Caterina
I’ve never been so relieved to wake up to an empty bed the next morning. Going to sleep next to Viktor last night was excruciating. He’d made sure to have his light off by the time I’d come back into the bedroom, probably wanting to avoid me as much as I wanted to avoid him. For the first time, I’d considered ignoring his clearly stated wishes and going to sleep in a guest room.
Only the thought of his reaction and how little energy I had to fight about it or deal with any gossip that might happen, as a result, kept me from actually doing it. Instead, I’d curled up on the very edge of my side of the bed and listened to Viktor’s soft snores as I stared at the closet door until exhaustion finally claimed me.
Now, getting dressed to go downstairs, I’m glad that I at least don’t have to deal with him this morning. I throw on jeans and a t-shirt, scraping my hair up into a high ponytail, and head downstairs to have breakfast, trying not to think about how my days stretch out with so little to fill them. Olga still hasn’t entirely trusted me to take care of Anika and Yelena, and they’re at school for a good part of the day. The hours feel empty, and although I know I should join a gym or find some other hobby to fill them, I can’t really find the desire to.
I’d thought that I would feel better once Franco was buried and I could make my own life. But now I’m just waiting again for the fertility treatments to be finished and to, with any luck, be pregnant. That at least will give me some kind of purpose. Something to focus on, something to do.
I’m barely paying attention to anything around me when I walk into the dining room, but then the moment I walk in, something stops me in my tracks. A girl is standing at the mantle of the fireplace, dusting it slowly, looking for all the world like she has absolutely no idea what she’s really doing.
She’s also not someone I’ve ever seen in the house before. I’d have remembered her—the girl has lovely strawberry blonde hair, more red than blonde really, which is currently braided back with flyaways escaping everywhere. She’s staring at the mantle intently, so much so that she doesn’t hear me come in until I clear my throat. She spins around, looking as guilty as if she were chipping away at the wood instead of cleaning it.
“I’m sorry!” she chirps, her eyes skittering over me. “I didn’t hear you come in, miss—Ms.—Mrs.—”
“I’m Mrs. Andreyva.” The name sounds strange on my tongue; I’m not sure if I’ve referred to myself that way before. It hadn’t felt so odd to change my name to Bianchi from Rossi. That had been another good Italian name, the syllables and rhythm of it comfortingly familiar. But there’s nothing familiar about my new, longer last name, or how it changes from Viktor’s to reflect the feminine, or the…Russian-nessof it. It feels as if it should belong to some other woman. Certainly not me.
“Are you having your breakfast in here, then?” Her voice has a lilting Russian accent, her voice more melodic than Olga’s, making it prettier. “I’ll go, so I don’t bother you.”
“No, wait.” The moment I speak, she freezes in her tracks, like a deer in the headlights. “I like to know the staff. What’s your name? You must be new.”
“I am.” She inclines her head, looking up at me through pale lashes. “I’m Sasha. Sasha Federova. Your husband hired me recently—I am new. New staff, that is. I’m sorry if I’ve done anything wrong—”
“You’re fine,” I tell her gently. “But I’m sure Olga has something for you to do if you want to stop polishing that mantle.”
“Of course, ma’am!” She bobs acurtsyof all things, as if she really doesn’t know what to do, and flees the room before I can say anything else, ostensibly in search of Olga.
There’s nothing really strange about it on the surface. I have no idea, really, how Viktor’s household is run, how the hiring of staff works, how often they bring on someone new. I haven’t been here long enough to really figure it out, and Viktor doesn’t exactly talk to me much about the running of the place. Neither does Olga, who I privately think doesn’t want me taking over much of her duties from her, regardless of whether or not Ishouldhave more of a say in the running of things technically, as Viktor’s wife. I’ve been fine with that because I was raised to run a good Italian household, to know how to behave and speak to and defer to the Italian men. These mafia men would come to dinner and expect to be served. How to entertaintheirwives, what to talk about, what to do. I don’t know how any of that is meant to work in the Andreyev household, and Olga doesn’t seem inclined to teach me.
But something seems off about Sasha. I can’t put my finger on it, and I don’t know really whatcouldbe wrong, but it’s just a gut feeling that something isn’t quite right.
What if Viktor has her here for himself? What if her being part of the staff is just a front for him to have an outlet for pleasure since I won’t have sex with him?
The idea that he might have some girl here, coerced into sleeping with him, makes me feel a deep wave of guilt. Would he be doing that if Iwerefucking him? I have no idea what Viktor’s ideas about fidelity within marriage are, particularly a marriage of convenience. Would he do something like that even if Iwas?
Stop,I tell myself firmly, forcing myself to take a bite of my breakfast and then another.You have no idea if that’s even what’s going on. There’s no reason to believe that. She could just be nervous about a new job.
The pit of anxiety stays in my stomach, though, all the way through breakfast and until Olga comes to find me to tell me that Viktor wants me to pick up the girls from school before lunchtime and bring them to see him at his office.
“Why?” I look at her curiously, and she shrugs.
“Sometimes, he likes to have lunch with them. He’s already called the school to say they’re being picked up.”
“And the school was fine with it?”
Olga smirks. “No one tells Viktor Andreyev no. Not even you,” she adds, with a hint of warning in her tone.
I feel a small rush of satisfaction at that because the fact is, Ihavetold him no. Just last night, in fact, and he backed down. It makes me wonder if he feels something more for me than just duty and obligation because everything I hear tells me that there’s a side to Viktor that I don’t see. That I don’t know about. I don’t know if it’s terrifying or encouraging that he’s clearly made concessions for me that he won’t make for others.
A little before noon, I go to pick up Anika and Yelena—or rather, I sit in the back of the car as the driver takes me to go and get them. It’s not unusual for me—a driver came and got me from my private Catholic school when I was a child. Still, I can’t help but wonder what it would have been like to be a normal child, riding a bus or being picked up by a parent, or to pick up my child on my own. I’ve never really craved a more ordinary life, but sometimes I think it must be simpler to not have so many restrictions on what you can and can’t do. To not have the weight of so much expectation.
To have more freedom. A thing I’ll never really have—and neither will Anika, nor Yelena, or my as-of-yet-unconceived child, no matter how much I love them or their father loves them.
The girls are both smiling ear-to-ear when they pile into the car—at least until Anika catches sight of me, and her face falls. “You’recoming along?” she asks, her voice suddenly brittle, and I’m amazed at how much she sounds like her father when he’s angry.
“I’m glad she’s here,” Yelena says, pushing her lower lip out and glaring at her older sister. “Why are you so mean?”
“I’m not mean.” Anika looks stubbornly out of the window. “She just doesn’t belong here, that’s all.”