The Beauty Who Loved Him by Bethany-Kris

15.

Vera glanced betweenthe chicken sandwich on rye bread and the Almond Puff sitting right beside it on another plate. She could already taste the flaky sweetness that would soon melt in her mouth. The small, tucked away cafe really did have a knack for homemade, fresh-baked cakes and pastries.

Hannah’s choice in lunch matched Vera’s right down to the vanilla chai lattes in little pink mugs. Each featured hand painted matryoshkas along the outside upper rim. Between the four plates and two mugs, there wasn’t much more room on the small round table, and there had only been seats for two. Kiril ended up three tables down.

Not that it mattered.

The cafe was mostly empty other than a boy, maybe eleven, or twelve, and who Vera suspected might be his little brother sitting across from him in the booth. The two boys sat opposite to Kiril who barely glanced up from whatever he was scrolling through on his phone.

A line of booths faced the front windows of the cafe, converted from the ground floor of an old bookmaker’s shop. Old tools and bindings hung displayed from bare rafters.

Their trio was lucky to arrive just after the afternoon rush that typically kept the cafe full and buzzing with activity. Vera waved her fork at the two plates closer to her, asking Hannah, “You wouldn’t judge me for eating dessert first, right?”

The freckles splattered across Hannah’s face almost seemed to dance with the same happiness as her eyes when she laughed. “That was my plan, too.”

Hannah picked up the tiny three-pronged fork that had come with her Almond Puff, and stabbed it into the corner of the rectangular chunk of sugary heaven, promptly plopping the bite into her mouth. Winking and nodding as she chewed, Hannah didn’t need to talk for Vera to understand.

Melt-in-your-mouth goodness.

She was half way through her own pastry, making an effort not to moan around every thin slice of crunchy almond that made up the top layer of the puff; her favorite part of the sweet. The buzz of Vera’s phone in the clutch she’d hung off the corner of the chair broke the silence between the two. Hannah shot her a questioning look.

“It’s a bit early for your mom or dad to be texting you from New York, right?” Then, she squinted one eye, asking, “Or am I off on the time zones? Didn’t you get a message when we were leaving the church, too?”

“Just ask me who’s messaging me,” Vera told her friend. “We can skip the twenty questions.”

Hannah pouted exaggeratedly. “You’re no fun.”

“You’re nosy.”

With a shrug, Hannah didn’t deny it. She did, however, say quietly, “Only maybe a little worried, too.”

Vera used the phone she pulled out of her clutch as a momentary distraction from the conversation. She didn’t think it would stop Hannah from bringing it up again, however. While her friend lifted her mug for a sip of latte, Vera checked her phone for the cause of the buzzing alert.

A smile bloomed instantly. “The invitations are ready.”

Hannah’s brow lifted high as she lowered the mug back to the table. “That was fast. Didn’t you put the order in two days ago?”

Vera shrugged. “I only needed ten, and they didn’t have to be ... fancy, or anything.”

Not to mention, the invitations didn’t need very much information. Her name, Vaslav’s, too. A standard greeting and appropriate invite followed by a time and an address to a church in Dubna that Vera had yet to visit. It had been, however, requested by Vaslav for reasons he promised to explain later.

“You’re really only inviting ten people?” Hannah asked.

Vera nodded. “Who else needs one?”

“I can name twenty women off the top of my head who would appreciate an invitation from you to literally anything.” Hannah yanked her chicken sandwich plate closer and picked up one triangular half in both hands. “And I know you have more family than your parents, so. Say it like it is. Vaslav Pashkov said ten guests, and ten it is.”

Vera barely suppressed a smile. “Getting right to the point, are you?”

Hannah sighed and stared at her sandwich like she might take a bite. Instead, she told Vera first, “You know he spent time in an institution, right? Not just prison institutions, Vera.”

“I saw the newspaper records you found on the online archives.”

Yet another thing Hannah had tried to bring to Vera’s attention over the past evenings. She simply hadn’t read through them as carefully as maybe she should have, except the information felt like an invasion of Vaslav’s privacy, in a way.

“He did terrible things to people,” Hannah said, “and it doesn’t take very much to find what those things were, either.”

He still does, Vera almost said.

Hannah had no fucking clue.

Instead of speaking what was on her mind, because she loved her friend just enough to put up with her prodding and concerns as it came from a good place, Vera glanced back down at her phone. She smiled at the image the designer and printer had attached of the simple and elegant invitations printed on cream card stock, framed by flaked gold leaf with black script in the middle spelling out her name and Vaslav’s larger than the rest of the writing.

