13 to Life (20 page)

He caught her easily and waved at Amy and me.

“Nice place,” Amy whispered to me as we headed up the herringbone brick walkway. “Not hurting for money, I guess.”

“Hmm,” I agreed.

We climbed the wooden stairs and were quickly in the porch’s shadow.

“Nice house,” I said.

“
Spahseebuh.
Thanks,” he said. “Glad you all could come.”

I saw him stiffen suddenly. There was noise inside, and he paused, his hand on the doorknob.

Then I heard it grow more distinct. Arguing.

“Then where the Hell’s it all coming from, Sasha?” There was a heavy thud. I imagined someone being shoved up against a wall.

Another solid thump, as if the roles had been reversed.

I looked at Pietr; his face was set, as hard as granite. “This a bad time?” I asked.

He shook his head, smiling welcomingly, although I thought I saw a muscle in his jaw twitch. “Just sibling stuff,” he assured me. But he didn’t turn the doorknob.

“Our parents were honorable people, Sasha—”

“And they left us with
nothing
!”

“So what are you doing? And
who
are you doing it for? This all came at a price!”

“
Life
has its price, you son of a—”

“Don’t dare—”

I jumped at the sound of things crashing. Something shattered. I hoped it didn’t include jaws or ribs.

Pietr reached over and jabbed the doorbell’s button hard. Twice. He shouted into the door’s window. “
Round two!
Get to your corners!”

I could see nothing; the window was covered by a lacy curtain. Things grew quiet inside.

Pietr chuckled, but it wasn’t the sound of someone comfortable with the circumstance. “My brothers, Alexi—
Sasha—
and Maximilian.” With a shrug, he cleared his throat and reinforced his smile. “It can be difficult—three brothers under one roof.” He held the door for us, and I took another look at his face before ducking beneath his arm to enter. I was not reassured.

Just inside was a wood-floored foyer—a
real
foyer—worlds away from what we called a mudroom at my house. The walls were done with a chair rail and slender wainscoting; a definite air of old elegance lingered in the space.

Picture frames dotted the walls. There were some images I recognized from my earlier world cultures class: St. Basil’s Cathedral, with its amazing onion-dome roofs, the long, redbrick expanse surrounding the Kremlin, and the severe and spartan architecture of Lenin’s tomb.

There were also things I was totally clueless about, including a picture featuring an enormous cannon and some folk art images captioned in what I guessed was Cyrillic. I wished I could read them. There were several mirrors, but no family photos. And everything seemed straight. Angular. Sharp. Nothing round or curved could be spotted as we followed Pietr along a path of perfectly spaced Oriental throw rugs and into a sitting room.

I recognized Pietr’s family immediately. His two brothers were straightening their shirts and fixing their hair. Obviously recovering quickly from their scuffle. Perhaps it was normal with so much unbridled testosterone in one place. Behind them the girl sat up in her seat, looking as if nothing was out of the ordinary. Which made things seem even stranger to me.

Pietr began introductions. “These are my brothers: Maximilian—”

Looking just a year or two older than Pietr, Maximilian smiled at us with bright blue eyes and blindingly white teeth.

“Max,” he reminded.

“Max,” we all murmured in consensus. He was handsome by almost anyone’s definition. He had a welcome smile and eyes that glowed with mischief; his hair was a shade or two
darker than Pietr’s and curled at the ends, giving him a boyish look that only magnified his charm.

“And this is Alexi, our eldest brother, and guardian,” Pietr added.

When compared to his siblings, Alexi seemed a bit of a surprise. Max equaled him in height, Pietr matched him in leanness, and their sister outshone him in poise. Alexi was, in fact, the least impressive of the family, but there was still something about him that spoke of dominance and power. He was to be respected—of that, I had no doubt.

Both Max and Alexi wore necklaces nearly identical to Pietr’s chain. I wondered if it was a Russian thing or a Rusakova thing, or even one and the same.

“Lovely to meet you ladies,” Alexi said, giving a gallant bow.

Pietr pointed to each of us in turn. “Sarah.”

“I have heard much about you, Sarah,” Alexi intoned.

Sarah beamed and introduced me. “Jessica.”

“Very nice to meet you,” Alexi said to me. As if he’d never heard my name mentioned before.

I forced a smile. It, like the surroundings, felt awkward at best. I could understand him not remembering me from Pietr’s first day at school, but shouldn’t he have heard
something
about me?

