Page 133 of Cashmere Cruelty

Damn. This is going to be a harder sell than I thought.“Matvey’s paying?” I try to sweeten the deal. “We can get lobster thermidor or whatever it is rich people eat?”

The twins perk up at that. “I could eat,” says Lena.

“Be rude to say no,” agrees Julia.

Which leaves only one holdout. “C’mon,” I whip out my best puppy eyes. “We can have a girls’ night. Paint each other’s rifle guns and all.”

I watch Petra falter. “You’re seriously inviting me?” she asks, squinting suspiciously around the room like there are prank show cameras hidden in the crown molding.

“I seriously am.”

“To dinner?”

“To dinner. On Matvey’s card.”

Her eyes narrow. “Which one?”

“I don’t know.” I shrug. “The black one? Aren’t they all bottomless anyway?”

Petra’s mouth opens and closes like a goldfish. I can taste victory already. What’s that saying?If you can’t beat them, aggressively befriend them?

And then, just as Petra’s about to give me an answer?—

BOOM!

I watch the door fly clean off its hinges.

The twins leap into action. Before I can even understand what’s going on, they’ve made a human wall before us, shielding me and Petra. Their guns are already raised.

A figure stumbles into the apartment. In the next second, it’s shot full of holes.

Then I scream.

It’s not an intruder. It’s a waiter—one I’ve seen often enough in the evenings. The one who always brings our cart.

But, judging by how little blood pools under his body…

He was already dead, I realize. “It’s a decoy!” I yell.

Just then, more bullets fly in from the doorway. If the twins had taken just one more step towards the body, they’d have been shot full of holes, too.

Then an army of masked men swarms in.

Bullets start raining down in all directions. I grab blindly for something, anything, to use as a weapon. I’ve almost got my hands on a frying pan—if it’s good enough for Rapunzel, it’s good enough for me—when Petra suddenly grabs my wrist.

With near superhuman strength, she drags me behind the kitchen counter. “Stay down,” she snarls.

Then she’s off, too.

Okay. I force myself to breathe.This is fine. Still not worse than Carolina Torres’s quinceañera. You can handle this, right?

I most definitely can’t, but I’m not about to admit that.

I peer from behind the counter. The action’s exploded everywhere: couches have been overturned, walls have been decorated with smoking polka dots, the air’s been filled with eau de gunpowder. Just another Bratva Tuesday. Right?

I take stock of the bodies on the floor. One, two, three—five bodies. When I realize that none of them seem to belong to women, I breathe a sigh of relief.

But there are still five more men on their feet, shooting everything in sight.

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