She was lucky to have a contact at a printer in the city who could get the invitations done as fast as they had; one of the only good things she had gained from The Swan House.

The guy used to do all their promo, promised to be discreet, and fast. All of which he had been, so far. Vera appreciated it.

“I really wanted to be able to get one sent to my parents—properly, in the mail,” Vera added, shooting Hannah a look, “before the actual wedding happens.”

Hannah laughed. “Better get it in the mail, then.”

That was the plan.

“I bet we could get Kiril to run us over to the printer to pick them up,” Vera said.

Hannah, chewing through another bite in her sandwich, eyed Vera as she finished the bite. All the while, the crease of tension in her friend’s forehead softened with every chew. Eventually, she swallowed the food, and muttered, “Just say it, Vera.”

“Say what?”

“You’re excited.”

Vera sucked in a breath, holding it in her chest as she wondered; is that what this is? The humming she felt in her chest, and the butterflies in her belly? The urge to look at her phone, and the image on the text again to see her name below his on cream card stock was that all just excitement? The wedding only a handful of weeks away was the first step to an uncertain future, but that didn’t stop her from looking forward to it all the same.

“It’s more than that, too,” Vera said, letting that breath she’d been holding out. “But he’s private, for good reason, and I don’t mind following along with his wishes if it means he’s comfortable. And just so you know, one of these invitations” —she waved her phone— “is for you.”

“Obviously, I’d be mad if one wasn’t,” Hannah threw back, sending both women into a fit of hushed giggles.

Eventually, Vera calmed enough to ask, “But you still won’t be my legal witness?”

Hannah eyed the quiet street outside the cafe from the wall of bay windows overlooking the scene. “Just to be clear, you getting married won’t change anything about you and me, right?”

“Of course, not.”

Hannah’s head bobbed up and down once. “I guess I better do it, huh?”

Vera only grinned. “We can pick a dress for you next week, too.”

“Are you paying?”

Like Hannah didn’t have the money, but all the same ...

“No, actually,” Vera said, smirking while she put the phone away. “Vaslav is.”

*

Vera, halfway throughher chicken sandwich while Hannah took a minute in the bathroom at the far end of the cafe, was lost devouring her lunch until Kiril swept past her in the aisle. She barely had the chance to look up and see him go before she heard the familiar ting of the bell over the cafe’s front door. She turned around in her seat as he exited the cafe at the same time a black limo came to a stop on the side of the street.

The unusual vehicle, with flags flapping from what she could see from the front, didn’t linger long. The second a figure dressed in black stepped out of the rear and closed the door, the limo pulled back onto the road as if it hadn’t even been in park.

A black SUV took its place.

One she recognized.

Vera didn’t pay Igor’s arriving SUV much mind because she was more interested in the figure that exited the street to enter the cafe. Vaslav was a hell of a sight for sore eyes when he decided to make a public debut. Of course, she’d witnessed him smartly dressed in a three-piece suit with a well-fitted blazer and vest and tie that matched the silk of his pocket square, all deep red. It didn’t change how the presence of him walking toward her from behind with purpose could practically shrink the entire world around her.

Swinging around in her seat at the same time Vaslav took the open chair across from hers, Hannah’s, all she could ask the man hiding his eyes behind dark aviators was, “What are you doing here?”

Vaslav smiled, or tried. His lips didn’t quite pull high enough for a full smile and fell too quickly. “Didn’t I promise you a date?”

“I thought I needed a black dress for the date?”

His chin tilted higher, and while she couldn’t see his eyes behind the opaque lenses, she could feel the way he stared at the dress hugging her curves. “Looks like you’re wearing black to me.”

“You said to buy a new dress.”

“Did I?”

He even had the nerve to cock a brow.

Vera refused to play his word game. “Just say you were at the funeral today, and Kiril probably passed along the message where we were going for lunch.”

“Conversations are less fun that way,” Vaslav returned.

She didn’t get the chance to reply because Kiril swept past the table again to return to his own with a wave. The man who followed behind the teenager, however, stopped at their table. Also dressed in a black three-piece suit, although his shirt, vest and tie underneath were the same dark hue, Igor folded his hands at his back and cleared his throat.

Vaslav didn’t look away from Vera. She, on the other hand, stared up at Igor.

