Ballerina for the Bratva: A Russian Mafia Romance Novel Read online

  “An alliance would be wise, though,” Kate pointed out. “Especially to strengthen your ties with those of us on his side of the ocean. But like Ivan said, no pressure. Your business is in a good position, considering the way your father left it.”

  Alexei felt a little burst of pride. His father had left things in a good position, yes. He was glad to inherit something like this, instead of inheriting… well, everyone had heard about the state that the Sokolov business had been in when Ivan had taken it over and turned it around. His father had been running the whole thing into the ground.

  Ivan had done an admirable job with it since, marrying Kate and getting the alliance of her family, one of his lieutenants marrying into the powerful Mikhailov family, and winning a couple key battles in some small turf wars. He was climbing up the ladder, no doubt about it, and Alexei was glad to have him on his side.

  “I’ll see who I meet at the party tomorrow,” Alexei said. Ivan was being kind enough to host a get-together for Alexei to meet all the powerful heads of the families in an informal setting. It was still business, because, well, everything was business in the bratva world, but at least this way it felt a little more relaxed and natural.

  Alexei was honestly nervous—not that he’d ever say as much out loud. He’d attended a lot of parties and so on back in Russia. He knew everyone there. But he had only heard of the men he’d be meeting tomorrow. Making a good impression would be paramount.

  At least he had his father’s reputation to precede him. Hopefully everyone would look at him as a worthy successor and he could get his foot in the door without looking like a complete idiot.

  “The others won’t appreciate it if they think I’m just here to carry off one of their daughters,” he pointed out. “I’d rather have them grow to trust me for my business and then we can discuss a possible alliance later on.”

  “And who knows?” Ivan joked. “You might be lucky enough to find someone to fall in love with.”

  Alexei laughed. Marrying for love wasn’t out of the realm of possibility, but most of the time it was a combination of love and alliance. Ivan and Kate, for instance, had fallen in love but were also a good alliance to have, the joining of their families benefitting both. He’d heard rumors that Ivan’s lieutenant had married into the Mikhailov family for an alliance, but had ended up falling in love with his chosen match.

  It was rare for it to be ‘just’ love.

  “You think it’s funny,” Kate said, “but you’re in a good position. Your business is strong. If you want, you can afford to marry whoever you want. It won’t damage you the way it would some of the smaller families who need all the help they can get.”

  “Fair enough,” Alexei admitted. “But I will be honest with you… I have yet to fall in love, and I doubt that it will happen. Especially now. I have too much to focus on with all that’s happened, I don’t need to be distracted by a pretty face.”

  “Now you’re just tempting fate,” Kate told him. “Just watch, you’ll fall in love here.”

  “Are you willing to stake a bet on that?” Alexei replied.

  Ivan chuckled. “I’d be careful about going against her, Alexei, she tends to have the universe on her side.”

  Kate winked.

  “But we’ll leave you alone about it… for now,” Ivan went on. “Let’s talk about the party tomorrow.”

  Alexei straightened up. Yes, the party. The business, the alliances, why he was here. Not for some ridiculous romance that wouldn’t even happen.

  He had to make a good impression. He had to make his father proud.

  Chapter Four

  Janet couldn’t quite stop her hands from shaking as she tied her ballet slippers.

  It was opening night. Opening night!

  And she was the lead!

  Sometimes she still couldn’t quite believe it. She’d been happy with her audition, she’d walked away knowing that she’d done her best. But she hadn’t thought that her best would be enough to beat out everyone else.

  “It’s your hard work paying off,” her mother had said when Janet had told her. “We knew you’d get there.”

  Her parents had faith in her, but Janet hadn’t had such faith in herself. Now… she might have to change that.

  She looked up at herself in the mirror—in her own private dressing room. She’d always shared with everyone else and she honestly missed sitting in between Vicky and Sofia, getting herself dolled up for the stage. But at the same time—a private dressing room! As if there was any more proof needed that she’d made it. That she was finally achieving her dreams.

  Oh, she’d been featured before, getting solos in The Nutcracker and Sleeping Beauty and so on. But she’d never been the star, and here she was. Not just the white swan, the doomed princess, but the black swan as well.

  They were the antithesis of one another. The white swan represented innocence, tragedy, love, and loss. The black swan represented temptation, fire, desire, ferocity. She had to perfectly embody both—which also meant being on stage for an insanely long time, barely a pause in between her scenes.

  It was going to be exhausting, but she had never been more excited. If she could pull this off, she’d be setting her career up for life.

  If she could pull it off.

  Janet double-checked her makeup in the mirror. She’d spoken with the director and the costume designer and they’d worked out her makeup so that she could easily transition from the white swan to the black swan and then back again for the ending. Delicate strokes of silver and white with hints of blue framed her face, trailing from the corners of her eyes in a sweep like stardust.

  For the black swan, she had red and black pieces made by the costume designer that Janet would stick onto her face with makeup glue, framing her eyes like a pair of black swan wings, and then black lipstick that she’d wipe off her face when she became the white swan again.

