. Refined looking. The opposite of me. He stands by her side and says something to her. He must be her manager, telling her to hurry this along.
Then my world stops for a second time in one evening. The old fucker slips his arm around Dasha’s impossibly slender waist and pulls her to him. A gold wedding band glints on the long finger at her waist, and my eyes immediately go to her ring finger. She’s not wearing a ring, but as I draw closer, a moth to the flame, I see the indentation where one usually sits.
Oh, fucking no. She’s fucking mine. Mine to hate. Mine to love. Mine to either reap unholy vengeance on, or ply with endless love.
The fucker with his arm around her pinches her waist harder. He’s smiling, but she winces. It’s brief, a flash, nothing more before she resumes with the queenly smiling for her adoring fans. I saw it, though.
He whispers in her ear, and her smile fades like a flower wilting away. Then, the bastard digs his fingers in harder, pressing into the flesh of her flat stomach.
I want to break every bone in his body.
I will break every bone in his body. I make a promise to myself there and then—he won’t get away with this.
He’s abusing her. I know. I recognize the signs. I’ve been where she is, only for me it was my father and the older men who hung around his house taking drugs and playing cards.
Damen’s a hacker, right? I’m going to get him to investigate every facet of Dasha’s life and find out who this absolute bastard is she’s married to.