“You good?” Igor asked.

Vaslav shrugged, asking Vera, “Are you?”

What did the question have anything to do with her?

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

The man across the table tipped his head toward Igor, saying only, “We’re fine.”

“I could run over to pick up the bags, save us the trouble later, no?”

Vera had clearly missed something in the conversation, but the two continued with their back and forth as if she hadn’t even been brought into it in the first place.

“The pup is right there,” Vaslav said with a gesture toward the quiet teenager a couple of tables away. “I’m sure he can manage.”

“Next time,” Igor drawled out as he turned to walk away, giving Vera a wink as he went, “just let me know we’re going for lunch.”

Vaslav graced the retreating man with an annoyed wave, and loudly muttered, “I thought you had figured it out!”

“Are you?” Vera asked him, then.

Vaslav pushed his aviator’s high on the crown of his head, and the hard squint of his brow gave away the truth; his pain. “Am I what?”

“Having lunch?”

“Not sure I can keep down what I might eat, but I knew I could get a few minutes with you.” As he spoke, Vaslav reached across the table for her. Vera couldn’t stop herself from letting her hands slip into his over the plates between them. He twisted her large engagement ring between two fingers before flipping over her hand, palm up, and kissed every one of her fingertips. As unexpected as it was sweet, she was helpless to let him do it while she melted from the inside. “Even if it’s not a proper date, kisska,” he said.

Oh, she figured.

Vera didn’t mind, to be honest. She’d take a few minutes with him over food, too.

“Good,” came a familiar voice, but new to the conversation. “I really hate being a third wheel.”

Heat flushed through Vera’s whole body. Vaslav even chuckled at the sight of her blush creeping over her grinning cheeks at being interrupted by her friend, the bastard. She hadn’t heard Hannah’s approach from behind until she spoke.

“Ah,” Vaslav said, turning his pain-riddled scowl on Hannah as she moved to stand beside their table instead of behind Vera. “The friend. Hannah, is it?”

He even stuck out his hand for a shake.

Hannah never once broke Vaslav’s gaze as she lightly shook his hand, her red ringlets bouncing as she fixed him with a hard stare. “It is. Hannah Malone. Don’t bother with your name, I already know it. And you’re in my seat.”

That earned her a smirk.

Only a little one.

Vaslav let go of Hannah’s hand, saying at the same time, “Well, I’ll get you another.”

Too amused to step in and stop the two from sniping at one another like they were, Vera remained quiet as Vaslav learned across the aisle and grabbed an empty chair from a table beside theirs. Hannah’s plates were all but empty, so it wasn’t exactly like they needed the table space for a third seat. Vaslav yanked the wooden chair around to face their table, and nodded at it, telling Hannah, “There, sit.”

His tone stayed clipped.

Short, and annoyed.

She did sit.

Quickly, too.

“If you call me “the friend” again,” Hannah told Vaslav, arching one red eyebrow high, “I’ll start calling you the fiancé in kind. Fair?”

Of all things she could have said, that remark actually earned Hannah a smile. Softer than his smirks and fleeting because of his pain. It had been there, though. For a second.

“Fair,” Vaslav said.

“Well,” Vera put in, waving for the server behind the breakfast bar made of centuries old wood, “this wasn’t awkward at all.”

Then, she looked to Vas, asking, “Do you want a coffee?”

“Black, please,” he muttered.

By the time Vera had repeated the order to a waiting server, the other two people at the table had attempted a restart to their conversation.

Kind of.

“You are aware that the general public basically believes you’re not allowed to leave Dubna, aren’t you?” Hannah asked. “Like you’ve got some kind of gate and guard out there keeping you behind lock and key.”

“Hannah,” Vera scolded, interjecting into the conversation fast. “That’s—”

Vaslav laughed, guttural and real. It stopped her from saying anything else to shut her friend up before the unpredictable nature of the man sitting at the table decided to show itself at the worst possible time.

Except he didn’t react like she expected.

It shocked even Vera.

“Jesus Christ,” Vaslav swore, rubbing at his cheek as he turned away from the table a bit. “The papers really will write anything, yeah?”

Hannah shot Vera a pointed look, with a flat, “And some of it might even be true.”

“Thin ice,” Vera replied dryly. “You’re walking on it.”

“Oh, she’s harmless,” Vaslav said, stunning Vera further. “And funny, I like her.”

Not even Hannah knew what to make of that.