Page 110 of Blood & Snow
"This? It's not designer. I bought it at the market?—"
"The tag is still in the collar."
Irina's voice drops to a whisper that somehow carries more menace than shouting.
"Valentino. I checked online. Three hundred thousand rubles."
There's no way for me to explain this away.
It's clearly not just something I picked up in lost and found.
I reach back to feel the tag, still there and damning in its presence.
"I can return it," I stammer.
"If it bothers you, I'll take everything back?—"
Now I'm walking, trying to avoid her.
I move toward the couch to touch the throw, so soft and luxurious but so absolutely wrong.
"To where? What store sells coats and accepts returns without receipts?"
The trap closes around me, each word tightening the noose.
I sink onto the sofa, my legs too weak to support my weight.
The cashmere throw beneath me is softer than anything I've ever owned, and feels like it burns my skin just by existing.
I cover my face with my hands and know I've got nowhere to run.
Irina needs to know the truth, but when I tell her she's going to flip out entirely.
She'll take the kids away and I'll never see them again.
She won't believe me when I tell her how Xander is good for us.
"Talk to me," Irina says, her anger shifting until she sits next to me, hand stroking my back in compassionate circles.
"Whatever's happening, we can figure it out. But I need the truth."
The truth?
She wants to hear about me cleaning blood from floors and watching men be killed?
Xander's hands on my body, his voice calling mePtichkaas he moves inside me.
No.
I can’t tell her the truth.
It's not that she's not strong enough to handle it.
She is.
But I'm not.
"I can't."
