Chapter 185

TIMOFEY

“I’m feeling quite honored because this is the first anyone has done with either of you in over a year. Since before Viktorov Industries went up in flames.” The reporter widens her eyes and takes us both in—the three of us, actually. “Since before you had a baby, too. Congratulations, by the way. He’s an angel.”

Piper adjusts Samuil in her arms. “Thank you. Hopefully, he’ll stay sleeping just like this so you keep that opinion of him. You’d think differently if you were here last night.”

“Not a sound sleeper?” the reporter asks.

Piper lowers her chin, eyebrow arched. “Monica, when I tell you he did not sleep for a single minute all night, I mean it literally.”

“We could have rescheduled. I would have understood! Especially around this time of year.” She gestures to the towering Christmas tree to our right. “It’s a busy season.”

“Every season is busy,” I say. “No amount of exhaustion will keep us from promoting the Christmas auction.”

Monica smiles. “Yes. And I promise we’ll get to that, but you have to answer some other questions for me, too. My editor would fire me in a New York minute if I let you get away without answering some questions.”

I sense Piper stiffen next to me.

There are countless reasons we haven’t done any interviews in the last year. One of them being that Piper wasn’t ready. Overnight, her life changed. She went from a single woman scraping by to a mother in a relationship with a Bratva don. She’s been the target of attacks. She’s seen death.

I wanted to allow her as much time as she needed to process all of that trauma and revel in our little family before I opened us up to the world again.

She reaches over and squeezes my hand, a gesture the eagle-eyed interviewer doesn’t miss. She jots something down in her notebook.

“We finally can answer some questions,” Piper says softly. “With the ongoing trials, our attorneys rightfully asked us not to speak out. Now that they’ve ended, we have more freedom.”

“It was hard to stay quiet with so many nasty rumors swirling,” I add.

Nasty, definitely. But rumors? Hardly.

I killed Kreshnik Xhuvani and Sergey Viktorov with my bare hands and set Viktorov Industries on fire. I’d do it again, too, if given the chance.

But that’s not the story we went with.

“That’s a good place to start,” Monica says. “There is maybe no name more likely to split a crowd than Timofey Viktorov. People either love you or loathe you. There doesn’t seem to be a middle ground.”

Piper loops her arm around mine and snuggles close. “Count me with the ‘love’ crowd.”

Monica smiles. “Some people call you a hero. They say you walked away from your father’s tarnished legacy and started again. Rising from the ashes, you could say. Others think maybe your hands aren’t so clean. Why do you think you divide people like that?”

I shrug. “Powerful men always draw detractors. It doesn’t matter what kind of good you try to do in this world, there will always be people who think it’s an act. And I don’t want to point the finger at you, Monica, but—”

“Uh-oh,” she chuckles. “I feel like you’re going to point the finger at me.”

Piper pats my arm, taking over the conversation. “Not you specifically, but the news has been running so many wild stories over the last year. One article hinted that I sent my family to Mexico to escape Timofey’s reach and that he is holding me captive.”

I gesture around at the lush garland hanging from the roaring fireplace and the tray of peppermint chocolate cookies Akim made for the interviewer. “Does this look like a prison?”

“If it is, it’s the nicest prison I ever saw.” Monica laughs appreciatively.

“We’re just a little dubious about allowing press into our baby bubble,” Piper continues. “We don’t want anything to ruin it.”

I drape an arm around her shoulder and pull her and Samuil close. “Nothing could ruin this.”

“I believe you,” Monica says. “Especially given everything the two of you have been through this year. Is it true you’ve left Viktorov Industries, Timofey?”

As nice as Monica seems, I know a gotcha question when I hear one. “I was removed as CEO in a board vote just prior to the fire, actually. I didn’t walk away willingly.”

“You’re referencing the fire that killed your adoptive father?”

I nod. “Yes. Unfortunately, he was one of the men lost in that tragedy.”

“This is where those nasty rumors come in,” she says. “Some people think the fire was a cover up.”

“People love to gossip,” Piper says.

Samuil is stirring in her arms, but she strokes her finger down his chubby cheek. He has her coloring—pale, peachy skin, and a head full of red waves.

Monica nods in agreement. “It’s not hard to see where the roots of these rumors stem from, though. Two of the wealthiest men in the city dead in the same fire? It’s almost unbelievable.”

“Backroom deals have to happen somewhere, don’t they? My father and Kreshnik Xhuvani were working together, forging an alliance during the annual Viktorov Industries gala. They couldn’t have known death was lurking just around the corner.”

I find great joy in repackaging the truth. Nothing I said is a direct lie, but there is some pertinent information missing.

Most importantly, that I was ‘Death.’

“Did you support your father’s alliance with one of his biggest competitors?” Monica asks shrewdly. “If you’d remained with Viktorov Industries, would you have seen that deal through to the end?”

“I haven’t considered it. I’m not with Viktorov Industries, so that decision is out of my purview. I am happy to look to the future.”

Monica’s mouth puckers. We aren’t quite giving her the hot and juicy story she was hoping for, I can tell. She turns to Piper.

“While you haven’t done any interviews for the last year, your father certainly has. I have noted here, let’s see… fourteen separate interviews he has done with the press. Most of them complain that he has been cut out of your life.”

Piper blinks placidly. “I’m not here to answer for the actions of my father. He is my blood relation, but I can’t control him anymore than he has controlled me.”

Not anymore, I think.

“‘Blood relation?’” Monica wrinkles her nose. “That’s a little cold.”

Piper sighs. “I just don’t want to—”

“Next question,” I interject.

“I know family can be difficult, but wouldn’t you rather answer some of these questions and dispense the rumors?”

I narrow my eyes. “Next question, Monica.”