Page 74 of Frozen Heart

“Gennadiy won’t go for this,” warned Bronwyn. “He doesn’t want us to even leave the house.”

“Then we’d better not tell him we’re going.” I stood up, water sluicing off me. I felt energized. There was hope, however small, and it was thanks to her. I took her hand and hauled her up. The smile she gave me hit me right in the chest. It was nervous and hopeful andproud,and…

It felt like we were a team. I squeezed her hand, and she squeezed back.

“Pack a bag,” I told her. “We’re going to New York.”

52

BRONWYN

Radimir leftto make some phone calls, trying to figure out where we could ambush Konstantin. I got dressed and sat on the bed, thinking.Are we really going to do this?Gennadiy was going to be pissed. Radimir might be the boss, but Gennadiy did most of the day-to-day running of things, sort of like a Chief of Staff to a President. And he’d be rightfully mad when the President ran off with his new wife on a secret mission in the middle of a freakin’ war to try to strike a deal he knew nothing about. He might blame me for leading his brother astray. I sighed.I’ll worry about that when we get back.

Ifwe get back.My shoulders slumped. That was the other reason this was a bad idea. Spartak’s men were hunting us and even if we made it out of Chicago alive, we’d be in a strange city with no backup.

But my crazy plan was our only hope. Wehadto do this. I straightened up...and caught a glimpse of my reflection in the mirror.

We had to do this...but I couldn’t do it likethis,in jeans and a t-shirt. I was going to be negotiating with one of the mostpowerful mafia bosses in the world. If I was a mafia wife, I had to start looking like it.

Gennadiy had handed us new phones to replace the ones we’d had to leave in Mexico. It only took me a few minutes searching on social media to find the person I wanted: the top personal stylist in the city. I sat staring at the message box for a while, trying to figure out what to type. Then I decided to just be honest.Hi. I’m Radimir Aristov’s new wife. And I need to look like it. NOW, this afternoon. Can you help me?I hit the Send button and prayed, but without much hope.

No more than ten seconds later, a reply came back.Send me your address, your measurements and a photo. I’ll be with you in an hour.

Fifty-seven minutes later, a van screeched to a stop in front of Gennadiy’s mansion. The security guards pulled their guns, thinking we were under attack. But instead of gunmen, a woman in an immaculate white trouser suit and scarlet blouse leapt out and shooed them away, completely unfazed by the weapons. “Clear the way!” she yelled in a British accent.

The guards sheepishly put their gunsdown and the woman banged twice on the side of the van. A sliding door opened, a ramp slid down, and two racks of clothes were wheeled down, pushed by a guy with chin-length black hair and Mediterranean-sea eyes.

“Rachel Waltham-Kutz,” she told me as she approached. “Behind me is Alfredo. You must be Mrs. Aristov?”

I nodded, awestruck.

“Good.” She strutted past me and clapped her hands twice. “Come come!We have work to do.”

I scurried after her into the living room, which she’d apparently decided was where we were doing this. She chased away a bewildered Valentin, closed the doors and turned to me.“So. You want to look likethem.The…” —she glanced around and then said, diplomatically—“Russianwomen.”

I nodded, then looked down at myself hopelessly. “But I’m not…” I indicated my curves. “They’re all…”

“It’s not about being skinny, darling, or having blonde hair. It’s about projecting strength. Using the weapons you have. You need to stop thinking you’re in their territory and start making them feel they’re in yours. You married the king; they should be bowing down to you as their queen. Alfredo, number seven!”

Alfredo whipped a dress from the rack with a flourish and passed it to me. I ran off into the next room to change and...what?!How did this fit me so perfectly? It was a black, figure-hugging dress that finished just above the knee with a complicated crisscross webbing across my boobs and short, angled sleeves that somehow balanced out my hips. It was sexy, giving a little hint of cleavage, but the webbing also looked kick-ass, like something a futuristic alien queen would wear. I turned around, gawping at myself in the mirror. It was evencomfortable!I ran back to Rachel. “I love it!”

“Of course you do. Alfredo, shoes!”

While I’d been away, Alfredo had brought in a huge, wheeled trunk. He opened the top and the whole thing folded outwards, becoming a three-tier display of shining, towering heels. Rachel passed me a pair of black, three-inch heels. “For normal occasions.” Then she passed me a pair of five-inch ones. “For emergencies.”

I tried the three-inch ones. My knees and ankles complained butwow,they did wonderful things to my legs, and the height boost gave me confidence.

Rachel unfolded a folding chair with a flick of her wrist. “Sit.”

I sat. Rachel opened a make-up case that probably cost a month’s rent. Then, to my surprise, Alfredo picked up scissors and a comb. He saw my startled expression and raised aneyebrow. “You thought I was only here to fetch and carry?” he asked in a melty Italian accent.

“No,” I lied, flushing.

He gave me a long-suffering sigh, then smiled to let me know he was kidding. He went to work on my hair while Rachel went to work on my make-up. She talked me through what products she was using and how she was applying them, recording the whole thing as a video on her phone so I could use it as a training aid. Even working at their expert speed, it took nearly an hour for them to finish. But when they did, and they handed me a mirror…

I sat there entranced, turning my face this way and that. I was having some sort of out-of-body experience: that wasn’tme,my eyes weren’t that big and my nose was bigger than that and my lipsdefinitelyweren’t that perfectly, softly pink and... holy shit,Iwanted to kiss me. And it felt so light and natural, even though I knew I was wearing a lot.

And my hair! Alfredo had somehow tamed it, and it looked almost liquid, falling in a sleek copper waterfall down my back. The black dress made it pop and then Rachel slipped a white jacket over the top and gave me a sleek silver-and-black purse to hold and...wow.I felt invincible. Untouchable.

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