Page 53 of Ivory Ashes

“Right,” Stella says slowly, nodding in understanding. “Now that you’re living here, Mikhail wants you to have everything you need. You didn’t bring much with you when you moved, so now, you get to go shopping.”

Admittedly, the mall is better than a nuclear fallout shelter or churning my own butter with all the other sister-wives Mikhail has abducted and impregnated… but not by much.

“No.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean that we aren’t going.” I slap the roof twice. “Pyotr, take this ginormous armored SUV back to the mansion. I’m not going.”

“This is why we didn’t tell you.” Anatoly leans forward, one elbow on my seat and his other arm splayed across the back of Stella’s. His hand rests casually on the maid’s shoulder. “You’re going to go buy a few things on Mikhail’s dime and not make a big deal about it, Viv. It’ll be fun.”

“I don’t want anything from him,” I hiss quietly enough that Dante can’t hear.

“Too late for that. Mikhail has given you plenty already.” Anatoly hitches a thumb in my son’s direction and wags his brows suggestively.

I slap his chest and he falls into the back seat laughing, giving Stella’s shoulder a tender pat as he pulls away.

Stella’s smile is shaky when she turns to me. “You really are going to need more clothes. There are a lot of responsibilities now that you’re… living with Mikhail. You’ll need dresses, at the very least.”

“It’s not like he’s going to take me anywhere. This is all some power play on his part. He doesn’t actually care what I look like.”

“Of course he does,” Stella says, looking genuinely offended I’d suggest otherwise. “You are his—” She glances back at Dante and huffs in frustration. “You are living with him now. That means something to Mikhail.”

Bless Stella’s heart for having so much faith in her employer. It would be sweet if it wasn’t so annoying.

“It’s really not that serious, Stella.”

“It is,” she insists. “To Mikhail, family is the most important thing in the world. He wouldn’t ask you to step into this role if he didn’t mean it.”

She’s wrong. Mikhail asked me to marry him because he wants access to Dante. It has nothing to do with me. I’m still not convinced the mission today isn’t for his henchmen to lose me at the mall and kidnap Dante.

But I don’t have the energy to un-brainwash everyone in this car. So I sit back and try to enjoy the ride.

“My legs are tired.” Dante sags forward, his knuckles dragging on the pavement like the little chimp he is.

I can’t blame him. We’ve been shopping for three hours. Two and a half of which have been spent in the children’s dressing rooms of designer clothing stores all up and down Fifth Avenue. Dante has never tried on so many clothes in his life.

I’ve never been able to buy him so many clothes in his life.

“I know, but we’re almost done. What if we go across the street and look for a new coat before we call it quits?” I ask, trying to make it sound exciting.

“He already has eight bags of stuff,” Anatoly points out.

Tired of being the pack mule, he asked a woman at the dress shop Stella all but forced me into to have all of our bags shipped to the mansion. I don’t even want to know how much of Mikhail’s money he paid for that luxury courier service.

“And I’m hungry,” Dante groans. “This is boring. My legs are?—”

Before he can finish, Pyotr sweeps in from behind and scoops Dante up. He does it easily, settling Dante on his shoulders like it’s a circus sideshow they’ve trained for.

“You don’t have to do that, Pyotr. He can walk.”

“My job is transportation,” Pyotr says with a grin. “Wherever you two need to go, I’ll get you there.”

Dante doesn’t have any reservations. He giggles and grabs the lapels of Pyotr’s suit and pretends to steer him like a horse down the pavement.

“I want a hot dog!” Dante declares, pointing at a cart on the corner. Without hesitating, Pyotr gallops on.

“He doesn’t need a—” I save my breath and let them go. Two days of living with Mikhail and my son is already spoiled absolutely rotten.

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