Pietr introduced Amy. Max had already recognized her.

“Ah, in French
ami
means ‘friend,’ ” Alexi said with a charming flash of teeth.

“Don’t get any ideas, buddy,” Amy quipped, smiling in return.

Alexi laughed, a deep, throaty sound. “What wonderful girls, Pietr,” he congratulated. “Very lovely and certainly very smart.”

Behind him the girl cleared her throat.

“Oh,
da,
” Alexi said apologetically.

“Our sister. The beautiful Catherine.”

“Pietr’s twin,” she announced.

We must have all gasped. She laughed, the dark curls framing her face bouncing. With her high cheekbones, strong nose, and bright eyes, she looked like she could have stepped right out of a book of ancient myths and legends.

“I can see there is much our Pietr hasn’t told you.” She laughed again, but I felt there was an edge to her laughter somehow. I was immediately struck by the fact I couldn’t recall seeing her in school other than that very first day. “Sometimes it is best to maintain a sense of mystery, is it not, brother?”

Pietr smiled in agreement, but it was a simple smile, not heartfelt. I wondered what Pietr was holding back from us—what mystery he might still be keeping from me.

“Well, make yourselves comfortable,” Catherine said, motioning us to sit. “I will make tea for us.” She smiled graciously and rose, ghosting from the room with a grace I mentally reserved for ballerinas. Perhaps that was why I’d never noticed her around. Whereas Pietr was the sun, attracting a multitude of noisy worshippers, Catherine was as quiet and soft-footed as the moon as it slid across a midnight sky.

Pietr barely waited for his twin’s invitation, falling into the middle of a small couch.

“What an adorable little
loveseat,
” Sarah said as she curled up beside Pietr, placing her backpack on her lap. Amy flopped onto his other side, and I was left standing by a marble-topped table covered with everything from amazingly detailed lacquer boxes to painted eggs depicting St. George and saintly women.

Pietr looked at me, but his expression was guarded. So he hadn’t told his family about me. Me—the one he constantly manhandled into dim corners to steal a kiss from. I fought down the rage growing inside me, knowing I couldn’t strangle
him in front of witnesses, so I’d better busy my hands elsewhere. I snatched up one of the many knickknacks on the table.

It was one of those Russian nesting dolls, and seemed to somehow match the décor in the room: seemingly old-world European thrown into an American small town. “Cool nes—”

“Matryoshka,”
Sarah corrected as if she were making some weird preemptive strike.

“It doesn—” Alexi began, but I adjusted my grip, gave it a twist, and opened the first of the wooden egg-like dolls.

“Doesn’t open,” Alexi finished, on his feet. There was a gasp from the other family members; Pietr’s eyes seemed to glow.

I blushed fiercely. “I’m sorry,” I whispered, even my hairline red with shame. “I didn’t know I shouldn’t . . .”

Alexi’s hand was heavy on my shoulder, his eyes on the
matryoshka
like I held a ghost. “
Nyet,
” he said. “We all tried. We could never get it to open.”

Catherine stood in the doorway, a platter in her hands covered with cups, cookies, cakes—all surrounding a stunning porcelain teapot. Staring, her mouth wide, she began to tremble.

“It’s probably like a jar of peanut butter,” I suggested, trying to dismiss the strange way the Rusakovas stared at the thing in my hands. “You know: You loosened it, and I get credit for my super-powerful strength because I’m the one who tries it one more time.”

The teapot and cups rattled on the platter in Catherine’s shaking hands. Max took it from her and set it aside on another small table. “Sit,” he told her. She did, eyes never leaving my hands.

Alexi put his hand out, and I placed the
matryoshka
—man, sometimes I
did
despise Sarah’s new way with words—in it. He put the first one on the table, closing it again, and gave the second one a twist. He tried, effort pinching his features.

“No good,” he said, handing it to me.

“Huh.” I gave it a twist; it popped open easily.

Another gasp.

The hairs on my arms stood up. “See, like peanut butter,” I insisted.

Alexi lined another one up. “Next,” he commanded, his voice oddly imperative.

Catherine was whispering, “Our parents had this made before we were born. They said a strange little woman in a tiny shop at Brighton Beach described it in some silly fortune-telling she did for them.” She caught her breath and clasped her hands together, remembering the tale.