  She was excited for it—had been longing for this for years—she just hoped that she could do the dual role justice.

  There was a soft knock at her door. “Come in!”

  Sofia entered, smiling, with Vicky behind her. “Just wanted to check in on our swan princess,” Vicky said gleefully.

  Sofia took Janet’s hands. “How are you feeling?”

  “Excited. Terrified. A little afraid I’m still going to wake up.”

  “I’d be concerned if you weren’t a little scared,” Sofia said. “My teachers in Russia always told me that the bad dancer is the one who goes onto stage with nothing to fear. The little bit of fear keeps you on your toes.”

  “Literally,” Vicky noted, holding up her foot and showing off her pointe shoe, which allowed the dancers to get up onto their toes.

  Janet laughed. “I suppose you’re right.”

  “Of course I’m right,” Sofia said quietly, firmly. “You’re going to be amazing.”

  “You’re going to have a crap-ton of admirers,” Vicky said, flopping into the spare chair. “Watch out, the bouquets are going to come pouring in.”

  “I highly doubt that.”

  “Now that you’ve gotten this role…” Sofia smiled softly. “Hopefully you’ll have more time for other things? Like relaxing? Sleeping in a little?”

  “Sleeping in? Relaxing?” Vicky scoffed. “What a shocking concept. I don’t think Janet even knows what those words mean, we’ll have to look them up for her and show her.”

  “Hardy har har,” Janet replied. “That is my hope, yes.”

  She didn’t know about romance or anything like that, but she did hope to be able to do other things.

  “Dance has been your whole life,” Sofia said. “I think that it’s time you found other things to put in your life, too. After all, you won’t be dancing forever.”

  “I know.” Like any career that was based on the physical, there was only so long she could dance before her body just decided it’d had enough. But hopefully that wouldn’t be for a long time to come. Still, best to start cultivating other interests now. And maybe get some balance in her life.

  “She doesn’t have to think about that right now, though,” Vicky said. “You’re on in a few minutes! Break a leg!”

  She and Sofia kissed Janet on her knuckles so that they wouldn’t smudge the makeup on her face, and then she was alone again.

  Janet took a few deep breaths. She finished tying her shoes.

  And she went on stage.

  The music swelled, everyone got into their positions, the curtain lifted…

  And she danced.

  This was what she’d been spending her whole life preparing for, working her ass off for, all those times she’d gotten up early and gone to bed late, skipped out on parties, on spending time with friends. All for this.

  It felt like she was flying, the movements coming naturally after spending hours upon hours practicing them, refining them, following the instructions of her director. She leapt into her partner’s arms, she led the corps of swans, she seduced the prince, she flung herself off the edge and down to land onto the pad hidden behind the constructed cliff.

  It was almost as though she wasn’t even in her body—she was outside of herself, watching, floating—yet at the same time she’d never felt more present, more herself, more alive.

  This was why she danced.

  When she landed on the pad at the end, one of the stagehands helped her up and then the dancer playing the prince, a good guy named Marcos, led her into the wings so that they could then run out onto stage together for the bows.

  “You were amazing!” he whispered, squeezing her hand.

  “So were you!” she replied, squeezing back. “Nate’s in the audience, right?” Nate was Marcos’s boyfriend.

  “Yes! I got him tickets!”

  “My parent
s too!” She laughed. It was almost like when she was a kid, when the audience was entirely made up of friends and family who’d been roped into coming, watching with big smiles because it was the people they loved on stage, not because the dancing was necessarily the best.

  But her dancing had been good. It had been—she dared to hope—the best.

  They stepped out onto the stage for the applause, and the audience went wild. People were standing, they were standing for her, and she realized with a start that she was crying, her chest heaving as she laughed and cried at the same time.

  She curtsied, and bowed, and curtsied, some flowers ended up at her feet somehow, and then it was all a glorious blur until she was being hugged to death by Vicky and Sofia.

  “You were amazing!” Sofia declared.

  “Fantastic!” Vicky added.

  “Thank you, you guys were fantastic too, that one pirouette, Sofia…”

  “Janet!”

  She turned in time to see her parents hurrying towards her. She burst into tears and hugged them, clinging to them. They were the reason that she was here, although they would probably claim it was all her own hard work if she told them so. But she couldn’t have done it without them encouraging her, helping her practice, supporting her every step of the way.

  “We’re going out to dinner,” Vicky announced. “Your parents, and us, and you. Sofia and I are treating you.”

  “Just let me change,” Janet told them.

  When she got to her dressing room she noticed that there were indeed a few small bouquets waiting for her from people she didn’t recognize. She ignored them. She didn’t need to start a whirlwind romance with some ridiculous guy who thought she was easy just because she was an artist or whatever.

  She hurried out to have a celebratory dinner with her parents and her two best friends.

  Chapter Five

  Alexei straightened his tie as he headed down the stairs to join the party. This was it. This was the big moment.

  The conversation was lively. Everyone knew each other and was comfortable with one another. It was mostly Russians but thanks to the marriage of Mikhailov’s eldest daughter to the heir of a powerful Yakuza clan, there were some Yakuza there as well. Kate’s Irish family and a few allies of theirs. One or two Italians.

