Page 73 of Where the Wind Whispers

Violet smiled.

He rarely talked to the baby girl in English. At first, Violet thought it was a little strange, but it didn’t take long for her to realize how incredibly smart he actually was for doing so. She used English—he used Russian. Anastasya was getting the best of both languages as early as she possibly could, and it would likely continue in that way.

Even she was picking up on more things now that she didn’t have a choice if she wanted to understand what Kaz was saying to their daughter.

Kaz said something else, a longer bit, and all Violet gathered as he spoke to the baby was that someone was coming over.

“Who?” Violet asked.

He passed her a look, shrugging. “Ma, the girls, and Vera.”

Violet didn’t bother to mask her surprise.

Irina avoided the house if she could, but she had come once to see the baby with Ruslan in tow while Kaz was out one afternoon.

“Are you going—”

“Not this time,” Kaz interrupted softly.

Violet openly frowned. “Did she ask you to?”

“No.”

All the while, Kaz never took his gaze off his daughter.

Violet could still see his silent, private pain.

It would be an interesting visit, she supposed.

Or a very awkward one.

There was nothing quite like a mother’s scorn.

Kaz had tried to ignore it, understanding that Irina would need time to grieve and come to terms with what Kaz had done, but because he had never truly felt it before, he wasn’t prepared to witness his mother’s anger.

Following the funeral, he had only seen her once, going by to take out some remaining things of his that he had never bothered to pick up. That time, she’d had them packaged in a box and waiting for him on the front stoop. She had stared down at him from an above window but moved out of sight when she saw him looking up.

Since then, she had avoided him, and though he reached out just to make sure everything was okay with her and the twins, he hardly saw or spoke with her. It was only because of Rus that he was regularly updated. Now with Vasily out of the picture, his brother was making up for lost time.

That, at least, was something good that had come out of it.

Even when Anastasya was born, Irina had made it a point to ask that Kaz not be around when she came to visit—a fact that still bothered him—so it had come as a surprise when Vera had called him asking if it would be all right if they all stopped by to see the baby.

Though her silent treatment didn’t bode well with him, Kaz would never keep his mother from her grandchild. He had planned to set it up with Violet, find something to keep himself occupied away from his own home, but Vera had surprised him when she mentioned that their mother had wanted him to stay.

“Just family, you said,” Kaz muttered to his sister, drawn from his thoughts as another waiter brushed by him carrying a tray topped with flutes of sparkling wine.

Just the girls, he had thought, but knowing his eldest sister, she always managed to turn something small into a goddamn event.

Vera grinned, a smile that even reached her eyes. For reasons known only to her, she had been a bit down lately. “This is just family.”

Somehow, she had turned a simple visit into a ‘Welcome to the World, Anastasya’ party, complete with servers, pink and white balloons and streamers, along with a one and a half foot high cake.

“Who’s footing the bill for this exactly?” he asked, watching that smile grow bigger. “You’re too comfortable spending my money.”

“Oh, stop your complaining, Kaz. Look at Violet. She’s happy, right?”

For the millionth time that day, Kaz sought out his wife, finding her smiling as she talked with the twins while holding a sleeping Anastasya in her arms. She was happy at the surprising turn of events, going right along with the flow of things as though it had all been planned.