Page 139 of Emerald Malice

“Yelena, it’s just the laundry!” I complain. “I can help with the laundry.”

She pulls the laundry room door shut behind her and puts her hands on her hips. “Those detergents are full of chemicals, and I don’t want you breathing in the toxins.”

I can’t help but pout. “I can help! And then you can tell me more stories about your childhood in Russia.”

“Another day,” she says, her scowl softening ever so slightly. “Right now, I have to get the laundry done. Where are your two shadows?”

“Misha is in a tutoring session.”

“Which means Remi is with him,” Yelena finishes knowingly.

Remi must be able to sense how much Misha hates his study sessions, because he refuses to leave Misha’s side while he’s working at the table. Remi curls up under the desk, and it’s so damn sweet that I don’t even mind being abandoned.

Even though I’m desperate for some company. Which is why I’m begging to do laundry.

“Find Mila then,” Yelena suggests.

“Mila is out with Leonty.”

“Katya?”

“Katya is busy, too,” I grumble. “If you just let me into the laundry room, I promise I won’t touch the det?—”

Yelena slips into the laundry room and closes the door before I can even finish.

So much for that.

I’ve spent plenty of lonely days in this house, so I don’t know what makes today so unbearable. Or, maybe I do know why…which makes it all even more unbearable.

The sad, pitiful fact is that I’m jealous of my friends. Mila is out with Leonty and Katya is with Shura. My two friends are out being wined and dined by handsome men, and I’m left behind to twiddle my thumbs and daydream.

I wander through the house, lowkey hoping that I might run into a certain silver-eyed distraction. But the manor is dishearteningly empty.

I’m nearly desperate enough to go hang with the Bratva boys who aren’t out wooing my friends. Except I already know Anatoly and Leif are in the gym, pumping iron and slapping each other in the back of the head for shits and giggles. And no amount of boredom is worth enduring that.

I’m about to give up and retreat back to my fortress of solitude in the pool house when the sound of an engine catches my attention.

Mila is back!

I careen through the house towards Mila’s wing of the house, prepared to drop to my knees and beg Leonty and Mila to let me third wheel with them.

I don’t see Leonty’s car in the drive and the entryway is quiet, so I keep moving to Mila’s room. It crosses my mind that I could be about to walk in on my friend and bodyguard getting it on, but desperate times and all that.

Unfortunately, Mila’s room is empty.

“Huh.” Hands on my hips, I spin in a slow circle like I might be able to make a friend appear.

Suddenly, the door behind me swings open.

“It’s about freaking ti—” The words die on my lips, replaced by only one. “Viktor.”

His eyes are bloodshot and hooded, and his attention is sluggish. If I hadn’t spoken, he probably wouldn’t have even noticed I was here.

“Who’re you?” he slurs.

He’s clear across the room, but I can smell the booze coming off him. Booze and smoke and filth I don’t even have the words for. If Yelena didn’t want me near laundry detergent, she’s certainly going to have something to say about my proximity to this walking trigger warning.

“I was just… waiting for Mila,” I mumble uncomfortably. “I’m gonna head back to the pool house.”

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