  But still, mostly Russians.

  Alexei entered the room, scanning the crowd.

  The conversation paused.

  The last time he’d been the center of attention like this, it had been at his father’s funeral. He wasn’t sure how much he liked it now, if only because he had so much to prove. But he didn’t let that show. His father had always taught him that all it took was one moment of weakness to send everything they’d worked for crashing down.

  Instead, he smiled lazy, charmingly. He nodded at them all, one by one, acknowledging them, then went over to the drinks table to get himself something.

  He could feel eyes tracking him, but then conversation resumed. Footsteps approached him, and he turned around, letting the smile fade and become more businesslike in his manner.

  It was Mikhailov himself. One of the most powerful men in the bratva.

  “Vanin,” Mikhailov said. Alexei started a little inside. He was used to his father being addressed that way, just by his last name, as if it was a title.

  “Mikhailov.”

  They shook hands. “I’m sorry to hear about your loss,” Mikhailov said. “I understand that it is never easy to lose family. Even when there is strain.”

  Strain? Alexei frowned. “My father and I were quite close.”

  “Ah. I am glad to hear it.” Mikhailov smiled.

  Alexei wanted to ask if there was a reason that he shouldn’t be close with his father, but then another important head of a family came up—Romanov. He wasn’t connected to the former royal family, although he sometimes liked to claim that he was.

  “Vanin!” he said, apparently having already had a few drinks. He clapped Alexei on the shoulder. “It is good to finally meet you. We had all wondered if you would turn out like your old man or not.”

  “He’s been perfectly wonderful,” Kate declared, easing Romanov off of Alexei and giving him her most charming smile. “I think that you’ll find business infinitely easier now that he’s at the helm.”

  What was that supposed to mean?

  Another man came up, this one Alexei’s age. Ivan was behind him, grinning. “Alexei, this is Pavel, my lieutenant.”

  “And my son-in-law,” Mikhailov added.

  Ivan nodded. “Pavel, this is Alexei Vanin, the new head of the Vanin family.”

  Alexei shook his hand. “I’ve heard good things about you. I’ll have to get your advice on choosing lieutenants, I fear my father’s men are all getting on in years and looking forward to their well-earned retirement. I’ll need new men that I can trust. Men with honor.”

  “Of course,” Pavel said agreeably. He seemed like an overall agreeable person. Alexei liked him immediately.

  “Honorable?” Mikhailov started laughing. “Not what I’d thought I’d hear from a Vanin.”

  “I’m sorry, am I missing something?” Alexei asked, seriously confused.

  Everyone looked at each other. Mikhailov sighed in a kind of fatherly way that Alexei recognized his own father used to do, and then he jerked his head towards the room in general. “Come, allow me to introduce you to everyone.”

  Alexei couldn’t shake the unsettled feeling in his stomach. What was going on? Was there some large joke at hand here that he wasn’t aware of? Did his father, did the Vanin family, have a reputation that Alexei hadn’t been aware of? Had someone perhaps spread rumors about his father?

  It was the only thing that he could think of to explain the comments. His father had been a good man. Everyone liked him. Could someone with some kind of grudge have spread false tales?

  But who would even have a grudge? Alexei didn’t know of anyone that his father had angered.

  It was all… disconcerting, to say the least.

  Alexei put on his best face and allowed himself to be introduced to everyone, shaking hands and making compliments. Talk turned to business now and again, but most people were trying to be polite and so asked after Russia, the politics, his mother, the culture, and so on.

  “And how is the ballet?” was another frequent question.

  “Unquestionably the best, as always,” Alexei told them.

  “I’m not so sure,” said Natalia, Pavel’s wife. “Swan Lake just debuted here and I’ve heard that the dancer playing the white and the black swan is as good as any at the Bolshoi.”

  “Nonsense,” her father said, laughing. “You only say that because you are stubborn. She is a rebel, this one,” he confided in a lower voice to Alexei. “She will say anything to be contrary.”

  “I’m not contrary without cause,” Natalia replied. “And I think that you ought to go and see her, Father, before you go making judgments. She’s truly astounding.”

  Talk turned to business again, and Alexei assured them all that he would be happy to renegotiate any outdated trade agreements but that none of them had to worry about him charging more or changing policies on them. “I’m not here to redo my father’s work,” he said. “Or to tear it down completely. If things are working well, then I want to keep them working well. If there’s something you’d like me to change, especially if it feels a little old-fashioned, then let me know and we can settle a time to get lunch and meet.”

  By the time the whole thing ended, Alexei felt drained.

  But the question about his father didn’t leave his head.

  “You look like you have had your fill of business talk,” Ivan said, laughing as he walked up. “Were all those old men too exhausting for you? I know they tire me out.”

  “It’s nothing, really, it’s just—some things they said.” Alexei looked Ivan square in the face. “Tell me, are there things about my father that I didn’t know? Is there some story that I’m missing out on? I loved my father, he was a good man, but when I say so, everyone looks at me with what feels like… pity.”