“Here when you need me, bro.”
Aware that he knew where my thoughts had gone, I cast him a sheepish look. “Thanks, Aid.”
“Don’t have to thank me. I’ll see you on Sunday, yeah? Missed you at the table this week.”
“Was weird not going,” I admitted. Unless we were out of the country, we had to attend Sunday Roast at the folks’ place.
“Surprised they let you get away with it.”
“Ma wasn’t happy, Da understood. Especially when I showed him a picture. He’s not happy with Vasov.” I bared my teeth. “Neither am I.”
Aidan whistled between his teeth. “There’ll be kickback from that episode at the wedding.”
I shrugged. “He can suck my dick… Wait. No, he can’t. He shouldn’t have fucking touched her.”
“There was a reason he did,” Aidan pointed out.
“Doesn’t take much to figure out why, genius. Still, he shouldn’t have touched her. I’m not exactly a catch, and I don’t blame her for wanting to pull out—”
“That wasn’t the only reason why he beat me.”
My eyes flared wide in surprise, and Aidan jerked too, telling me he hadn’t seen Inessa appear in the doorway.
That she was as sneaky as me didn’t bode well for keeping her out of my business. And, not for the first time, I wondered what she’d heard when sneaking around her old man’s place, and whether or not she’d be down with sharing it with me.
“Why did he beat you, Inessa?” Aidan’s voice was soft. I cast him a quick look, and saw he was taking in her face. She was beautiful, scrubbed free from makeup the way she was, but when I looked at her, critically, I knew the bruises were still heavy enough for him to get a glimpse as to how she’d been last week.
What had been black and purple was now a discomforting shade of green and yellow.
All week, she’d been sporting her bruises, and whenever I looked at her, I wanted to kill her father, then I wanted to kiss her, then I wondered why the fuck I wanted to kiss her when she looked like she did.
It was a confusing mess, and I didn’t deal with that kind of shit easily.
I got boners for sexy women who didn’t mind bending over where I wanted and taking it however I wanted to give it to them.
I didn’t get hard-ons for angel-faced domestic violence victims.
I had my kinks, but that wasn’t one of them.
Her chin tipped up, defiance made her eyes spark. “I told him it was wicked of him to expect me to marry a serial killer. But he started it. He gave Svetlana one of my mother’s rings. I was supposed to inherit it when I got married. I asked for it, she slapped me.” She touched her lip, telling me the ‘slap’ had been a damn sight more forceful than she was making out. “Father broke us apart, asked what was happening. I told him, even though I knew what would happen.”
I frowned. “How did you know what his reaction would be?”
“After Mother died, we were never to mention her.”
“Why?”
Inessa tilted her head to the side. “Do you really not know?”
“Know what?”
Her brows rose in surprise. “How she died?”
I shrugged. “No. I only knew that Svetlana wasn’t your mother because she’s too young.”
“She’s about six years older than me,” Inessa confirmed, pressing her side to the door where she leaned against the jamb, neither in the gym nor out of it.
I wondered if she wanted to flee, if she regretted starting this conversation, but she stated calmly, “Some of Father’s enemies infiltrated the compound where we live. Mother died as a result.”