Page 100 of Blood Mosaic

“With me and Zara in it? Not appealing.”

“Just Zara, little wolf.” Oleg smiled. “I have other plans for you once Zara is no longer a headache.”

Seban reached over and silently put on his favorite accessory: a pair of high-tech noise-canceling headphones.

Tatyana saw them. “I need to get a pair of those.”

“Not when you’re traveling with me.” He should have put her in the cage with him. “Zara. Trap. How do we bait it better?”

Tatyana huffed out a breath. “I don’t know. What do you think she wants?”

“She wants money and to make my life miserable.”

“Okay…”

“Zara likely left Istanbul because she was stealing from her new lover, so she knows Laskaris won’t protect her anymore, but it doesn’t matter. She’s already made my business less profitable through increasing the tariffs.” He leaned back. “Now she needs money.”

Tatyana frowned and stared at the ground near her feet. “I’m not going to bother asking why she hates you so much—parents are complicated—but the money she stole from you is hard to access. She hid it well, stashed it in property that she can’t sell without coming out of hiding. So she probably needs cash.”

Oleg enjoyed watching her think. Her forehead drew two little lines between her eyebrows. Her face scrunched up in concentration.

She looked older than twenty-seven, and he suspected that she’d long been the most responsible member of her family. She had gone away to university. She had also returned when it was necessary and spent all her savings and inheritance to preserve her family property.

He approved of her work ethic and values, but he also had the very strong urge to erase those lines on her forehead. He wanted to wipe away the stress he saw in her eyes.

He had the nagging urge to watch her sleep. Would she be restless and tense? Would she relax like an exhausted child?

Oleg grimaced, irritated that this human woman was occupying so much of his mind.

Once he was rid of Zara, he would install Tatyana at the house in Sevastopol. That was the ideal situation. She could be near her mother, and Oleg could visit her like he’d visit any of his human mistresses. He’d indulge in her company when it suited him and then go about his business. She would be well cared for, and he could get back to living his immortal life.

Tatyana looked up. “Does Zara have gold? Like the gold you were mentioning earlier? Something she could take to one of these exchanges?”

He nodded slowly. “Technically? Yes. She’s my daughter.”

“So she has something like a trust fund she can access?”

“Ah.” Oleg smiled. “Not exactly. Vampire children are supposed to spend their first years with their sire. We teach them how to control their urges, how to feed without killing. How to live inconspicuously in the human world, eliminate their enemies, and develop a ruthless business sense in order to survive for centuries.”

She nodded. “So a typical family environment.”

He didn’t try to stop his smile. “Often vampires stay with their sires for decades or even centuries before venturing out on their own. Some never leave at all.”

“Let me guess,” Tatyana said. “Luana didn’t want to wait a decade. She wanted Zara back.”

“She did. I trusted Luana to protect her, so I allowed Zara to go with Luana instead of staying with me.”

“But she has a trust fund? Something from you or from Luana?”

“She has nothing from Luana. Though we were estranged, I was still Luana’s mate. All her property belonged to me after herdeath. But when vampire offspring venture out on their own, they are given an inheritance from their sire.”

“So Zara has her inheritance from you.” Tatyana nodded. “And that is in gold?”

“It’s in gold and quite a lot of jewels.” Oleg folded his hands together. “And she can come retrieve it anytime she wants.”

Realization dawned in Tatyana’s eyes. “She has an inheritance, but she doesn’thavean inheritance.”

“When she defied me and went to Laskaris, I told Zara her inheritance would be waiting for her in Saint Petersburg.” He smiled. “All she has to do is go there and get it.”

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