Page 166 of Crimson Oath
Rumi had been promoted to her house manager, and most of the time that was fine.
Except when her mother was visiting.
Everyone loved Anna, but Rumi wasn’t keen on an old Russian woman teaching her how to cook, and Anna was suspicious of everyone.
Her phone buzzed in her pocket.
Are you home yet?
She typed back.
Mama is cooking. She and Rumi are arguing.
What is it tonight?
Tomato in stroganoff.
I have no opinion on this.
She braced herself for battle and walked into the kitchen on the ground floor of the sprawling house within the Poshani compound in a residential neighborhood east of the Vistula River.
“Hello! I am home.” She set her messenger bag in the officethat was just off the downstairs entryway, then walked back to the kitchen to see Rumi and Anna glaring at each other.
Rumi broke off eye contact and looked at Tatyana. “How was work?”
“Good. As expected. No surprises.”
“That’s excellent.”
Anna barked, “Dinner is almost ready.”
“Good,” Tatyana snapped back. “Because if you don’t feed me, I’m going to bite you.”
“Eh.” Anna waved a hand at her as Rumi held back a laugh.
Tatyana walked around and placed a kiss on her mother’s cheek, then put an arm around her waist. “Thank you for cooking.”
Anna grumbled. “These people hug each other constantly, and now it is rubbing off.”
“I know, what will you do?” She sat at the counter, watched her mother cook, while Rumi opened a bottle of blood-wine and poured her a glass.
If anyone had told her a year ago that she’d be settled in Warsaw, running a business and coming home to her mother complaining at night, with friends who kept gardens, an extended family living in the rambling compound around her, and kids running through her house when they were in trouble with their parents…
She would have thought that person was delusional.
But six months made all the difference. It was nearly time for the kamvasa to start again, though she wouldn’t be able to join it for the entire season like she had last time.
No, she was needed at the office to build the future of her people.
And though there was ever more rumbling on the borders near Oleg’s territory, for the first time in Tatyana’s immortal life, she didn’t just feel safe.
She knew she was home.
There weretwo hours left before dawn when the black Mercedes pulled up to a town house in the center of Warsaw. The streets were dead, so when she stepped outside, there was no one to greet her.
The car pulled away, and she walked around the corner to the wrought iron gate, used her key to open the lock, and slipped inside.
If she were a wind vampire, this would be so easy, but she was not.
