Page 6 of Her Vicious Angel

“Who is our guest?” said Frederik.

“My mail-order wife,” replied Andrei. “My father has hired her to draw attention away from my other interests.”

“I thought that meant he was gay!” I put in.

Frederik looked at both of us and waved his hands conciliatingly. “Let’s calm down and have some dinner.”

He held out an arm to me, and I rushed over to take it.

Andrei wasn’t ready to give up, though, and he strode over to tangle a hand in my hair, twisting my long waves up so hard my eyes prickled. He pulled my head up so I was forced to look at him.

“I don’t like being disobeyed,” he said.

I gasped. The feeling of his rough hands on me was intoxicating and sent ripples of pleasure to my core. My heart began to pound at how close he was to me, and I felt his raw power like a harsh buzz all along my skin.

“We are going to have some dinner,” repeated Frederik, cutting across his nephew coldly, and Andrei dropped his hand with some reluctance.

I made a mental note to never be alone in the same room with him again.

4

CERISE

Isat as far away from Andrei at the dinner table as I could, but it didn’t matter. I could still feel his eyes on me, making my skin prickle with a combination of fear and lust.

If having secret boyfriends wasn’t his unnatural proclivity, thenwhat the fuck was it?

Frederik was coolly equal to the situation, and he poured me a glass of wine and asked me about myself.

Andrei looked angrily from the other side of the table.

Frederik was delighted to hear that I had specialized in Russian iconography and art.

“That must have been why my brother selected you as Andrei’s wife,” he said.

“That shit bores me,” Andrei put in. “A woman who wants to spend all day looking at crumbling art in a church is not an inducement for getting married.”

“You didn’t look bored when I came in,” his uncle said.

The dinner was excellent, even if I couldn’t identify it all, and served in exquisitely delicate plates with expensive-looking heavy silverware.

Andrei took calls throughout the dinner.

“What’s he saying?” I asked Frederik. “I only understand a few words of Russian.”

Frederik’s face was mobile and cultured, and his lips quirked up in a smile.

“He’s telling the rest of the family to meet him here. His family and his men will all be here by tomorrow. All except Grigoriy Ivanovich Petrovic, of course. Andrei will have to go to the Pakhan if he wants to meet with his father.”

That word sounded vaguely familiar, but I couldn’t remember the meaning.

“Is everyone in your family involved in the theater business?” I asked.

Frederik seemed to find my question amusing as he bent to his salad. “Yes, every male except me. I don’t have the. . .taste for the more hands-on aspects of the family business. But I’m not any more evolved than my brothers. I don’t have the taste but I reap the benefits. My brother bought me a professorship with his influence and his money and his power and I have enjoyed that very much, although I’m taking a sabbatical right now to write a book.”

I felt another shiver of fear down my spine. I was afraid but I couldn’t keep myself from asking,

“Why does a theater owner need so much armed security?”

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