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So—my new husband is, what? A bank gangster boss?
I’m so confused.
I fork another scoop of fluffy eggs and smile in thanks at Tatiana, as she slides my tea onto the table, a coffee for Maxim. I ask Maxim, “Does she not speak any English?”
“No.”
“It is Russian you speak, is it not?”
He cocks a brow? “Do you know Russian?”
I shake my head. “No, but I’ve heard it spoken before.” I don’t tell him Daddy was Russian. I don’t mention my father at all. I don’t want to have to explain that he had refused to teach me the language, saying Russia was not a country he ever wanted me to visit, and therefore, I had no use for the language. I don’t want to explain that I always strove to please Daddy, and that when it came to learning Russian, to respect his wishes, I didn’t. “I’ve always really liked listening to it.”
He grins wide. “Most people think it sounds harsh.”
“I disagree.” I’ve always thought it was so comforting. Even though Daddy had refused to teach me the language, he never denied me when I asked him to talk me to sleep in his native tongue.
Maxim’s wide smile turns mildly sheepish as he watches me slice into a piece of ham. “You’re not what I expected.”
“Oh?” I sip my tea, calmly asking, “And what did you expect of the kidnapped girl your respectable bank boss kept locked in a cellar for over a month?”
He doubles over, choking on his coffee. It’s a good choke, because coffee dribbles from his nostrils, and he wipes at it painfully with his sleeve as his eyes water. Tatiana clucks something in Russian as she hurries to his rescue with a tea towel.
We don’t speak again until I finish my breakfast, standing with my plate and bringing it to the sink. I look to Maxim who still looks a little blotchy and red from his near-death-by-coffee experience. “Will you teach me how to say ‘thank you’?”
His kind eyes soften, and he says gently, “Spasibo.”
I turn to Tatiana, my hand touching hers until she gives me her eyes. I repeat, “Spasibo.”
She assesses me for a long moment, before the skin around her eyes crinkles. I get the feeling I passed some kind of test as she gives me an approving dip of her chin. Then she replies, “Pozhaluysta.”
My gaze slides to Maxim and he translates, “You’re welcome.”
Thirteen
Ruby
My new husband has left me with very little in the way of restrictions. Maxim tells me that I can do what I like, so long as what I like isn’t to leave the property—or his presence. Unless I am in my bedroom, in which case Maxim stations himself in a chair outside the bedroom door, or at the foot of the stairs.
I’ve come to realize that I married my new husband on a Sunday night, because he’d left for work Monday morning. He’d returned early enough to share a tense, and silent dinner with me, before retiring to bed with me. I’d thought if I went to bed early, he would leave me be.
I’d been wrong, and it had been a hard lesson learned. Not only had he joined me in my room immediately after dinner, but he’d brushed my hair, stolen another long kiss that made me question all that I knew about myself, before tucking me into his large chest, rolling me into the bed, and falling quickly asleep. I had struggled, laying beneath his weight, with his arousal resting against my behind. My own pitifully drenched panties were a discomfort I’d been unable to shed for hours as I prayed for the mercy of sleep, only to be denied it.
This routine repeated throughout the rest of the week. Although I’d been careful to put off retiring to the room until late after that first mistake. Like I said, lesson learned.
Now, it’s Friday night, and I can’t help but wonder what Saturday is going to bring? Does he have a normal Monday-to-Friday, nine-to-five, grind? Or is he a workaholic, spending every chance he gets at the office?
I hope he’s the latter. The less time I have to spend with my harsh, and cruel husband, who steals kisses and forces my body to feel things for him that my mind tries stubbornly to reject, the better.
As it is, I’ve gone through a hefty chunk of the backlist of titles I’d had on my Kindle. Another few weeks of this, and I’ll have, quite literally, nothing to do with myself.
But, at least, for now, I have something to do while I sit at the windows—always a different window—and watch the men who patrol the property. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before, the marching men who stroll the grounds, always at the ready for what?—war?
What are they watching for, so tense, and on guard? Who is this man I’m married to? This banker with underworld ties?
Tonight is a particularly snowy night. Over this last week, I’ve learned not only a few Russian words, but that it’s mid-February. That means I’d spent just over two months of my life here, most of it in the cellar.
Two months of my life just gone.
