"Does he look familiar?" her fiance murmured back.
Not Nikky, too. Did everyone think they were related? They weren't. Tatyana didn't believe in those types of coincidences. She tilted her head, studying the man. "He does look a little like Yoda, doesn't he?" Pointed ears, bald, wrinkled head. "A fraud, you are." She did her best impression. "Crazy, I am."
Nikky laughed. She loved hearing him laugh. "How I love you, Brat."
She inhaled sharply. "You love me?"
"How did your mother die?" That blunt question came from the crazy gnome.
"I'm sure the girl doesn't want to talk about it," added the crazy gnome's taller and even older brother.
"She doesn't mind," Tatyana lied. She did mind. Very much. Under the cover of the tabletop, Nikky took her hand in his, the contact comforting. "The girl slept over at a friend's house."
It had been her parent's anniversary and her gift to them was a night alone. "She returned to the apartment to find them, face up on the living room carpet, a bullet square between each of their eyes." She tapped the spot on her own skull. The blood was everywhere, the stench overwhelming. "They were holding hands, their feet tucked beneath them." As though they were kneeling, knowing death was coming. "They loved each other, you see."
Silence at the table.
Igroek's fist pounded on the table. "That was not my daughter."
"No, it was not." Tatyana agreed, talking slowly and quietly as not to further aggravate the crazy gnome. "And I'm not your daughter, either. I know how it is to lose someone you love, Mr. Igroek. I know what it does to you. I thought I saw my parents everywhere after that."
She attempted a chuckle, but it ended up sounding more like a sob. "I even thought I saw my mom on a bus, once. I was so convinced I sat beside her." She stared across the room, remembering. "It wasn't her, though. Her voice wasn't the same and she didn't have..." She touched under her bottom lip.
"The scar she got when she fell off her bike," Igroek added.
Their eyes met and Tatyana's heart jumped. "Yes." Coincidences. Coincidences and wishful thinking. "I'm going to marry Nikky." She tilted her chin up, daring him to say differently.
"Properly, Granddaughter," Nikky's grandfather repeated.
"No ransom, no games," Nikky forbade that Russian tradition. "No one touches Tatyana. Not Chan, not anyone else."
"Agreed." Nikky's grandfather smiled. "But guest lists, blood tests, church wedding, two day reception, properly."
Blood tests? She didn't want to spend any more time in a hospital. "I thought blood tests weren't necessary in Vegas?"
"Nikolay is my heir," Nikky's grandfather proclaimed in his behave-or-else voice. "I will not have his marriage called into question."
"Oh." She hadn't thought of that. Nikky squeezed her hand. "We can do all that tomorrow.
The next day, we'll getȄ "
"The mailing of invitations alone," Nikky's mom protested.
"We'll hand deliver them, get the answers right there." It was a reckless use of Kaerta resources, but she had the feeling that if they didn't get married right away, something bad would happen.
"You will notȄ"
"Igroek." Nikky's grandfather shook his head.
"To order the invitations..." Nikky's mom raised another roadblock.
It was an easy one to overcome. Tatyana smiled. "We'll print them ourselves." A simple solution. "There's the loveliest card stock at Walmart."
"No Walmart." It was Nikky's turn to cause a fuss. What he had against Walmart, she didn't know.
"She still at Walmart?" Nik asked Pavel.
"Yes, Boss." His top man grinned. "Fyodor is requesting danger pay after the veil incident."
He deserved it, Fyodor and Boris had been sucked deep into the wedding planning abyss.
Nik lasted less than a half hour, beating a retreat after the third auntie 'bumped into'
Tatyana and his mom at the Walmart. There was only so much talk about tulle he could take.
And he had more serious matters to manage.
"I don't like that." Nik motioned over his shoulder to where Stepan was talking with Igroek's brother. The two acted too buddy-buddy for Nik's peace of mind.
"The great-uncle has been asking questions, Boss." There was an ominous note to Pavel's normally flat voice. "Not only about your fiancee, about security."
"Shit." That wasn't good. "No one talks to him, understand? We are rivals, not partners."
"Our men won't be a problem, Boss."
Stepan would be, was the unspoken communication. "From now on, Boris reports only to Tatyana." Although the bodyguard had fucked up, he was devoted to the brat and he was all Nik had. To assign anyone else to her now would be too suspicious. "Cut off all open contact with him. If he's approached by Igroek's team, he's to say yes to whatever they want." That would give them a man on the inside.
Pavel's eyes gleamed. "Understood, Boss." A pause. "She's Igroek'sȄ"
"Yes." If there was any doubt in his mind, it was laid to rest as Yuri motioned to him.
Grandfather needed him. "But she's my fiancee first, Pavel." He wouldn't lose her. He couldn't. Nik stalked off.
The smoke was even thicker than usual, as Igroek was also a cigar smoker. The two were puffing away in silence, power hanging around them like a cloak. Shit. Nik braced himself.
He was now a dog with two masters. "Grandfather."
"Sit, Nikolay."
Sit. Roll over. Beg. Nik sat across from them.
"This is about you and me, Kaerta." Igroek kept his gaze fixed on his rival. "Why is he here?"
"If this affects Tatyana, it affects me." She was his fiancee.
"Nikolay is closer to the situation than I am." It was as though he'd never spoken. A dog barking in the background. "We could benefit from his insights."
"His insights because this situation was arranged by you. This is all your doing." A snort from Igroek. "She's good, I'll give you that. And you did your research. Those casual memories she let drop? Brought a tear to my eye."
"You're an ass, Igroek. Some things never change."
Why were they forcing a situation they didn't want? For more power? The risk wasn't worth it. "Let him go back