“They felt compelled to follow her description, even having it detailed in the style of the Sergei Posad
matryoskas,
but they never told us any more of what the instructions entailed. Or what was inside. It’s been the family puzzle. We tried so often to open it—with no results—we presumed it wasn’t able to be opened but was just a single, solid figurine.”

Alexi kept accepting the smaller, hollow wooden dolls, lining them up and demanding I open the next. There were already three dolls on the table. I paused, looking at them. “Weird. They kind of look like each of you, don’t they—except the first one,” I amended.

“Our mother,” Max said soberly.

“Oh. So this must be Catherine,” I said, holding the doll and looking at Pietr’s twin. There were definite similarities. I wrinkled my nose. “You were born first?” I asked.

“By two minutes,” she confirmed.

“Ouch.”

Sarah stood. She put her hand under my face. “Let someone else have a try,” she said. She didn’t say it gently, or happily, or—I handed it to her as if it had changed into a snake in my grasp.

“So this should reveal Pietr, right?” Sarah asked.

Everyone nodded, faces set, expressions ranging from curious to grim. Pietr just seemed to have frozen into a statue—cool and distant.

Sarah gave Catherine’s doll a twist. Nothing. She applied more effort. She shifted her grip. Still, it didn’t budge beneath the determination of her will or the strength of her slender hands. She grunted, trying one last time and looked at me in total exasperation. Defeated, she handed it to me again. “That’s the last one,” she said. “I guess they weren’t expecting twins.”

I spun the doll between my two hands and heard a little whine as the two halves parted. “For once, you’re wrong.” I winked at Sarah and parted the pieces. “Peanut butter,” I proclaimed, watching Amy’s and Pietr’s faces.

The Rusakovas gasped at what was in my hands even before I peeked.

“What?” I asked, looking down as Alexi set up Catherine’s doll beside the others. “Huh. Well that’s gotta be a surprise,” I admitted, holding the tiny wooden doll up to the light. “It looks like a wolf,” I said. “I mean, I guess the hair color and eye color matches you, Pietr, but otherwise, I don’t see any similarity,” I said with a teasing smile.

No one else in the room smiled back.

“Well,” I said, still holding the tiny wolf, “if you think
that
was impressive, you should see how fast I can solve my dad’s old Rubik’s cube.”

Still, no one moved or laughed. Tough room.

The Rusakovas stared at me as if I were some sort of enigma. I examined the wolf again, hoping to give them time to pull themselves back together. Seeing them so visibly stunned had me shaken, too. “Oh, cool,” I said. “The wolf opens, too. . . .”

“What?!”

Although I’d never lost their focus, it seemed the stares of the Rusakovas doubled in intensity—if that were even possible.

“The wolf opens, too,” I insisted. But I hesitated, seeing how they watched me. It was as if I had magic in my hands. Like I’d change their world forever depending on what I found.

“Maybe I shouldn’t,” I whispered, but Pietr sprang off of the loveseat and stood before me, shadowing me, his head down, face so close his breath warmed my cheeks to blushing.

“Open it.” It wasn’t a command, and not quite a plea—but something suffering in between. His tone squeezed at my heart.

I met his eyes. They shimmered, the uncanny ring of gold that surrounded his pupils seemed like the sun just caught on the far side of an eclipsing moon, threatening to burst free. The ocean-deep blue of his eyes quivered. I was breathless before him. “Sure?” I asked. I would not open the wolf unless
he was certain. Strange as it was, they seemed intimately connected.

He nodded, one quick jerk of his head.

“Okay,” I agreed, hoping the single word might tame the wildness that crept around the edge of his glittering irises. With one swift move, the deed was done, the wolf opened, the contents spilled into my palm.

Pietr looked at Alexi.

Alexi and the other Ruskovas closed ranks around me.

“What? What is it?” Sarah asked from behind the wall of bodies.

With his index finger Alexi gently rolled the cream-colored heart over in my open hand.

“A charm in the shape of a heart.” He squinted, lowering his face to study the pendant. “It appears to be white amber.”

“
Royal
amber?” Catherine whispered. I knew I was missing something. Something big.

Pietr snatched the heart out of my hand. The look he gave me—gave us all—was one of total trepidation. He spent a moment examining the heart. Then he held it directly in front of me so I couldn’t help see the creamy, swirling detail of it.