He knew how to use a fucking phone. He’d regularly had one when he worked in the chambers, just in case he needed it for whatever reason. There were rules, and the phone wouldn’t call anyone but the people in the contacts that had been inputted for him, but still …
“I’m just saying, yes, that it has been a week since the two of you landed in Russia, and this is the first phone call you’ve afforded me out of your very busy days,” Konstantin replied cheerfully. “That made me suspect you didn’t know how to use the device.”
“I know how to use it; I had nothing to call for.”
“Mmm.”
“I didn’t have anything to call for, and I still don’t, but I thought you might like an update anyway.”
Pav shifted on his feet and scratched the back of his neck as he peeked over his shoulder at the closed door. There were a lot of men on this estate watching Vadim Boykov. The man was supposed to be in exile, but there were times when Pav stayed in the shadows and observed, that he thought this was more like a vacation for Vadim. The man simply seemed to be biding his time.
The point?
He didn’t trust any of them.
There could be a man outside of the bedroom door right now, and he wouldn’t even be surprised about it. Pav was terribly good at staying out of sight, if he didn’t want to be seen, but the men on this estate made it their mission to sneak up on him at least once or twice a fucking day. He was starting to become uncomfortable.
“What is the update, then?” Konstantin asked.
“Nothing unusual. Viktoria is quiet and refuses to talk to most everyone here.”
He didn’t try to hide the bitterness.
Konstantin didn’t miss it, either.
“Even you?”
Pav cleared his throat. “Even me.”
Pretty regularly, too. Occasionally, she might say something to him in passing, but for the most part, the woman locked herself away, in a separate bedroom from him. She avoided her father at all costs, no excuses. He’d noticed that, too. She took her meals in her room, brought to her by a female maid, and that was basically the extent of her activity here.
Pav didn’t know what to make of it.
“She’s still angry, then?”
“And uncomfortable here,” Pav replied.
“She is Vadim’s favorite. He treated her like a princess for her entire life. Why would she—”
“She did learn some things involving her father before we came here. That could be why, don’t you think?”
Konstantin made a harsh noise under his breath. “It could, yes. And how is he with you?”
Pav blinked. “I don’t understand—”
“Vadim. How is he treating you? Does he speak to you? Does he … instigate you? These are things I had been concerned about with sending you there to watch over her.”
“He barely speaks to me at all,” Pav replied, “and when he does, he calls me Zhatka.”
“I see.”
“He’s not asked about business, or my circumstance, if that’s what you’re trying to get at. He’s …” Mostly. “… acting like a properly exiled man.”
“He’s still Vadim at the end of the day, which means I cannot trust him with even an inch. The spies I keep on his guard try to keep me informed, but when someone is not close to truly control the hands that feed them, one has to be worried they’re not being entirely truthful.”
“Is that what you believe?”
Konstantin made a noise on the other end of the call. “What I know is that Vadim is a secondary problem to me right now. He is exiled—far the fuck away from me where he can’t really cause problems. His calls are monitored. His access to everything and anything is carefully supervised. No man is allowed on those grounds unless I know who they are and have given permission. Hell, even the whore he calls in to suck his cock is one I approved. He cannot move without me knowing it.
“The bigger problem that I have to handle right now is here,” Konstantin snapped. “The man who attacked my sister is still on the loose, one of our warehouses was burned to the ground, and the gang activity in the Heights has picked up so badly that I even needed to put men down in there to try and get it under control. Vadim isn’t even a blip on my radar right now.”
“But you said it,” Pav murmured. “There is a chance that you’re not able to control each and every man in this house when you’re so far away.”
“And I will handle that when I can. There is nothing Vadim could possibly do to me, my brother, or the Bratva when he is where he is—a place I put him. He is a secondary problem and he will be treated as such.”
Who was Pav to argue?
That didn’t mean he had to trust Vadim.
Vadim taught him not to.
“So, the problems there,” Pav started to say.
“Some may be related to Boris getting free. Others, probably not.”
“Huh.”
“It’s not for you to concern yourself over,” Konstantin replied. “You are where you need to be, Pav. Continue keeping an eye on her and try to make her slightly more comfortable. I don’t want Viktoria coming back here unless I have no choice but to bring her back. We don’t have any indication that Boris is going to attempt to come after her, but considering all the Boykovs have done to him over the last two years …”
“It’s unlikely that a part of him wouldn’t blame her and want retribution.”
“That,” the man agreed, “and the fact he likely knows it would hurt us a great deal if he were able to do to her
