Page 12 of Defiled Innocence

Christian eyes me for a long moment in silence, then puts his glass down on the counter.

“You think he’ll do that? He’ll just let you walk?”

“Why wouldn’t he? If he doesn’t marry me, he still gets shares in the company.” From a business standpoint, it’s a no-brainer. All that nonsense about it being time to settle down was just that, nonsense.

“What do you need from me?” Christian asks.

“Lucas handled the foundation’s investments. I need to see them, and we need to come up with a plan to keep it managed. I know you hate the financial stuff.” Christian is more of the marketing type. He has brilliant ideas, but bringing them to life has never been his strongest attribute.

Christian sighs.

“I can call a friend of mine; he works at a brokerage firm. We can have him look over what Lucas has done so far and see if he will agree to manage it.”

“You don’t look confident that he’d say yes.” I finish the last bit of wine.

He lifts a shoulder. “Going up against Dmitri Dragunov? It’s not really something many are going to be willing to do.”

“I know he’s a little dirty, but—” I’m cut off by Christian’s burst of laughter.

“A little dirty? Lia, he’s not just a little dirty, the man is the dirt.”

Confused, I stay silent. “He’s the dirt?”

He shakes his head. “I mean, he’s Russian mafia. Aside from his own dealings, his family is the Romanovs.”

“Oh.” I hadn’t connected the two when I met Nikolai this afternoon. The Romanovs are partly the reason centers like mine exist.

New drugs hit the streets almost daily, and a large portion of them are sold by the Romanov family. Mostly party drugsthat they would argue aren’t addictive, except to someone who’s running away from reality. It’s the escape they become dependent on. And using the shit the Romanovs pump into the streets works just as well as harder drugs like cocaine and heroin.

“Why would Lucas want me to marry him then?” I need to understand. “You’re his best friend, Christian; he had to have told you something. Why would he want me to marry into the Russian mafia?”

Christian slides over when I bring my empty glass to refill it. A heavy scent of spiced liquor follows him.

“You know, there might be another way out of this.” Christian turns, pressing his hip into the counter’s edge and watching me pour a healthy glass of wine.

“Like what? Pay him off? The man’s a billionaire by all accounts.”

Christian glides a fingertip along my cheek, pushing a loose strand of hair behind my ear.

A little jolt of something, not heat or excitement, something uncomfortable, runs through me. When I look back up at him, his eyes are softer.

“Like you could marry me.”

“Marry you?” I try not to laugh because he seems to be serious.

“Yeah.” He scoots closer to me, taking my glass away and putting it on the counter. “The attorney said if you weren’t married then you’d have to marry Dmitri to get the inheritance. You marry me, that takes care of the obligation.”

“Christian, I’m not marrying anyone.”

“Lia. You’ve crushed on me for years.” An arrogant smile pulls on his lips. If I had been drinking, all of the wine would have been spit on him.

“Did Lucas tell you that? That was years ago, Christian. I was in middle school.” I smile at the memory of an infatuation from long ago. A lifetime ago.

“Okay, but still.” He lifts a shoulder. “If you marry me, you’ve fulfilled the obligation, and we can contest the will.”

My eyes narrow a fraction. “And then we’d get everything.”

“Right.” He nods with another grin, and I wonder if this is what he looks like when he’s at the clubs. Lucas was always complaining about how much time Christian spent at dance clubs picking up what he called the ‘flavor of the week.’

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